Emptiness is a Garden

"Emptiness is the garden where you can't see anything. It is actually the mother of everything from which everything will come." -- Suzuki Roshi

"I think most of us study Buddhism like something already given to us. We think what we should do is preserve the Buddha‘s teaching, like putting food in the refrigerator. We think that to study Buddhism is to take the food out of the refrigerator. Whenever you want it, it is already there.

Instead, Zen students should be interested in how to produce food from the field, from the garden, should put the emphasis on the ground. If you look at the empty garden you wont see anything, but if you take care of the seed it will come up. The joy of Buddhism is the joy of taking care of the garden."

—Shunryu Suzuki-Roshi