The old Taoist masters knew it comes down to, flows from, centers upon, living from our original/ essential/ true/ eternal nature. "What was the face that was yours before your grandparents were born?" Why don't we know? Why doesn't everyone know? "Buddha Mind" is any mind that knows who it is and what it is about, to the point where nothing can interfere with or prevent it from being who it is, doing what it has to do-- because it HAS to do it, in a "I have no say in the matter. It's the pirate's life for me, Gibbs. Savvy?" kind of way. And we get there by seeing what we look at. Hearing what we listen to. Knowing what we know, and have always known, and doing what needs to be done about it in each situation as it arises all our life long the way that is true to our original/ essential/ true/ eternal nature. Savvy? It all comes out of, centers upon, flows from the right kind of emptiness, stillness, silence, solitude-- living apart from, untouched by, noise, complexity, drama, trauma. All of which was so before the earliest Taoists/Buddhists/Yogis knew it. It is all there is to know-- and we keep having to find our way back to it, generation after generation. Because having our way keeps getting in the way. Leading us to forget about the face that was ours before we were born.
–0–
Jim Dollar's Photography and Philosophy 