To study the self, forget the self.
Straight to the utmost crown of night he flew.
The nothingness was a nakedness, a point
Beyond which thought could not progress as thought.
He had to choose. But it was not a choice
Between excluding things. It was not a choice
Between, but of. He chose to include the things
That in each other are included, the whole,
The complicate, the amassing harmony.
– Wallace Stevens (Notes Toward a Supreme Fiction)
study the self. To study the self, forget the self. Forgetting the self means being confirmed by the whole universe, by all beings. Being confirmed by all beings, you will drop off body and mind — your own, and those of others. No traces of enlightenment will remain, and yet those traces will continue on and on.
– Dogen, Genjo Koan (Shobogenzo)
