Katagiri Quotes & Sayings

A unicorn is nothing more than a big horse that comes to a point, anyway. Nothing to get so excited about. — Terry Pratchett

Compassion is like springwater under the ground. Your life is like a pipe that can tap into that underground spring. When you tap into it, water immediately comes up. So drive your pipe into the ground. Tap into the water of compassion. — Dainin Katagiri

The moment between before and after is called Truth. — Dainin Katagiri

I have made terrible mistakes that have hurt the people that I cared about the most, and I am terribly sorry. I am deeply ashamed of my terrible judgment and my actions. — Anthony Weiner

Karma is not something pessimistic. If you think of karma as something wrong, you are seeing karma only according to what happened in the past. You look at the past and karma becomes a monster. So you should also look at karma in the present and future. Then karma becomes something very wide and really alive. Through karma you can understand what your destiny is. Destiny itself has no solid form; it's something you can create. You can create your life. That is why we study karma. — Dainin Katagiri

My mother told me that everything in life happened for a purpose. She said all things were part of God's plan, even the most disheartening setbacks, and in the end, everything worked out for the best. — Ronald Reagan

I know, when I look into the eyes of my own children, the look of wonder when I speak of life back in the '60s. That's why the Rolling Stones are such a hit even in their 60s, why Dennis Hopper is so compelling, even when he's making pitches for something unhip as long-term financial planning. — Chris Matthews

And this song," Doug said as the CD advanced to the next track, "Makes me think about how Stephen's love completes my soul." Rapid-fire drumming led into lyrics describing the satisfaction one felt when pointing a Glock at a filthy puta. — Valerie Z. Lewis

All of us experience a gap between our minds and the reality of time - that's why we suffer. — Dainin Katagiri

The point of the spiritual life is to realize Truth. But you will never understand the spiritual life, or realize Truth, if you measure it by your own yardstick. — Dainin Katagiri

Make positive effort for the good. — Dainin Katagiri

The nature of ignorance is to lack deep communication with nature or with the universe. It is to separate, to isolate, to create discrimination and differences, so that finally we cannot communicate as a harmonious whole. These differences we create appear as fighting, anger, hatred, and war. — Dainin Katagiri

All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through:
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.
Peace, re-assurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love
a scholar's parrot may talk Greek
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.
Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack.
I see the chasm. And everything you are was making
My heart into a bridge by which I might get back
From exile, and grow man. And now the bridge is breaking.
For this I bless you as the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains. — C.S. Lewis

If you want to find Buddha nature, love someone and care for them. — Dainin Katagiri

There are so many flavors of Coke now - Coke with lemon, Coke with vanilla, Coke with lime, Cherry Coke, and they've just brought out another new flavor - Coke with Pepsi. — David Letterman

Whatever you think is delusion. — Dainin Katagiri

If you see the intersection of time and space, you experience complete freedom of being. This state of existence is completely beyond any idea of time, space, or being. In that liberated state you can see fundamental truth and the phenomenal world simultaneously. That is called Buddha's world. That is the place where all sentient beings exist, so you can stand up there and see all beings, myriad beings. Then you know very clearly, through your own emotional and intellectual understanding, how all beings exist. — Dainin Katagiri

Nothing ought more to humiliate men who have merited great praise than the care they still take to boast of little things. — Francois De La Rochefoucauld

Real knowing comes up when we stand in the appropriate place. But usually we don't. First we want to understand something according to individual knowledge, prejudice, customs and habits. This means we are standing up in our individual place, not the universal perspective. This egoistic behavior makes it very difficult to see the overall picture. But buddhas and ancestors recommend that we first stand up in the appropriate place. Just stand up, be present in the Universe itself. — Dainin Katagiri

What do women want? To be treated like a queen;
but by a king, not a pawn. — James Robison

You cannot find any peace by escaping from human pain and suffering; you have to find peace and harmony right in the midst of human pain. That is the purpose of spiritual life — Dainin Katagiri

You have to do your best to face every moment, because this moment will never come again. The moment that you are living right now is a very important opportunity to make your life vividly alive. If you want to live with spiritual security in the midst of constant change, you have to burn the flame of your life force in everything you do. — Dainin Katagiri

Be present, from moment to moment, right in the middle of the real stream of time. That gives you spiritual security. That is why in Buddhism we don't try to escape from impermanence; we face time itself in our daily living. — Dainin Katagiri

Spiritual security means you are fully alive and comfortable in your life as it is, without expecting anything. — Dainin Katagiri

Katagiri Roshi says: "Poor artists. They suffer very much. They finish a masterpiece and they are not satisfied. They want to go on and do another." Yes, but it's better to go on and do another if you have the urge than to start drinking and become alcoholic or eat a pound of good fudge and get fat. — Natalie Goldberg

So the first step in seeking happiness is learning. We first have to learn how negative emotions and behaviors are harmful to us and how positive emotions are helpful. — Dalai Lama

Because, Mr.. Katagiri, Tokyo can only be saved by a person like you. And it's for people like you that I am trying to save Tokyo. — Haruki Murakami

The important point of spiritual practice is not to try to escape your life, but to face it - exactly and completely. — Dainin Katagiri

Accept that your life is going on beyond your usual understanding. — Dainin Katagiri

Well, Mr Katagiri, I have not been frogging all these years for nothing. I keep my eye on the important things in life. — Haruki Murakami

I just hate people who are lazy. To be on my team, you have to have energy and a sense of wanting to learn. That really excites me. — Francisco Costa

If you want to take care of tomorrow, take better care of today. We always live now. All we have to do is entrust ourselves to the life we now live. — Dainin Katagiri