Got another fabu quote from Shunryu Suzuki in his Not Necessarily So book, and thought I’d mention it here (page 77):

Our aim is to have complete experience or full feeling in each moment of practice. What we teach is that enlightenment and practice are one, but my practice was what we call stepladder Zen: “I understand this much now, and next year,” I thought, “I will understand a little bit more.” That kind of practice doesn’t make much sense—I could never be satisfied. If you try stepladder practice, maybe you too will realize that it is a mistake.

Perhaps it is human nature, but it is difficult to do something without a goal. Perhaps it is just how I was raised as well, but self-improvement has always been the purpose of religion … funny, contentment was never mentioned as an alternative.

Religious practitioners (not matter which path is chosen) has always been looked at as “weak”, and given that Middle-America-work-ethic that I was raised with, contentment would just be another form of laziness. Our economy is based on greater consumption— a recession will happen if we don’t consume.

So I guess that since I want the economy to improve, I’ll keep the secret of contentment to myself.