Dogen-zenji said, “When you say something to someone, he may not accept it, but do not try to make him understand it intellectually. Do not argue with him; just listen to his objections until he himself finds something wrong with them.”

This is very interesting. Try not to force your idea on someone, but rather think about it with him.

If you feel you have won the discussion, that also is the wrong attitude. Try not to win in the argument; just listen to it ; but it is also wrong to behave as if you had lost.

Usually when we say something, we are apt to try to sell our teaching or force our idea. But between Zen students there is no special purpose in speaking or in listening. Sometimes we listen, sometimes we talk; that is all. It is like a greeting: “Good morning!”

Through this kind of communication we can develop our way.

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Not to say anything may be very good, but there is no reason why we should always be silent. Whatever you do, even including not-doing, that is our practice. That is an expression of “Big Mind”.

So big mind is something to express, but it is not something to figure out. Big mind is something you have, not something to seek for. Big mind is something to talk about, or to express by our activity, or something to enjoy.

If we do this, in our way of observing precepts there is no Hinayana way or Mahayana way. Only because you seek to gain something through rigid formal practice does it become a problem for you. But if we appreciate whatever problem we have as an expression of big mind, it is not a problem anymore.

Sometimes our problem is that big mind is very complicated; sometimes big mind is too simple to figure out. That is also big mind. But because you try to figure out what it is, because you want to simplify the complicated big mind, it becomes a problem for you.

So whether you have a problem in your life or not depends upon your own attitude, your own understanding.

Because of the double or paradoxical nature of truth, there should be no problem of understanding if you have big Mahayana mind. This kind of mind will be attained by true zazen.

from: Zen Mind, Beginners Mind by Shunryu Suzuki

(Transcribers Notes: Big Mahayana mind is the authors representation of beingness, consciousness, or allness. A person begins to realize Big Mahayana Mind when they see their own body/mind as an object of life’s expression. They cease to identify with, and lose interest of, the contents of their own life.

A person honoring Big Mahayana mind has dropped ideas of mine and yours, right and wrong, left and right, up and down, and experiences all phenomenological expression as an actualization of this unified field of awareness. Whatever it is that is reading these words is big Mahayana mind just as much as the words themselves are.

Zazen is a tradition of meditation where one sits in posture, abiding in the Self or Big Mind. True Zazen needs no special posture or practice. True Zazen accepts and acknowledges all that is: movement/non-movement.)

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