"Consciousness is always aware of something. When a patch of azure bursts into our field of awareness, a blip of eye-consciousness sees the color. When a smell wafts toward us, another blip of consciousness knows the scent. Only mind and object; that's all there is to it. Our entire lives are nothing but a chain of moments in which we perceive one sight, taste, smell, touch, sound, feeling, or thought after another. Outside of this process, nothing else happens."

What's so great about now? - Tricycle:  The Buddhist Review - Winter 2006

"Equanimity is the nonreactive, nonmoving mind".

Stepping out of self-deception - p. 138

"The ultimate goal of life, liberation from rebirth, though in general shared by all soteriologies in Brahmanism, Jainism and Buddhism, was represented uniquely by Buddhists as the pacification of all psychological attachments through the extinguishing (nirvana) of desires, which would lead to a consequent extinguishing of karma and the prevention of rebirth."

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy - Nagarjuna

"If we have ambitions—even if our aim is enlightenment— then there is no meditation, because we are thinking about it, craving it, fantasizing, imagining things. That is not meditation. This is why an important characteristic of shamatha meditation is to let go of any goal and simply sit for the sake of sitting. We breathe in and out, and we just watch that. Nothing else. It doesn’t matter if we get enlightenment or not. It doesn’t matter if our friends get enlightened faster. Who cares? We are just breathing. We just sit straight and watch the breath in and out. Nothing else. We let go of our ambitions. This includes trying to do a perfect shamatha meditation. We should get rid of even that. Just sit."

Do nothing - Tricycle: The Buddhist Review - Winter 2009

"What is zen? Zen is the unsymbolization of the world and all the things in it."

The tao of zen

"The deliberate, conscious practice of zen is a self-defeating process, an exercise in futility. This self-defeating process is ended when the practice of zen becomes the same as ordinary activity. When nothing noteworthy distinguishes zen from anything else, zen becomes unpretentious and inconspicuous. Thus those who practice everyday zen simply disappear into the ordinary."

The tao of zen

"The dilemma is that zen, once it seems to be lost, can only be found by becoming more lost."

The tao of zen

"The aliveness of zen has entirely to do with eliminating the conceptualizations that organize, categorize and institutionalize experience."

The tao of zen

"The only purpose of zazen is to prevent the 'something else' that distracts from a sense of total presence. Any activity will suffice."

The tao of zen