Product Description

Our tendency is to be interested in something that is growing in the garden, not in the bare soil itself. But if you want to have a good harvest, the most important thing is to make the soil rich and cultivate it well.

In a beautiful companion volume to Shunryu Suzuki's first book, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, this is a collection of thirty-five lectures taken from the last three years of Suzuki's life that has been masterfully edited by Edward Espe Brown, bestselling author and one of Suzuki's students.

In Not Always So Shunryu Suzuki voices Zen in everyday language, with humor and good-heartedness. While offering sustenance -- much like a mother or father lending a hand -- Suzuki encourages you to find your own way. Rather than emphasizing specific directions and techniques, his teaching encourages you to touch and know your true heart and to express yourself fully.

Wise and inspirational, Not Always So is a wonderful gift for anyone seeking spiritual fulfillment and inner peace.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #203361 in Books
• Published on: 2003-06-01
• Released on: 2003-05-27
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 176 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780060957544
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
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Amazon.com Review
If you can imagine Zen Existentialism, Not Always So is it. Part instruction manual for Zen practice and part philosophical meditation, Shunryu Suzuki's teachings emphasize being-in-the-world. He does not point toward a singular enlightenment-event as a burst into higher consciousness. Rather, he suggests a more experiential enlightenment that finds meaning in a full awareness of the present. For example: "If you go to the rest room, there is a chance for enlightenment. When you cook, there is a chance for enlightenment. When you clean the floor, there is a chance to attain enlightenment."

Shunryu Suzuki was an important emissary of Zen Buddhism to the United States. Establishing a Zen center in San Francisco in the 1960s, he attracted many noted pupils, including this book's editor, Edward Espe Brown. In fact, Not Always So is Brown's collection of Suzuki's teachings during his last years, in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

No doubt some readers will want to wrestle with the often paradoxical nature of Zen teachings. And those from the Western philosophical tradition may find vast differences between the Western system that takes its cue from Descartes' cogito and the Eastern one that emphasizes the destruction of the ego. Says Suzuki: "It is just your mind that says you are here and I am there, that's all. Originally we are one with everything." While the book does not wrestle with cultural-philosophical differences, it is nevertheless a good introduction to Zen. Suzuki's teachings tend to flow from simple stories, usually drawn from his own experiences. It's almost entirely free of the jargon that clutters many books on Buddhism, and the teachings are communicated with clarity and brevity. --Eric de Place

From Publishers Weekly
Contrary to Zen's principle of "nothing special," Brown (The Tassajara Bread Book; Tassajara Cooking) has indeed produced something very special: an edited collection of talks by beloved Zen Master Shunryu Suzuki, who died in 1971. It is impossible to overestimate the sustained impact of Suzuki's 1970 classic, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, a world-renowned bestseller. Brown, ordained by Suzuki in 1971 after six years of study under him, has edited transcriptions that both read well on the page and capture the style, humor and solid grasp evident in the first volume. But this is no Zen Mind sequel, and will prove highly valuable to anyone, rank novice or zazen master. These 35 talks, delivered shortly before Suzuki's death from cancer, sparkle with simple freshness and familiarity: "Our tendency is to be interested in something that is growing in the garden, not in the bare soil itself. But if you want to have a good harvest, the most important thing is to make the soil rich and cultivate it well. The Buddha's teaching is not about the food itself but about how it is grown, and how to take care of it." Suzuki's messages are like deceptive pools of water, shimmering with surface possibilities that provoke stronger swimmers to aim for the depths. Suzuki, too, beckons us to the deeper reaches of learning, becoming "a wise, warm-hearted friend, [and] an unseen companion in the dark." Again we are blessed with more of his superb vision.
- an unseen companion in the dark." Again we are blessed with more of his superb vision.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Suzuki, who died in 1971, came to the United States in the late 1950s to teach the practice of Soto Zen, the Japanese school of Buddhism emphasizing sitting meditation. His introductory talks in the now classic Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind brought the teachings of this beloved first abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center to a generation of Americans hungry for more satisfying spiritual nourishment. Collected in Branching Streams Flow in the Darkness, Suzuki's lectures provided both the master's well-known, down-to-earth advice on practice and his difficult-to-locate insights into monastic life. In this latest collection, Brown, Suzuki's student and author of The Tassajara Bread Book, presents carefully edited transcripts of talks selected from the period shortly before the great teacher's death. Frequently enigmatic and always iconoclastic, the resulting brief essays will help readers deepen their practice. An essential purchase for most public and academic libraries. James R. Kuhlman, Univ. of North Carolina Lib., Asheville
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Customer Reviews

Roshi Will Always Be Present
When you think of Zen Buddhism, chances are the first name that comes to mind for you may be Roshi Shunryu Suzuki. His bestselling book, "Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind," has remained a monolith in the area of Zen literature for years, and rightly so. The title of this particular book captures the ongoing paradox of Suzuki's teaching style, stemming from his often used phrase, "It may be so, but it is not always so." What this means is that people so oftentimes cling to their own understanding to the point where they cannot flex or learn anymore. We might become experts without even knowing it, even experts on not being an expert. This is possible. Yet everything changes in our world, that includes even truth. In order to help this world as well as ourselves, we must be willing to bend some and let go of our linear thinking.

Life is a process of learning. But learning alone is simply not enough. There isn't a good practice or a bad practice, there is only practice. That means you, "vow to save all beings suffering everywhere." That's not good or bad. That's your job. Roshi Suzuki helps each and everyone of us step into the world that is eternally present and free from all opposites. Where everything we encounter is, "Just like this." Only that. Every action leads to understanding, so please don't separate anything; this is Roshi's most precious gem he has left behind for all of us. Buddhist life is just life. It's going to work, caring for the garden, and taking a walk. I do hope you'll buy this book so you may step into the world of practice as stated by Suzuki here, because it's the key to all of the happiness humanity can ever know. The happiness of no happiness. Hopefully you understand that point. As Korean master Seung Sahn would likewise state, "Only go straight." Enjoy this book.

Sweet presence
Can we accept ourselves and our lives just as they are? That is what Shunryu Suzukis asks us to consider in this wonderful book. The slim volume is a lovely successor to "Zen Mind Beginner's Mind" imploring us again to slow down, let our true nature find its expression in meditation and stillness. And then we can find our way in life-- feeling our way along-- supported in our expansive magnificence, and encouraged by our very limitations.

"One day, something wonderful will happen..." Here is the expression of Zen in a modern teacher who came to America to share a quiet enlightenment.

Astonishing!
This new collection of talks by Shunryu Suzuki is astonishing. They are perhaps more profound and more beautiful than those of Zen Mind,Beginner's Mind. These talks have the feel of a beloved friend returning after many years --ready to continue the simple but beautifully profound conversation about the nature of being human and the practice of living in the true world.