Bodhidharma Quotes & Sayings

When the mortal mind appears, buddhahood disappears. When the mortal mind disappears, buddhahood appears. When the mind appears, reality disappears. When the mind disappears, reality appears. Whoever knows that nothing depends on anything has found the Way. And whoever knows that the mind depends on nothing is always at the place of enlightenment. — Bodhidharma

To go from mortal to Buddha, you have to put an end to karma, nurture your awareness, and accept what life brings. — Bodhidharma

Buddhas move freely through birth and death, appearing and disappearing at will. — Bodhidharma

The Buddha is your real body, your original mind. — Bodhidharma

Mortals liberate Buddhas and Buddhas liberate mortals. — Bodhidharma

Those who worship don't know, and those who know don't worship. — Bodhidharma

When we're deluded there's a world to escape. When we're aware, there's nothing to escape. — Bodhidharma

People of this world are deluded. They're always longing for something-always, in a word, seeking. But the wise wake up. They choose reason over custom. They fix their minds on the sublime and let their bodies change with the seasons. All phenomena are empty. They contain nothing worth desiring. — Bodhidharma

Unless you see your nature, you shouldn't go around criticizing the goodness of others. There's no advantage in deceiving yourself. Good and bad are distinct. Cause and effect are clear. But fools don't believe and fall straight into a hell of endless darkness without even knowing it. What keeps them from believing is the heaviness of their karma. They're like blind people who don't believe there's such a thing as light. Even if you explain it to them, they still don't believe, because they're blind. How can they possibly distinguish light? — Bodhidharma

The Way is basically perfect. It doesn't require perfecting. — Bodhidharma

At every moment where language can't go, that's your mind. — Bodhidharma

Neither gods nor men can foresee when an evil deed will bear its fruit. — Bodhidharma

The mind's capacity is limitless, and its manifestations are inexhaustible. Seeing forms with your eyes, hearing sounds with your ears, smelling odors with your nose, tasting flavors with your tongue, every movement or state is all your mind. — Bodhidharma

All the suffering and joy we experience depend on conditions. — Bodhidharma

The Dharma is the truth that all natures are pure. By this truth, all appearances are empty. — Bodhidharma

Buddha means awareness, the awareness of body and mind that prevents evil from arising in either. — Bodhidharma

The mind is the Buddha, and the Buddha is the mind. — Bodhidharma

Without the mind there is no Buddha. Without the Buddha there's no mind. — Bodhidharma

Regardless of what we do, our karma has no hold on us. — Bodhidharma

To have a body is to suffer. Does anyone with a body know peace? Those who understand this detach themselves from all that exists and stop imagining or seeking anything. The sutras say, "To seek is to suffer. To seek nothing is bliss." When you seek nothing, you're on the Path. — Bodhidharma

If your mind is pure, all buddha-lands are pure. — Bodhidharma

One clings to life although there is nothing to be called life; another clings to death although there is nothing to be called death. In reality, there is nothing to be born; consequently, there is nothing to perish. — Bodhidharma

All phenomena are empty. — Bodhidharma

Everything sacred, nothing sacred. — Bodhidharma

Poverty and hardship are created by false thinking. — Bodhidharma

But this mind isn't somewhere outside the material body of the four elements. Without this mind we can't move. The body has no awareness. Like a plant or a stone, the body has no nature. So how does it move? It's the mind that moves. — Bodhidharma

Not engaging in ignorance is wisdom. — Bodhidharma

To seek is to suffer. To seek nothing is bliss. — Bodhidharma

The awareness of mortals falls short. As long as they're attached to appearances, they're unaware that their minds are empty. And by mistakenly clinging to the appearance of things they lose the Way. — Bodhidharma

Our nature is the mind. and the mind is our nature.this nature is the same as the mind of all buddhas. buddhas of the past and future only transmit this mind. beyond this mind there's no buddha anywhere.but deluded people don't realize that their own mind is the buddha.they keep searching outside.they never stop invoking buddhas or worshipping buddhas and wondering where is the buddha? don't indulge in such illusions. just know your mind. beyond your mind there's no other buddha.the sutras say, "everything that has form is an illusion."they also say, "wherever you are, there's a buddha." your mind is the buddha. don't use a buddha to worship a buddha. — Bodhidharma

