-- Way Without Mistakes --

A monk asked Joshu, "What is the way without mistakes?"

Joshu said, "Knowing one's mind, seeing into one's nature, is the way without mistakes."

----!!!!----

Zen is all about meditation. But people are very strange. They don't want to meditate.People have made their mind a mad-house and when things go on to the extreme, they somehow want to silent their mind by reading good quotes or reading these Zen stories. It is not going to happen instantly. The more you evade from meditation, the worse the probelm will become. And there is no button which you put off and the thoughts will disappear!

Also, Zen is not about silencing the mind. In fact the more you try to silence you mind, the more agitated it will become. No! Zen is about observing the mind.

उलझी निगाहों से मुसल्सल मुझे देखता रहा,
आईनें में खड़ा शख्स परेशान बहोत था...!!
Means
With confused eyes, he kept staring at me continuously
The person standing in the mirror was quite distressed!!!

But if you keep on observing patiently and persistently without discrimination, slowly slowly you will find that all the stress are on the periphery and you are just a watcher on the hill.
Zen is not about controlling the mind. Zen is about observing the mind. If you can't observe your thoughts directly, start with observing the breath and body sensations! But don't evade from meditation.

-- Mystery of Mysteries --

Once, a monk asked Tozan, "What is the mystery of mysteries?"

Tozan said, "It is like the tongue of a dead man."

----!!!!----

The world is revealing its mysteries to us. It is up to us whether we understand it or not. The world is always motivating us to look within and meditate. It is up to us whether we meditate or not.The world will not come like a living man and shout at you to meditate. You have to yourself learn from life.

-- Zuigan Calls His Own Master --

Zen Master Zuigan called out to himself every day: `Master.'

Then he answered himself: ‘Yes, sir.'

And after that he added: ‘Awake! Awake!'

Again he answered: ‘Yes, sir.'

‘And after that,' he continued, `do not be deceived by others.'

‘Yes, sir; yes, sir,' he answered.

----!!!!----

A meditator has to motivate himself to meditate. People around you are worldly. They never meditate. How will they come to motivate you to meditate? It is against their ego. Because if they suggest you to meditate and are themselves not meditating then it creates cognitive dissonance. You have to keep yourself motivated.

उठाना खुद ही पड़ता है, थका टूटा बदन अपना

कि जब तक सांस चलती है कोई कन्धा नहीं देता |

Means
One has to uplift his own tired body
Because till one breaths, no one comes to support him!

-- Xizhòng made Carts --

Zen Master Yuèān (1079-1152) said to a monk, “Xizhòng, the first wheel maker, made a cart whose wheels had a hundred spokes.
Now, suppose you took a cart and removed both the wheels and the axle.
What then becomes clear?”
(Case 8 of the Gateless Gate)

----!!!!----

Zen starts from awareness of body and mind, but it goes beyond both! Are you only a composition of mind and matter? Or something else as well? You can think about this and then come to an answer. You can even mug up its answers from scriptures. Those answers may become right but you shall remain wrong. Only your own authentic experience of truth can save you.
Remember! Zen is not about information. Zen is about transformation! Though Master Yuèān is asking this question, he is not asking you to think or google out its answer. No! He is asking you to meditate and have the direct experience of the truth. So don't blindly conclude that there is nothing beyond mind and matter or there is a soul or there is a God. No! Just meditate.

-- The Meaning --       

Great Master Kyōgen Chikan was a Dharma heir of Great Master Isan Reiyū. He once said to his assembly, “Imagine someone climbing up a tree at the edge of a thousand-foot-high cliff.( ‘Climbing a tree’ is a metaphor for doing one’s training and practice) He grabs hold of a branch with his mouth, since he cannot get a hold with his feet and he is unable to pull himself up with his hands. Just at that moment, a man at the bottom of the tree asks him, ‘Why did Bodhidharma come from the West?’ At such a time, were he to open his mouth to answer the man, he would lose his grip and forfeit his life. Were he not to answer, he would make a mistake due to the nature of what was asked. (That is, by not answering a spiritual question, he would be acting contrary to the Bodhisattva vow to spiritually help all sentient beings.) Speak up! What, for goodness sake, should he do at such a time?”

At that moment, a novice monk named Kotō Shō came forth from the assembly and said, “I have no question about the time when the man has gone up the tree but, Venerable Monk, please tell me, what about the time before he has climbed the tree?”

The master thereupon gave a great laugh, “Ha ha.”

--Nothing exists--

Yamaoka Tesshu, as a young student of Zen, visited one master after another. He called upon Dokuon of Shokoku.

Desiring to show his attainment, he said: “The mind, Buddha, and sentient beings, after all, do not exist. The true nature of phenomena is emptiness. There is no realization, no delusion, no sage, no mediocrity. There is no giving and nothing to be received.”

Dokuon, who was smoking quietly, said nothing. Suddenly he whacked Yamaoka with his bamboo pipe. This made the youth quite angry.

“If nothing exists,” inquired Dokuon, “where did this anger come from?”

--Non-Attachment--

Kitano Gempo, abbot of Eihei temple, was ninety-two years old when he passed away in the year 1933. He endeavored his whole life not to be attached to anything. As a wandering mendicant when he was twenty he happened to meet a traveler who smoked tobacco. As they walked together down a mountain road, they stopped under a tree to rest. The traveler offered Kitano a smoke, which he accepted, as he was very hungry at the time.

“How pleasant this smoking is,” he commented. The other gave him an extra pipe and tobacco and they parted.

Kitano felt: “Such pleasant things may disturb meditation. Before this goes too far, I will stop now.” So he threw the smoking outfit away.

When he was twenty-three years old he studied I-King, the profoundest doctrine of the universe. It was winter at the time and he needed some heavy clothes. He wrote his teacher, who lived a hundred miles away, telling him of his need, and gave the letter to a traveler to deliver. Almost the whole winter passed and neither answer nor clothes arrived. So Kitano resorted to the prescience of I-King, which also teaches the art of divination, to determine whether or not his letter had miscarried. He found that this had been the case. A letter afterwards from his teacher made no mention of clothes.

“If I perform such accurate determinative work with I-King, I may neglect my meditation,” felt Kitano. So he gave up this marvelous teaching and never resorted to its powers again.

When he was twenty-eight he studied Chinese calligraphy and poetry. He grew so skillful in these arts that his teacher praised him. Kitano mused: “If I don’t stop now, I’ll be a poet, not a Zen teacher.” So he never wrote another poem.