everything that appears before you is the foremost paramita

pai-chang said, let go of body and mind, setting them free.

he said, having a mind neither stilled nor disturbed in the presence of all things in the environment, neither concentrated nor distracted, passing through all sound and form without lingering or obstruction, is called being a wayfarer.

nan-ch’uan was asked about practice, he said, do what you have to do, don’t just follow behind others.

yuan-hsien said, if the light is not revealed, you need a method.

and that sounds appealing. stopping and seeing sounds like a method, turning the attention around to look within sounds like a method, something you could trust. but ta-tu, quoting an old timer, said, if you want to cultivate practice and seek to become a buddha, i don’t know where you will try to seek the real.

in the surangama, at the buddha’s request, 25 bodhisattvas each stand and recount their paths to ending outflows, each passage ends with, thus we believe X to be the best method.

but in the very first book of the whole enchilada, the buddha’s first teaching, the oceanic hosts at the buddha’s site of enlightenment have assembled: the unlimited types and species were all around the buddha, filling everywhere. their forms and companies were each different.

those assembled had already gotten rid of all afflictions and mental preoccupations as well as their residual habits. they had surpassed the mountains of multiple barriers, and perceived the buddha without obstruction.

the infinite assembly of enlightening beings includes all manner of celestial kings, brahma kings, garuda kings, thunderbolt-bearing spirits, multiple-body spirits, sanctuary spirits, city spirits, earth and mountain spirits, forest and herb spirits, crop and river spirits, ocean spirits, wind and fire spirits, space and direction spirits, day spirits and night spirits, and every one of these humans found the door of liberation in a different way.

sung-yuan says, it is presented right to your face, wholeheartedly imparted: carry it with your whole body, with unavoidable strictness.

he says, just manage to pay attention, 24 hours a day, whatever you may be doing, stepping back into yourself and silently bringing up over and over again the contemplation, what is this?

ying-an says, at this time, who makes birth and death? who makes coming and going? who makes good and bad? who makes opposition and harmony? who makes right and wrong? who makes heaven and hell? who makes the various states of being?

the whole world is a door of liberation, the whole thing is the experience of the true human being with no position.