Spot the Pattern

I need to read the same thing from multiple sources before it finally occurs to me to put it all together and internalize the message. So in a marvelous coming together of resources, nearly every book I’ve read recently is saying the same basic thing in different ways.

See if you can detect the pattern:

“All we need to do is pay attention. We don’t have to decide if something is good or bad, right or wrong.  We don’t need to have judgments about what kind of person we are because we have certain kinds of thoughts of thoughts or feelings or reactions. That is the road to suffering. Our job is quite different: Just notice. What is happening right now? We notice this, then this, then that, then that… We pay attention to all of it. Where is the suffering?”

– Suffering is Optional, by Cheri Huber

“The Indian philosopher J. Krishnamurti once remarked that observing without evaluating is the highest form of human intelligence. When I first read this statement, the thought, “What nonsense!” shot through my mind before I realized that I had just made an evaluation. For most of us, it is difficult to make observations, especially of people and their behavior, that are free of judgment, criticism, or other forms of analysis.”

– Nonviolent Communication, by Marshall Rosenberg

“In a Zen kitchen, you do not compare or judge one apple as better than another. Every piece of food is unique unto itself, and every item of food is to be cherished without comparison.” – The Mystic Cookbook, by Denise Linn and Meadow Linn

“The Great Way is not difficult;

It only avoids picking and choosing.

When love and hate are both absent,

Everything becomes clear and undisguised.

Make the smallest distinction, however,

And heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.

If you wish to see the truth,

Then hold no opinions for or against anything.

To set up what you like against what you dislike

Is a disease of the mind.

When the deep meaning of things is not understood,

The mind’s essential peace is disturbed to no avail.

The Way is perfect like vast space,

Where nothing is lacking and nothing is in excess

Indeed, it is due to our choosing to accept or reject

That we do not see the true nature of things.

Live neither in the entanglements of outer things

Nor in inner feelings of emptiness.

Be serene in the oneness of things

And such erroneous views will disappear by themselves.

To deny the reality of things

Is to miss their reality;

To assert the emptiness of things

Is to miss their reality.

The more you talk and think about it,

The further astray you wander from the truth.

Stop talking and thinking

And there is nothing that you will not be able to know.

-The Faith Mind Sutra: Verses on the Unfailing Source of Life, by Master Sengcan (J. Sozan).

So continuing in this theme, I will neither comment nor judge the preceding quotes. I simply present them to you, to make of what you will.