Zen

...the emphasis is not on the learning of philosophic concepts but on simple labor and a life of awareness. For in Zen, intellectual learning is nothing but the studying of the menu, while actual practice is the eating of the meal. ...the truth of existence is revealed through a deepening awareness that comes from living a life of single-mindedness, of being "awake" in whatever one is doing. There is no better laboratory for doing this "aware work" than everyday life, especially one's daily work.

Yet we live in a society where the object for so many is to do as little work as possible, where the workplace, whether office or home, is looked upon as a place of drudgery and boredom, where work rather than being a creative and fulfilling aspect of one's life is seen as oppressive and unsatisfying. How different is this from Zen! In Zen everything one does becomes a vehicle for self-realization; every act, every movement is done wholeheartedly, with nothing left over. In Zen parlance, everything we do this way is an "expression of Buddha," and the greater the single-mindedness and unself-consciousness of the doing, the closer we are to this realization. For what else is there but the pure act--the lifting of the hammer, the washing of the dish, the movement of the hands on the typewriter, the pulling of the weed? Everything else--thoughts of the past, fantasies about the future, judgments and evaluations concerning the work itself--what are these but shadows and ghosts flickering about in our minds, preventing us from entering fully into life itself? To enter into the awareness of Zen, to "wake up," means to cleanse the mind of the habitual disease of uncontrolled thought and to bring it back to its original state of purity and clarity. In Zen it is said that more power is generated by the ability to practice in the midst of the world than by just sitting alone and shunning all activity. Thus, one's daily work becomes one's meditation room; the task at hand one's practice. This is called "working for oneself."

---Philip Kapleau---