Everything changes.

Without accepting the fact that everything changes, we cannot find perfect composure. But unfortunately, although it is true, it is difficult for us to accept it. Because we cannot accept the truth of transience, we suffer. — Shunryu Suzuki

Everything changes.

Seasons pass, rivers flow, oceans never stand still, the wind blows, it changes direction, the sun sets, it rises again, leaves fall, we get sick, we die.

A student of Shunryu Suzuki, after many years of listening to his Dharma talks, still not clear in his understanding of Buddhism. He asked Suzuki Roshi to express Zen Buddhism in a single phrase.

Suzuki Roshi's answer? “Everything changes.”

If we don’t accept this basic fact of life, we are bound to suffering. Literally, bound to it.

If we let go of attachment to things, people, places, states of mind, states of being, the bliss and other joyful experiences that can be experienced through meditation or even awakening experiences — we come into acceptance of this constant flux. The moment we accept the constant flux, we are not bound by it, and we cannot suffer it.

Difficulties will still arise, even moments of suffering, or bliss. But if we simply allow them to rise, and fall away again, without any attachment, we can begin to note how everything we are experiencing through the filter of the mind, is eternally changing.

We can hold onto nothing. The moment we try, suffering arises, because we are playing a losing game.

So we must let go of everything that changes. If it changes, don’t want it, and don’t want to hold onto it.

Let go and live.

With the joy that naturally arises out of this freedom.

A leaf just fell on my keyboard, and a cloud is moving across the sun… everything changes.

Accept this simple statement, and you can really begin to live.

 

[image : pogoryelov]