When one speaks of awakening, it means de-hypnotizatio n; coming to your senses. But of course to do that, you have to go out of your mind.

But the transformation of consciousness undertaken in Taoism and Zen is more like the correction of faulty perception or the curing of a disease. It is not an acquisitive process of learning more and more facts or greater and greater skills, but rather an unlearning of wrong habits and opinions. As Lao-tzu said, "The scholar gains every day, but the Taoist loses every day.

What the devil is the point of surviving, going on living, when it's a drag? But you see, that's what people do.

What you are basically, deep, deep down, far, far in, is simply the fabric and structure of existence itself.

The hallucination of being a separate ego will not stand up to biological tests.

Lack of awareness of the basic unity of organism and environment is a serious and dangerous hallucination.

The art of living... is neither careless drifting on the one hand nor fearful clinging to the past on the other. It consists in being sensitive to each moment, in regarding it as utterly new and unique, in having the mind open and wholly receptive.