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that I have been standing here for a few minutes, waiting. But then I thought it is better to interrupt you because you are not going to see me of your own accord."
The man said, "I am sorry, but this is how my life is. Whatever I am doing I am doing it totally. Nothing of me remains to do anything else. Chopping wood, I am simply chopping wood. There is nobody else other than the chopper of wood. So, no need to be embarrassed. What do you want?"
He said, "I want to see the master, Nan In."
Nan In said, "You go directly into that hut and wait. The master will be coming soon."
The king went and waited there. Nan In took a shower, put on his master's robe, and came in from the back door. But the king was very puzzled, because both men looked so alike. He thought, "It is almost an impossibility. There are not two men alike in the whole world, and just in this monastery, within a few hundred yards I have seen a man exactly like this man."
Nan In said, "You wanted to see master Nan In -- master Nan In is now here."
The king said, "That I will enquire about later on. First I want to know who was chopping wood at the gate."
Nan In laughed. He said, "At that time I was a chopper of wood. Now I am going to chop your head; now I am a master. We live each moment, moment to moment, but we are indivisible. The chopper was also master Nan In. If you had eyes you could have seen my involvement with the movement, my totality of action, my intensity of being.
"If you had eyes you could have seen him there; you would not have asked about master Nan In. You had already met him, but you didn't know. Now I am a chopper of heads. That's the function of a master: to make you so egoless, to make you so thoughtless that you are almost without a head, just the heart pulsating with love, with compassion. Have you come only to ask some questions? Are you really a seeker? Are you ready to lose something?"
The king was just confused, shocked, even afraid of the man. He had never been afraid of anybody, but this man was simply crazy -- he was talking of chopping his head!
The king said, "You have confused me too much and I
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