A Buddha is someone who finds freedom in good fortune and bad. — Bodhidharma

Buddhas don't practice nonsense. — Bodhidharma

The ultimate Truth is beyond words. Doctrines are words. They're not the Way. — Bodhidharma

When your mind doesn't stir inside, the world doesn't arise outside. When the world and the mind are both transparent, this is true vision. And such understanding is true understanding. — Bodhidharma

People who don't see their nature and imagine they can practice thoughtlessness all the time are lairs and fools. — Bodhidharma

But people of the deepest understanding look within, distracted by nothing. Since a clear mind is the Buddha, they attain the understanding of a Buddha without using the mind. — Bodhidharma

Those who remain unmoved by the wind of joy silently follow the Path. — Bodhidharma

The essence of the Way is detachment. — Bodhidharma

This one life has no form and is empty by nature. If you become attached by any form, you should reject it. If you see an ego, a soul, a birth, or a death, reject them all. — Bodhidharma

As long as you're enthralled by a lifeless form, you're not free. — Bodhidharma

The farther away you are from the truth, the more the hateful and pleasurable states will arise. There is also self - deception. — Bodhidharma

Not creating delusions is enlightenment. — Bodhidharma

All know the way; few actually walk it. — Bodhidharma

The mind is the root from which all things grow if you can understand the mind, everything else is included. It's like the root of a tree. All a tree's fruit and flowers, branches and leaves depend on its root. If you nourish its root, a tree multiplies. If you cut its root, it dies. Those who understand the mind reach enlightenment with minimal effort. — Bodhidharma

A Buddha doesn't observe precepts. A Buddha doesn't do good or evil. A Buddha isn't energetic or lazy. A Buddha is someone who does nothing, someone who can't even focus his mind on a Buddha. A Buddha isn't a Buddha. Don't think about Buddhas. — Bodhidharma

All know the way of prosperity only few walk it. — Bodhidharma

Once you see your nature, sex is basically immaterial. — Bodhidharma

As mortals, we're ruled by conditions, not by ourselves. — Bodhidharma

Trying to find a buddha or enlightenment is like trying to grab space. — Bodhidharma

A buddha is an idle person. He doesn't run around after fortune and fame. — Bodhidharma

Not suffering another existence is reaching the Way. — Bodhidharma

To see nothing is to perceive the Way, and to understand nothing is to know the Dharma, because seeing is neither seeing nor not seeing and because understanding is neither understanding nor not understanding. — Bodhidharma

Many roads lead to the path, but basically there are only two: reason and practice. — Bodhidharma

Not thinking about anything is Zen. Once you know this, walking, sitting, or lying down, everything you do is Zen. — Bodhidharma

To find Buddha, you have to see your nature. Whoever sees his nature is a Buddha. If you don't see your nature, invoking buddhas, reciting sutras, making offerings, and keeping precepts are all useless. Invoking buddhas results in good karma, reciting sutras results in a good memory, keeping precepts results in good rebirth, and making offerings results in future blessings-but no Buddha. — Bodhidharma

In order to see a fish you must watch the water — Bodhidharma

Our true buddha-nature has no shape. And the dust of affliction has no form. — Bodhidharma

The true Way is sublime. It can't be expressed in language. Of what use are scriptures? But someone who sees his own nature finds the Way, even if he can't read a word. — Bodhidharma

Don't hate life and death or love life and death. Keep your every thought free of delusion, and in life you'll witness the beginning of nirvana, and in death you'll experience the assurance of no rebirth. — Bodhidharma

But while success and failure depend on conditions, the mind neither waxes nor wanes. — Bodhidharma

Life and death are important. Don't suffer them in vain. — Bodhidharma

Only one person in a million becomes enlightened without a teacher's help. — Bodhidharma

To have a body is to suffer. — Bodhidharma

But when you first embark on the Path, your awareness won't be focused. You're likely to see all sorts of strange, dreamlike scenes. But you shouldn't doubt that all such scenes come from your own mind and nowhere else. — Bodhidharma

To enter by reason means to realize the essence through instruction and to believe that all living things share the same true nature, which isn't apparent because it's shrouded by sensation and delusion. — Bodhidharma

Vast emptiness, nothing holy. — Bodhidharma

If you use your mind to study reality, you won't understand either your mind or reality. If you study reality without using your mind, you'll understand both. — Bodhidharma

