All Dharmas Arise from the Mind

All phenomena arise and cease, impermanent, suffering, and empty. All phenomena are like illusions and transformations, like dreams and dew, like wind and shadows, like bubbles and foam. No matter how you grasp or cling, in the end it is empty, empty, empty—nothing but emptiness. It is better to sit quietly in a tranquil courtyard, observing the wind and clouds rise, observing all phenomena come and go; observing all phenomena arise and fall; observing all phenomena born and extinguished. But your mind should not follow the arising and ceasing of phenomena, nor follow their coming and going. Do not grasp or cling to any phenomenon. All phenomena are all phenomena, and you are you. All phenomena are fundamentally not all phenomena, therefore you must empty your mind.

Wherever there are people in the Saha world, there are affairs. Where there are affairs, there are disputes. For ordinary people, the arising of affairs and disputes is normal. If you feel it is abnormal, believing there should be no affairs and disputes, then you are no longer an ordinary person. Ordinary people see affairs and disputes as affairs and disputes. Those with an empty mind see affairs and disputes as not being affairs and disputes; or they see the arising, ceasing, changing, impermanence, suffering, and emptiness of affairs and disputes; or they see affairs and disputes as illusions and transformations; or as shadows and echoes; or as dreams and dew; or they see affairs and disputes as Bodhi itself; or as the Way itself; or as Suchness itself; or as Buddha-nature itself. In this way, where are there affairs and disputes? Where is there chaos?

The world is fundamentally peaceful. If your mind is not peaceful, all phenomena become unpeaceful. The great chaos of the world arises from your mind; you are then responsible for the world's great chaos. Yet, having stirred up the world's great chaos, you are fundamentally incapable of bearing the responsibility. What should you do? Practice! Extinguish the mind! Extinguish the mind's greed, hatred, and delusion; extinguish the mind's tendency to meddle; extinguish the mind's sense of right and wrong; extinguish the mind's attachments to appearances; extinguish the mind's grasping and clinging. Then, what affairs and disputes remain? Is the world not quiet? Peaceful? Empty? Purify your mind, and you purify all phenomena, purify the world, purify all sentient beings. In this way, have you not delivered sentient beings? Have you not achieved a Pure Land? This is practice. This is the result of practice. This is the merit of practice. What more is there to seek? What is there to grasp? What is there to cling to?