The spirit of the West, of America, is different than the East. The cultural conditioning is very different. It seems to be harder for people to work in teams, more difficult for people here to live in harmony, in a monastery.

Sitting around idly contemplating doesn't produce much. In work you can discipline your attention, forget about your misery.

In the Upanishads they talk about the path of the sun and the path of the moon. The path of the moon is rebirth. The path of the sun leads to self-knowledge, from which there is no return.

Forever is not an idea or a concept, it is reality. All of the things here come from forever. We call forever nirvana in Zen.

Change is continuous and the aggregate of the self is constantly shifting.

In my very early childhood, when I was only 3 or 4 or 5, I would enter for many hours into meditative states in which the world would become light and energy and I would transcend the boundaries of the senses.

You may feel a sensation of floating. You may see colors, maybe no phenomena, it doesn't matter. You are absorbing power.