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end. If Nature were to shake herself a little, the human race would wake up to its utter helplessness. Nature remains generous. Paradoxically it is this unceasing action of giving that enables man to believe himself to be a separate power.
What comes is not just “good vibrations”. It is as if we become aware of the compassionate eye of Nature - who is aware of our difficulties and of what a task has been laid upon us - looking upon us. No matter how much we destroy, the compassion does not weaken.
The privilege is really an obligation. Many years ago, I had a talk with D. T. Suzuki, a wonderful man who did so much to introduce Zen Buddhism into the West, on this very thing. He visited us at Coombe Springs and spent a few days with us. One evening we were sitting together in the evening.
For some reason I said: “Everything is Buddha”. He answered me: “Yes, everything is Buddha, but we people have the right to be conscious of that; and if we do not exercise this right, we are not as we should be”.
There is great value in practicing the Vayu Prana meditation. We come to see air not simply as a combination of material gases but as nourishment of our inner being. When we go further and see the unlimited and the giving nature of air it is a spiritual perception.
In this experience, something is received from the spirit of the tree. As I have said on another occasion, part of the experience belonging to the New Epoch will be the re-awakening of perceptions of the spirit world and the spirits that reside in living things. But the spirit of the tree cannot speak in our language. She opened herself and love came from the tree and the tree wanted to say something. It could not understand her problems, so what could it do? It reached that part where words and ordinary thoughts are not needed and asked this part, the higher self, to do something.
is a totally different experience for us when we are not obsessed by being at the centre. Then the centre is everywhere and we see differently.
Nature is not sentimental. We can learn a great deal about this by working in the garden. We have to destroy many living things in order to have a garden.
has a creative element - it is fanciful in the old sense of the word - and we have to be very gentle and not attempt to make anything out of it, else it turns very quickly into indulgence. To know how not to indulge is very important. When the spontaneous ‘fanciful’ perceptions
come they enable us to be in tune with Nature and to see that there is a creative self-expression which is not brought in from our subjectivity. Someone spoke about Nature as sometimes almost threatening. We experience
AI Summary
The Image of God in Work by J.G. Bennett presents key insights from the Zen tradition. The 10 passages above capture the essential teachings.
Core Themes:
- [To be expanded]
Key Passages: Highlights 1, 3, and 10 are particularly representative.
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