Let’s Appreciate the Sound of the Rain Now

For the past few weeks, I’ve been copying down the notes I took while reading Shunryu Suzuki’s Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind in my notebook. It’s been a marvelous journey but a journey that is not yet over.

While you are practicing zazen, you may hear the rain dropping from the roof in the dark. Later, the wonderful mist will be coming through the big trees, and still later when people start to work, they will see the beautiful mountains. But some people will be annoyed if they hear the rain when they are lying in their beds in the morning, because they do not know that later they will see the beautiful sun rising from the east. If our mind is concentrated on ourselves we will have this kind of worry. But if we accept ourselves as the embodiment of the truth, or Buddha nature, we will have no worry. We will think, “Now it is raining, but we don’t know what will happen in the next moment. By the time we go out it may be a beautiful day, or a stormy day. Since we don’t know, let’s appreciate the sound of the rain now.” This kind of attitude is the right attitude.

— Shunryu Suzuki

All that matters is right now. This moment is all we have. Let go of the past and the future and simply focus on this moment, on this breath, and appreciate this existence. Death is waiting for us; life isn’t. So, live.