In life as well as in art Zen never wastes energy in stopping to explain; it only indicates.

If you study the writings of the mystics, you will always find things in them that appear to be paradoxes, as in Zen, particularly.

How is it possible that a being with such sensitive jewels as the eyes, such enchanted musical instruments as the ears, and such a fabulous arabesque of nerves as the brain can experience itself as anything less than a god? And, when you consider that this incalculably subtle organism is inseparable from the still more marvelous patterns of its environment - from the minutest electrical designs to the whole company of the galaxies - how is it conceivable that this incarnation of all eternity can be bored with being?

To feel that life is meaningless unless “I” can be permanent is like having fallen desperately in love with an inch.

The power of memories and expectations is such that for most human beings, the past and the future are not as real, but rather more real than the present.

We have a strange anxiety in us; that if we don't interfere then it won't happen. Now that's the root of an enormous amount of trouble.

In a certain sense, Zen is feeling life instead of feeling something about life.