Wu Hsin - Life without trying

"The natural condition is life without trying.
A mirror reflects whatever is in front of it. There’s no deliberateness, no trying to reflect things. Every trying is a movement away from this naturalness.
As you listen to Wu Hsin, a gong is struck outside. You hear it. You don’t try to hear it.
When you sit, you have the feeling of your body on the floor. You don’t try to feel it.
A thought arises; you don’t try to think. Likewise, rice is digested without trying.
This is what you are, perceiving and living without trying. This is inherent in everyone, complete in everyone, not less in ordinary people, not more in sages.
The novice Pu Chai Tzu then approached Wu Hsin and, speaking softly, asked: ‘My dearest Master, I have heard your words. Are you suggesting that I stop trying to drop this personage that seems so real?’
Master Wu Hsin replied: The notion of personhood can drop away permanently. It does so temporarily every night. However, the paradox is that you can’t drop 'you’.
Just as you can’t will yourself to sleep, you can’t will away 'you’. You can’t renounce 'you’. Nor can any practice or method take 'you’ away.
The perception of a 'you’ is by itself the best proof of that which is antecedent to 'you’, its perceiver.
Those instants when one is aware of a seeming person reveal that one is not that person.
Attendance to this prior-ness discloses 'you’ for what it really is; with attendance to this prior-ness, the 'you’ cannot stand.
Now, don’t try to understand, Pu Chai Tzu. Understand."

 

 

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