Not Always So: Practicing the True Spirit of Zen by Shunryu Suzuki (PDF)

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Practising the true spirit of Zen.Not Always So is based on Shunryu Suzuki’s lectures and is framed in his own inimitable, allusive, paradoxical style, rich with unexpected and off–centre insights. Suzuki knew he was dying at the time of the lectures, which gives his thoughts an urgency and focus even sharper than in the earlier book. In Not Always So Suzuki once again voices Zen in everyday language with the vigour, sensitivity, and buoyancy of a true friend. Here is support and nourishment. Here is a mother and father lending a hand, but letting you find your own way. Here is guidance which empowers your freedom (or way–seeking mind), rather than pinning you down to directions and techniques. Here is teaching which encourages you to touch and know your true heart and to express yourself fully, teaching which is not teaching from outside, but a voice arising in your own being.

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: Review “Indeed something very special . . . [Brown] has edited transcriptions of Suzuki’s talks that both read well on the page and capture the style, humor and solid grasp evident in [Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind]. This will prove highly valuable to anyone, rank novice or Zen master.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review) About the Author The Zen master Shunryu Suzuki was an unassuming, much-beloved spiritual teacher. Born the son of a Zen master in 1904, Suzuki began Zen training as a youngster and matured over many years of practice in Japan. After continuing to devote himself to his priestly life throughout the Second World War (when priests often turned to other occupations), Suzuki came to San Francisco in 1959. While some priests had come to the West with “new suits and shiny shoes,” Suzuki decided to come “in an old robe with a shiny [shaved] head.” Attracting students over several years, Suzuki established the Zen Center in San Francisco, with a training temple at Tassajara-the first in the West. After a lengthy illness, he died of cancer in December 1971.Edward Espe Brown was ordained as a Zen priest in 1971 by Shunryu Suzuki, who gave him the name Jusan Kainei, “Longevity Mountain, Peaceful Sea.” While a student at the Tassajara Zen Mountain Center, he wrote two bestselling books, The Tassajara Bread Book and Tassajara Cooking. His most recent book is Tomato Blessings and Radish Teachings. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Not Always SoPracticing the True Spirit of ZenBy Suzuki, ShunryuQuillCopyright © 2004 Shunryu SuzukiAll right reserved.ISBN: 0060957549Chapter OneCalmness of Mind”Calmness of mind is beyond the end of your exhalation, so if you exhale smoothly, without trying to exhale, you are entering into the complete perfect calmness of your mind.”Shikantaza, our zazen, is just to be ourselves. When we do not expect anything we can be ourselves. That is our way, to live fully in each moment of time. This practice continues forever.We say, “each moment,” but in your actual practice a “moment” is too long because in that “moment” your mind is already involved in following the breath. So we say, “Even in a snap of your fingers there are millions of instants of time.” This way we can emphasize the feeling of existing in each instant of time. Then your mind is very quiet.So for a period of time each day, try to sit in shikantaza, without moving, without expecting anything, as if you were in your last moment. Moment after moment you feel your last instant. In each inhalation and each exhalation there are countless instants of time. Your intention is to live in each instant.First practice smoothly exhaling, then inhaling. Calmness of mind is beyond the end of your exhalation. If you exhale smoothly, without even trying to exhale, you are entering into the complete perfect calmness of your mind. You do not exist anymore. When you exhale this way, then naturally your inhalation will start from there. All that fresh blood bringing everything from outside will pervade your body. You are completely refreshed. Then you start to exhale, to extend that fresh feeling into emptiness. So, moment after moment, without trying to do anything, you continue shikantaza.Complete shikantaza may be difficult because of the pain in your legs when you are sitting cross-legged. But even though you have pain in your legs, you can do it. Even though your practice is not good enough, you can do it. Your breathing will gradually vanish. You will gradually vanish, fading into emptiness. Inhaling without effort you naturally come back to yourself with some color or form. Exhaling, you gradually fade into emptiness — empty, white paper. That is shikantaza. The important point is your exhalation. Instead of trying to feel yourself as you inhale, fade into emptiness as you exhale.When you practice this in your last moment, you will have nothing to be afraid of. You are actually aiming at emptiness. You become one with everything after you completely exhale with this feeling. If you are still alive, naturally you will inhale again. “Oh, I’m still alive! Fortunately or unfortunately!” Then you start to exhale and fade into emptiness. Maybe you don’t know what kind of feeling it is. But some of you know it. By some chance you must have felt this kind of feeling.When you do this practice, you cannot easily become angry. When you are more interested in inhaling than in exhaling, you easily become quite angry. You are always trying to be alive. The other day my friend had a heart attack, and all he could do was exhale. He couldn’t inhale. That was a terrible feeling, he said. At that moment if he could have practiced exhaling as we do, aiming for emptiness, then I think he would not have felt so bad. The great joy for us is exhaling rather than inhaling. When my friend kept trying to inhale, he thought he couldn’t inhale anymore. If he could have exhaled smoothly and completely, then I think another inhalation would have come more easily.To take care of the exhalation is very important. To die is more important than trying to be alive. When we always try to be alive, we have trouble. Rather than trying to be alive or active, if we can be calm and die or fade away into emptiness, then naturally we will be all right. Buddha will take care of us. Because we have lost our mother’s bosom, we do not feel like her child anymore. Yet fading away into emptiness can feel like being at our mother’s bosom, and we will feel as though she will take care of us. Moment after moment, do not lose this practice of shikantaza.Various kinds of religious practice are included in this point. When people say “Namu Amida Butsu, Namu Amida Butsu,” they want to be Amida Buddha’s children. That is why they practice repeating Amida Buddha’s name. The same is true with our zazen practice. If we know how to practice shikantaza, and if they know how to repeat Amida Buddha’s name, it cannot be different.So we have enjoyment, we are free. We feel free to express ourselves because we are ready to fade into emptiness. When we are trying to be active and special and to accomplish something, we cannot express ourselves. Small self will be expressed, but big self will not appear from the emptiness. From the emptiness only great self appears. That is shikantaza, okay? It is not so difficult if you really try.Thank you very much.Continues…Excerpted from Not Always Soby Suzuki, Shunryu Copyright © 2004 by Shunryu Suzuki. Excerpted by permission. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site. Read more

