Pat Enkyo O'Hara of Village Zendo in New York City (cropped version of the original) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
“We all want to idealize our teachers, and we want to idealize enlightenment, and ourselves. What happens is we set things up so that there is enlightenment, and there’s this teacher who’s going to give it to us, and that teacher has to be perfect and we have to be perfect. And of course, it makes it impossible for us to practice, and to have compassion for ourselves and for others. The fact is, we’re all human. And enlightenment does not bestow perfection. There’s no such thing as perfection.”
~~Sensei Enkyo O’Hara, “Practice First”
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Yes, no teacher can give us enlightenment. A teacher can give us hints but we have to do the job. Beautiful post!
Isn’t it a great quote? I don’t know her teachings well and I have only started to connect with Village Zendo and their Contemplative program on dying.
Much happiness,
I think there is such wisdom here and I look forward to reading more and of course sharing it here.
Thanks for taking the time to shout out!
Jen