Meditation Quotes

Rigging is like Zen meditation. You must bend over the boat until your back is breaking, until your brain is filled with numbers and fractions of numbers, until you can accurately measure an oarlock’s pitch without bothering to use the pitch meter. Only then will you see the way of eternal rigging happiness.

Understanding that everything is impermanent, that happiness is transformed into suffering, and that all phenomena are lacking reality in themselves and are only projections of our mind, will permit us to counteract the first hindrance to meditation, that is, our attachment to this world.

When we let our mind relax, a moment will come when we rest without thoughts. This stable state is like an ocean without waves. Within this stability a thought arises. This thought is like a wave which forms on the surface of the ocean. When we leave this thought alone, do nothing with it, not “seizing” it, it subsides by itself into the mind where it came from.

The process could be likened to relaxing on a riverbank and watching a fish leap out of the water, sparkle for a moment in the sunlight, then dive back in a graceful arc. There is no need to engage in a mental dialogue about the merits and demerits of the fish, emotionally react to the fish, or jump into the water to try to catch the fish. Once the fish is out of sight, it should also be out of mind.