Clear Mind – Drawing Parallels Teaching of Zen Masters and Rumi
“If your mind is empty, it is always ready for anything, it is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s mind there are few” – Shunryu Suzuki
Some Zen masters would say that Earth does not know that is it called Earth and Moon does not know it is called Moon, yet they serve their purpose. A dog does not know it is called a dog and yet it can function well without this knowledge. All the names are put there by our thought and culture built over the years. The reality is we are only one as a whole and all divisions are created by our mind. A Zen expert’s mind is the one that has accepted all the definitions, divisions and names that we have given. A Zen’s mind is thus saturated and it has developed the notion of right and wrong and taken ideas as truth. Or in other words, it is conforms to the structures created by culture or society and hence some philosophers have said that man is a crowd. The beginners mind is a closer to an empty mind and thus can fathom the true nature of our existence. A Zen master’s mind is thus like a cluttered white board, where a lot is already written while a beginning mind is an empty board.
Maulana Rumi had once said “Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and right doing there is a field. I’ll meet you there”
That field is a beginners mind.
Right and wrongs created by society keep changing with time. There is nothing eternal about rights and wrong created by culture as it changes with the needs over length of time (Polygamy was an accepted norm with kings but society of today considers it immoral – this just one example of how rights and wrongs keep changing with time).
If someone can drop all of it down and get to beginners mind, then there is a chance of true self-realization. A Zen mind has great utility in a material world while a beginner’s mind can attain eternity. A beginners mind is a clear mind, just like a mirror that reflects anything that comes its way without retaining
An intelligent human being can make use of a Zen mindset as a tool (when needed in worldly matters) but can retire back into beginner’s mind and master this game of duality. And meditation is the best aid to take you in that state of existence.
Osho had said this many times that there are many paths that lead to the peak. Whether it is Zen Buddhism or Sufism, both lead you to Eternity or nothingness as some may like to call it.