Being Perfectly Human

Nothing is more terrifying than the state of chronic anxiety you experience when you are subjected to the illusion that you can hold onto and secure something in life, and nothing can.

So the acceptance of all that flows is absolutely fundamental to freedom, to being a…cloud-water person, who floats like clouds and flows like water.

But we shouldn’t make ourselves too ridiculous in this. I mean, of course, all human beings have some attachment within them, so you can’t let go of them completely; you wouldn’t be human if you did. You cannot be just a leaf in the wind, or just a ball in a mountain stream, to use a Zen poetic phrase.

People suffer because they take seriously what the gods created for fun.

Because if you did that, you wouldn’t be human, just as I have pointed out that a person without emotions, who is in complete control of his emotions, is a ‘stone Buddha’. So someone who was completely ‘let go’ would also be a kind of inanimate object.

Zen therefore clearly emphasizes being human, being perfectly human as an ideal.

And so to be a perfect human being you must not have a state of absolute detachment, but a state of detachment that involves a little bit of resistance, a certain amount of clinging. They say in India… about a man who is liberated in this world, that he must cultivate some mild bad habits to remain in the body, because if he were absolutely perfect he would disappear from manifestation.

The meaning of life is simply to live. It’s so clear and so obvious and so simple. And yet everyone is running around in a panic as if it is necessary to achieve something beyond themselves.

And so the great Yogi might smoke a cigarette or be in a bad mood every now and then, something that keeps him human, and that little thing is very important, it’s like the salt in the stew, it makes him ground.

Zen does not confuse spirituality with thinking about God while peeling potatoes. Zen spirituality is just peeling the potatoes.

We thought of life in analogy to a journey, a pilgrimage, which ultimately had a serious purpose, and it was about achieving that goal, success or whatever it was, maybe heaven after you were dead. But we missed the point all the way. It was a musical thing and you had to sing or dance while the music was played.