Meditating frog / Sengai (Rinzai Zen monk and teacher 1750–1837)

In this brush painting, he demonstrates his love of zazen, the act of sitting in meditation, and at same time, the humour of it.

Zen masters tell us that no amount of desiring awakening will lead us to enlightenment – we must to sit without expectation or desire, and only then will the goalless goal of awakening come. Beginners have a head start on the rest of us.

Any one can meditate, any one of us can awaken. Even this frog.