Zen and Us

"The three components of human happiness are vitality, beauty, and a sheltering sense of community. We always start by relying on ourselves and looking for these three things in power, order, and fellowship as the world understands them. Failing to find them there, we eventually seek them in the only way that makes sense-in Being, which transforms, fulfills and brings us to new life." ~Karlfried Graf Dürckheim, Zen and Us I am so happy to find the source of this idea! For years, I have had it written down as "vitality, beauty, and a sheltering sense of community, rather than power, order, and fellowship," without attribution. As I was rereading Dürckheim last night, there it was! I love this book. Originally published in West Germany in 1961, it discusses what Zen has to offer the rational West. Dürckheim emphasizes that Zen is Being, is experience, and experience only. He says, "This doctrine is not a philosophical theory of being, and has nothing to do with metaphysical inquiry, but expresses an inner experience-the experience of Being, which we ourselves are, in our true nature."

This book has the rare gift of providing a context and a meaning to Zen Buddhism in Western culture. This is accomplished by preserving the universal values in Zen to be seen from a Western philosophy background. The author creates a link between Eastern and Western cultures based on our common search for enlightenment, in the process he strips Zen and Western philosophy from the limitations of its cultural roots. The end result of this approach is an eclectic view of Zen not as a diverging Eastern option, or a end all, but as a contributing tool for humanity's evolutionary process. --- Adolfo Aguirre [email protected]