Serenity In The Hills Reiki Center

05/12/2025

Recognition

Zen enlightenment is as if you have been away from home for many years, when you suddenly see your father in town. you know him right away without a doubt. There is no need to ask anyone else whether he is your father or not.
Zen Master Foyan

04/23/2025

"Buddhism has the characteristics of what would be expected in a cosmic religion for the future: it transcends a personal God, avoids dogmas and theology; it covers both the natural and spiritual, and it is based on a religious sense aspiring from the experience of all things, natural and spiritual, as a meaningful unity"
---- Albert Einstein

03/25/2025

Zen does not confuse spirituality with thinking about God while one is peeling potatoes. Zen spirituality is just to peel the potatoes.
~ Alan Watts

03/12/2025

TY Judith,
Have you ever walked into a room and forgot why you went there or what you were going to do?

That actually has a name and is called “The Doorway Effect.” It is a known psychological event and it occurs because we change both the physical and mental environments, moving to a different room and thinking about different things. It also highlights the fact that we are so often not fully present in our lives and our minds are on a dozen different things, either past or present.

Want to run an experiment to see how present you are in your day/life? Every time you walk through a door pause and mentally check what you are thinking about at that second. Ask yourself, "was I just thinking about whatever I am doing right this minute, or is my mind off in the past or future?"

Why not use doorways as useful triggers to get present and be—right here—right now? It is actually a fantastic meditation that can be used throughout the day to reduce stress.

It is actually not easy to do, because so often we go about our day and our minds are completely somewhere else thinking about things that are not occurring. The shocking thing is that we are not present for the vast majority of our life. We get trapped in the busyness, tasks, agendas, etc., that it is even difficult to even be aware enough to remember why we walked into a room let alone notice we are walking through a doorway. However, it is when we are truly present and aware of the NOW that we experience and love life.

Today is a perfect day to practice pausing as we walk through each door’s threshold—to take a breath—to be aware—to get fully into the present moment.

03/10/2025

TY Judith,
Thoughts over coffee....(with Ekardt Tolle)
The beginning of freedom is the realization that you are not "the thinker."
The moment you start watching the thinker, a higher level of consciousness becomes activated. You then began to realize that there it is a vast realm of intelligence beyond thought, that thought is only a tiny aspect of that intelligence. You also realize that all things that truly matter--beauty, love, creativity, joy, inner peace--arise from beyond the mind.
You begin to awaken.

01/15/2025

“Painting is poetry which is seen and not heard, and poetry is a painting which is heard but not seen.”
– LEONARDO DA VINCI

04/27/2024

In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities; in the expert's mind there are few.
-Shunryu Suzuki, "Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind

04/23/2024

Buddha/Zen Thoughts

"Buddhism has the characteristics of what would be expected in a cosmic religion for the future: it transcends a personal God, avoids dogmas and theology; it covers both the natural and spiritual, and it is based on a religious sense aspiring from the experience of all things, natural and spiritual, as a meaningful unity"
---- Albert Einstein

"The Buddha was often referred to as the Awakened One. Awakened to all the illusions and freed from them. The analogy that is often used is that the non-enlightened state is like being asleep. This is because your Buddha-nature, your enlightened awareness, is masked by a the sleep of ignorance, greed, and hatred. When you awake to the fact that that all is part of the illusion of egocentricity, you are free from that illusion. So you are awakened from the ego-illusion and all that goes with it." Rob Nairn

"In general the teaching of the Buddha is very vast and profound, it is not so simple as to grasp it in one time. If we had to summarize the complete teaching of Buddha we would see that all is included in two main points, that is:

• cause no harm to any sentient beings,
• always try to benefit all sentient beings;

or, if we are not able to benefit others we should at least avoid all harmful thoughts and actions.

Buddha Himself summarized in a few lines the essence of His teachings: abandon all harming actions and all negative actions, practice all positive actions completely and control your own mind. This is the teaching of Buddha. "

04/01/2024

"Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art
of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of
non-essentials."
--Lin Yutang

Practicing Buddhism is a clever way to enjoy life. Happiness is available. Please help yourself to it. Thich Nhat Hanh

03/24/2024

02/17/2024

Not thinking about anything is Zen. Once you know this, walking, standing, sitting, or lying down, everything you do is Zen. To know that the mind is empty is to see the Buddha...Using the mind to look for reality is delusion. Not using the mind to look for reality is awareness. Freeing oneself from words is liberation.

-Bodhidharma