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is no need to be serious. Any seriousness, any effort, any anxiety about being spiritual is the greatest barrier. Just be playful.
I have found myself without any seriousness. Hence, when I say this, I say it on my own authority.
FOR SIX MONTHS BANSHO MET WITH NO SUCCESS AND SHOMOKU MADE THE COMMENT, "I ONLY HOPE YOU WILL UNDERSTAND LATER."
FINALLY, AFTER A LONG TIME, BANSHO did SUDDENLY HAVE AN INSIGHT.
The anecdote does not say a few things; they have to be understood.
What must have happened that suddenly one day Bansho did have an insight?
Effort has a limitation: you get tired -- that is the beauty of effort -- otherwise you will never be enlightened. Any kind of effort, any anxiety has a limitation. A moment comes, you say, "Fuck it all!" That very moment is your enlightenment!
Basho wrote:
THE EVENING HAZE.
THINKING OF PAST THINGS --
HOW FAR OFF THEY ARE.
THE EVENING HAZE. THINKING OF PAST THINGS -- HOW FAR OFF THEY ARE.
What does Basho mean by this haiku? He is one of the most insightful of Zen masters....
He is saying that what seems to be very important to you today, what is creating so much seriousness in you, so much anxiety in you, won't have any relevance after a few years. It will be far away, miles away, as though perhaps you have seen it in a dream. All the anxiety that it was giving you is lost.
Understanding this, just look backwards: at every point in the past you will find yourself ridden with anxiety, anguish, misery, failure. But now all that has become just writing on the sands. A breeze comes and the whole writing disappears, or a tidal wave comes and takes the whole writing away, leaves behind a fresh sand without any signature.
Basho's intention is that looking at the past you should understand that what is present will become past tomorrow. Don't be so serious. Tomorrow it will not matter at all. And the same is true about your future: never be serious, because everything is going to become past, just like a dream you had seen somewhere. Perhaps you may not even recognize that you were so much troubled.
Basho's statement is
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