A Picture does not tell a Thousand Words | The Fullerton Hostel

The tool shed

I am in Fullerton, CA at the moment. I visited the hostel where I used to work in the mid 90’s. The place was closed, the sign said, until June. It used to be open all year.

It was a gloomy, rainy day. I took a stroll to my favorite place but it wasn’t there. Another had taken its place, full of fallen branches and overrun by dry, tall mustard stalks leaning down to the ground, making it difficult to move around. The old eucalyptus and lesser friends were still there. I thought I saw the cat, but she must be dead now. So it must have been my imagination—the slinking black cat who stopped briefly to look at me and then vanished, perhaps stalking  a ghostly prey. Is she still there?

I saw everybody, although no one was there. They were just thoughts. But isn’t everything a thought, a dream? We are being dreamed. And we disappear. Who are we? Have you ever thought of that? Who are we really? 

The Entrance

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Buddhism | Who are we?

Dogen Zenji

It cracks me up when I hear somebody say, “I am a Buddhist”. Because, to my knowledge, it was the Buddha who said. “Don’t say ‘I am this or I am that“.  And with reason, for as soon as we say, “I am this” (Buddhist or whatever) we create a separation from anyone who is “that”. We destroy Unity. Don’ we?

What the great sages have always taught is an intelligent way of life, a life with presence and morality. We don’t have to be anything in particular, but just “be” and do unto others as we would have others do unto us. We don’t need a membership to anything.

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