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐It is always enlightening to read this wonderful teacher’s marvelous insights about the practice of Zen Buddhism! For me, the very best of Zen Buddhist teachers. He practiced as he lived and exemplified Zen Buddhism. In another text he wrote, “When you are yourself, Buddha is Buddha.” He always seems to emphasize this realization outside of the words as the ground of everything and everyone. Of course, in simply being yourself you are Buddha nature and Buddha, but it is important not to be caught in the idea that your thinking mind and all that you think or have thought is actually the extent of Buddha nature–your true self identity. That is your thinking mind and if you are bored with life, or angry or depressed it is because you are attached to it and it has become in a sense your sense of self-identity. That is samsara, or delusion. In itself delusion is still Buddha and Buddha nature but there is no freedom from suffering. That is why Zen Buddhism is so important.

⭐We should all be so lucky that we can find a book or two that reach this level of insightfulness. Not only does the reader connect to the presence focused trappings of a roshi steeped in Zen Dharma, but there is a sense that this has got to be true for all humanity. Shoot, I would bet they would say that he is in touch, or very close to being in touch with, all of reality. That were if one were asking old guard at the SF Zen center.

⭐Haven’t read Zen Mind, but really enjoyed this. Short, to the point, and also funny.

⭐This is a wonderful, inspiring and touching book. Many have compared it to Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind by Suzuki Roshi, which is also a deeply moving and inspiring book, but I think Ed Brown’s selection of lectures by Suzuki Roshi is actually quite different in style and nuance from the first book. In Zen, it is always tricky to compare things, but in many ways I found this book more advanced than Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind…perhaps aimed at students who have been practicing for some time. I loved Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind, so don’t take my comment as a criticism of it; it is a genuinely life-changing book. So is “Not Always So”; but I think it’s life-changing in a somewhat different way, a subtle but perceptible difference.

⭐Another curator of suzuki’s lectures. This style is softer and less technical than zen mind beginners mind. Somewhat similar to branching streams. A relatively nicely short book.

⭐This is one of my favorite books of Buddhist teaching, accessible and wonderful. And please release a Kindle edition!

⭐There’s so much here. Just read it!

⭐I first read this book 10 years ago when I began sitting. Indeed the book encouraged me to just start. Fast forward 10 years later and it is still a powerful companion. I’ve read other books, listened to other talks, even “hopped around” from place to place as I continued “seeking”….but no one gets to the heart of the matter the way Suzuki Roshi does. He is funny, gentle, direct, and compassionate. He makes it clear. And you can feel the spirit in it. In the book he talks about eventually sitting with great Zen masters. Sit with everything. Wow. It’s not just talk. Master or student, get it and find out for yourself. It can change your life. It certainly changed mine…and continues to do so every moment.

⭐A superb companion to -Zen mind, beginners mind. Streightforward and focused chapters that deal with aspects of Zen practice. Entirely without the flannel of the usual ‘How to do Zen’ stuff.

⭐briliant

⭐this is a must of book.still love to pick it up read again and again.

⭐Lightweight to take on my travels

⭐This is a great help for people who want to understand more about and improve their Buddhist meditation.I would definitely recommend this book to my friends.

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