To give up yourself without regret is the greatest charity. — Bodhidharma

And the Buddha is the person who's free: free of plans, free of cares. — Bodhidharma

The mind is always present. You just don't see it. — Bodhidharma

And as long as you're subject to birth and death, you'll never attain enlightenment. — Bodhidharma

As long as you look for a Buddha somewhere else, you'll never see that your own mind is the Buddha. — Bodhidharma

All Buddhas preach emptiness. Why? Because they wish to crush the concrete ideas of the students. If a student even clings to an idea of emptiness, he betrays all Buddhas. — Bodhidharma

The fools of this world prefer to look for sages far away. They don't believe that the wisdom of their own mind is the sage ... the sutras say, "Mind is the teaching." But people of no understanding don't believe in their own mind or that by understanding this teaching they can become a sage. They prefer to look for distant knowledge and long for things in space, buddha-images, light, incense, and colors. They fall prey to falsehood and lose their minds to insanity. — Bodhidharma

If you see your nature, you don't need to read sutras or invoke buddhas. Erudition and knowledge are not only useless but also cloud your awareness. Doctrines are only for pointing to the mind. Once you see your mind, why pay attention to doctrines? — Bodhidharma

Delusion means mortality. And awareness means Buddhahood. — Bodhidharma

When you don't understand, you depend on reality. When you do understand, reality depends on you. — Bodhidharma

Whoever knows that the mind is a fiction and devoid of anything real knows that his own mind neither exists nor doesn't exist. — Bodhidharma

Someone who seeks the Way doesn't look beyond himself. — Bodhidharma

Once you stop clinging and let things be, you'll be free, even of birth and death. You'll transform everything. — Bodhidharma

Unless you see your nature, all this talk about cause & effect is nonsense. Buddhas don't practice nonsense. — Bodhidharma

If you know that everything comes from the mind, don't become attached. Once attached, you're unaware. But once you see your own nature, the entire Canon becomes so much prose. It's thousands of sutras and shastras only amount to a clear mind. Understanding comes in midsentence. What good are doctrines? The ultimate Truth is beyond words. Doctrines are words. They're not the Way. The Way is wordless. Words are illusions ... Don't cling to appearances, and you'll break through all barriers ... — Bodhidharma

I do not need any writing, since I transmit teaching beyond words and ideas. — Bodhidharma

Freeing oneself from words is liberation. — Bodhidharma

You can't know your real mind as long as you deceive yourself. — Bodhidharma

Whoever realizes that the six senses aren't real, that the five aggregates are fictions, that no such things can be located anywhere in the body, understands the language of Buddhas. — Bodhidharma

Every suffering is a buddha-seed, because suffering impels mortals to seek wisdom. But you can only say that suffering gives rise to buddhahood. You can't say that suffering is buddhahood. Your body and mind are the field. Suffering is the seed, wisdom the sprout, and buddhahood the grain. — Bodhidharma

If you use your mind to look for a Buddha, you won't see the Buddha. — Bodhidharma

Worship means reverence and humility it means revering your real self and humbling delusions. — Bodhidharma

Leaving behind the false, return to the true: make no discriminations between self and others. In contemplation, one's mind should be stable and unmoving, like a wall. — Bodhidharma

All know the way, but few actually walk it. — Bodhidharma

Your nature is the Buddha. — Bodhidharma

When mortals are alive, they worry about death. When they're full, they worry about hunger. Theirs is the Great Uncertainty. But sages don't consider the past. And they don't worry about the future. Nor do they cling to the present. And from moment to moment they follow the Way. — Bodhidharma

Everything good and bad comes from your own mind. To find something beyond the mind is impossible. — Bodhidharma

Reality has no inside, outside, or middle part. — Bodhidharma

Words are illusions. — Bodhidharma

To find a Buddha all you have to do is see your nature. — Bodhidharma

According to the Sutras, evil deeds result in hardships and good deeds result in blessings. — Bodhidharma

Still others commit all sorts of evil deeds, claiming karma doesn't exist. They erroneously maintain that since everything is empty, committing evil isn't wrong. Such persons fall into a hell of endless darkness with no hope of release. Those who are wise hold no such conception. — Bodhidharma

Your mind is nirvana. — Bodhidharma