...

I'm unstoppable
I'm a Porsche with no brakes
I'm invincible
Yeah, I win every single game
I'm so powerful
I don't need batteries to play
I'm so confident, yeah, I'm unstoppable today
Unstoppable today, unstoppable today
Unstoppable today, I'm unstoppable today.

Sia

i began this life
neked as a jaybird
then i made a lot of money
but that was absurd
so i gave away my wallet
and everything that was in it
now i'm back to neked
and i don't give a hoot

~ rookie is as rookie does

As long as people desire Enlightenment and grasp after it, it means that delusion is still with them; therefore, those who are following the way to Enlightenment must not grasp at it, and if they reach Enlightenment, must not linger in it.

When people attain Enlightenment in this sense, it means that everything is Enlightenment itself as it is; therefore, people should follow the path to Enlightenment until in their thoughts, worldly passions and Enlightenment become identical as they are.

- Lankavatara Sutra

Those who practice LOVE
have neither religion nor status.
— Rumi

toward the One,
the perfection of Love, Harmony, and Beauty,
the only Being,
united with all the illuminated souls,
who form the embodiment of the Master,
the Spirit of Guidance

~the invocation toward the One
~Hazrat Inayat Khan

Evening mountains
Veiled in somber mist,
One path entering the wooded hill:
The monk has gone off,
Locking his pine door.
From a bamboo pipe
A lonely trickle of water flows.

- Ishikawa Jozan (1583-1672)

Everything done from love is beyond good and evil.

Nietzsche

People who really have their minds on the Way do not forget work on the fundamental no matter what they are doing.
Yet if they still distinguish this work from ordinary activities even as they do them together, they will naturally be concerned about being distracted by activities and forgetting the meditation work.

This is because of viewing things as outside the mind.

- Muso

I was born with a divine jewel,
Long since filmed with dust.
This morning, wiped clean, it mirrors
Streams and mountains, without end.

- Ikuzanchu

''god is a mother
and with that
sentence
the world stops

the world always stops
when woman and
divine
commingle

as if the
feminine
dilutes the
miraculous
when in reality
it embodies it

when jesus turns water
to wine
they clap
but when women turn breasts
to milk
they cringe

a broken man’s body
is celebrated each sunday
while a broken woman’s body
is just hidden away

and it’s no wonder
that mother is a word
used by men
to demonize those
who don’t claim the name
and weaponized to shame
those who step out of line
because
their ideal
woman
plays the role of nurturer
and silencer
in pews
built and led by them

but
when god
becomes mother
she is neither quiet
or compliant
she leads confidently
she questions authority
she commands respect
which might be the problem

for mother god
did not gather us up
carelessly
but took her time with it
she fed us milk
birthed our souls
and broke her body
and the permanence
can be uncomfortable

and to disentangle god
from motherhood
is impossible
but
to disentangle god
from womanhood
is sinful

because seeing god as mother
is one step closer
to seeing god in me
and it’s in that
i am truly
born again''

~ Kaitlin Hardy Shetler

Deep in the mountains an unseen cloister
Wicker shadows lock in the long bamboos.
Suddenly there’s a bell
Ringing now and then,
Empty valley filling with white clouds

Off drawing water, an old monk returns
Pine-tree dew stains his robe green.
Bell barely murmurs; the cloister gate has closed.
Mountain birds, all by themselves,
Skirmish over roosting spots.

- Ch’en Fou (1240–1319)

just as the water reflects the stars and the moon,
the body reflects the mind and the soul

~ rumi

The mind is an uncertain thing. This body is uncertain. Together they are impermanent. Together they are a source of suffering. Together they are devoid of self. These, the Buddha pointed out, are neither a being, nor a person, nor a self, nor a soul, nor us, nor they. They are merely elements: earth, water, fire, and wind. Elements only!

When the mind sees this, it will rid itself of attachment which holds that ‘I’ am beautiful, ‘I’ am good, ‘I’ am evil, ‘I’ am suffering, ‘I’ have, ‘I’ this, or ‘I’ that. You will experience a state of unity, for you’ll have seen that all of mankind is basically the same. There is no ‘I’. There are only elements.

- Ajahn Chah: Bodhinyana

Hard rain, our gathered firewood scant;
Lamp frozen, glimmers not at night.
In the cave, wind blows stones and mud.
Moss engravings weatherstrip rickety door.

Brooks in torrent untiring;
People’s words more and more rare.
What schemes calm the heart?
Sitting in the lotus,
Wrapped in robes of Zen.

- Hsu Yun

If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts;
but if he will be content to begin with doubts he shall end in certainties.

~Sir Francis Bacon
English author, courtier, & philosopher (1561 - 1626)