"Still deeply dejected, I took up my begging bowl early the next morning and went into the village below Iayama Castle. My mind was hard at work on my koans. It never left them. I stood before the gate of a house, my bowl in hand, lost in a kind of trance.
A voice within yelled, “Go on! Go somewhere else!” But I was so preoccupied I didn’t even notice it. This must have angered the resident of the house, because she suddenly appeared, flourishing a broom upside down in her hand. She flew at me flailing out wildly, whacking away at my head as if she was bent on dashing my brains out. My sedge hat lay in tatters. I was knocked down and ended heels-up on the ground. I lost consciousness and lay there like a dead man.
As I regained consciousness, my eyes opened, and as they did, I found that the unsolvable and impenetrable koans I had been working on-all those pointed cat’s paws-were completely penetrated. Right to the root. They had suddenly ceased to exist. I clapped my hands and laughed great shouts of laughter, frightening the people who had gathered around me."
-From Wild Ivy: The Spiritual Autobiography of Zen Master Hakuin
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