Mamiya went to a great teacher to learn meditation. The teacher told him to concentrate on the famous koan:
What is the sound of one hand?
Mamiya went away and came back a week later shaking his head. He could not get it.
Get out! said the Master. You are not trying hard enough. You still think of money and food and pleasure. It would be better if you died, then you might learn the answer.
The next week Mamiya came back again.
When the Master asked him: Well, what is the sound of one hand?
He clutched at his heart, groaned and fell down as if dead.
Well, you have taken my advice and died, said the Master, but what about the sound?
Mamiya opened one eye: I have not solved that yet, he said.
Dead men don't speak, said the Master.
Get up and get out!
The whole yoga has gone dead because of imitation. One cannot imitate anything that is real, the real is always spontaneous: one can jump into it but one cannot practice it. Any practice is of the mind and by the mind - and the mind is the past, the dead; the mind is the thing one has to jump out of. Out of the mind is the explosion, so be aware of the mind and its tricks!
What is the sound of one hand?
Mamiya went away and came back a week later shaking his head. He could not get it.
Get out! said the Master. You are not trying hard enough. You still think of money and food and pleasure. It would be better if you died, then you might learn the answer.
The next week Mamiya came back again.
When the Master asked him: Well, what is the sound of one hand?
He clutched at his heart, groaned and fell down as if dead.
Well, you have taken my advice and died, said the Master, but what about the sound?
Mamiya opened one eye: I have not solved that yet, he said.
Dead men don't speak, said the Master.
Get up and get out!
The whole yoga has gone dead because of imitation. One cannot imitate anything that is real, the real is always spontaneous: one can jump into it but one cannot practice it. Any practice is of the mind and by the mind - and the mind is the past, the dead; the mind is the thing one has to jump out of. Out of the mind is the explosion, so be aware of the mind and its tricks!
