
Zen Stories
Who Tied You Up
This morning, while wiping my mala beads, a phrase suddenly surfaced in my mind. "Who tied you up?" Four words. Strange to say, but they floated up fr
6/3/20266 min
Whatever comes to mind. Sometimes a story I read, sometimes something that came to me while holding my mala beads.

This morning, while wiping my mala beads, a phrase suddenly surfaced in my mind. "Who tied you up?" Four words. Strange to say, but they floated up fr

Behind that chubby, big-bellied, grinning Buddha at the temple entrance, there was a real person — a monk who carried a cloth bag and spent his life smiling. This is his story.

Su Dongpo thought he was enlightened and wrote a poem declaring "the eight winds cannot move me." Foyin replied with two words: "Bullshit." He immediately crossed the river to confront his friend. This ancient story feels like it's about me.