Top 100 Dōgen Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “Life and death are of supreme importance. Time swiftly passes by and opportunity is lost. Each of us should strive to awaken. Awaken. Take heed, do not squander your life.”

— Dōgen

2. “A flower falls, even though we love it; and a weed grows, even though we do not love it.”

— Dōgen

3. “A zen master’s life is one continuous mistake.”

— Dōgen

4. “In the mundane, nothing is sacred. In sacredness, nothing is mundane.”

— Dōgen

5. “The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in one dewdrop on the grass.”

— Dōgen

6. “To be in harmony with the wholeness of things is not to have anxiety over imperfections.”

— Dōgen

7. “What is the way of the Buddha? It is to study the self. What is the study of the self? It is to forget oneself. To forget oneself is to enlightened by everything in the world.”

— Dōgen

8. “One must be deeply aware of the impermanence of the world.”

— Dōgen

9. “Do not follow the ideas of others, but learn to listen to the voice within yourself. Your body and mind will become clear and you will realize the unity of all things.”

— Dōgen

10. “If you are unable to find the truth right where you are, where else do you expect to find it?”

— Dōgen

11. “If you want to travel the Way of Buddhas and Zen masters, then expect nothing, seek nothing, and grasp nothing.”

— Dōgen

12. “Enlightenment is intimacy with all things.”

— Dōgen

13. “A fool sees himself as another, but a wise man sees others as himself.”

— Dōgen

14. “Do not travel to other dusty lands, forsaking your own sitting place; if you cannot find the truth where you are now, you will never find it.”

— Dōgen

15. “In a mind clear as still water, even the waves, breaking, are reflecting its light.”

— Dōgen

16. “When we discover that the truth is already in us, we are all at once our original selves.”

— Dōgen

17. “Students, when you want to say something, think about it three times before you say it. Speak only if your words will benefit yourselves and others. Do not speak if it brings no benefit.”

— Dōgen

18. “Just practice good, do good for others, without thinking of making yourself known so that you may gain reward. Really bring benefit to others, gaining nothing for yourself. This is the primary requisite for breaking free of attachments to the Self.”

— Dōgen

19. “To escape from the world means that one’s mind is not concerned with the opinions of the world.”

— Dōgen

20. “No matter how bad a state of mind you may get into, if you keep strong and hold out, eventually the floating clouds must vanish and the withering wind must cease.”

— Dōgen

Featured in: Strong Quotes

21. “Your body is like a dew-drop on the morning grass, your life is as brief as a flash of lightning. Momentary and vain, it is lost in a moment.”

— Dōgen

22. “Prefer to be defeated in the presence of the wise than to excel among fools.”

— Dōgen

23. “Do not be amazed by the true dragon.”

— Dōgen

24. “If we seek the Buddha outside the mind, the Buddha changes into a devil.”

— Dōgen

25. “Truth is not far away. It is nearer than near. There is no need to attain it, since not one of your steps leads away from it.”

— Dōgen

26. “You should stop searching for phrases and chasing after words. Take the backward step and turn the light inward. Your body-mind of itself will drop off and your original face will appear. If you want to attain just this, immediately practice just this.”

— Dōgen

27. “Meditation is not a way to enlightenment, Nor is it a method of achieving anything at all. It is peace itself. It is the actualization of wisdom, The ultimate truth of the oneness of all things.”

— Dōgen

28. “Consider that nirvana is itself no other than our life.”

— Dōgen

29. “Learn the backward step that turns your light inward to illuminate your self. Body and mind of themselves will drop away, and your original face will be manifest.”

— Dōgen

30. “When one first seeks the truth, one separates oneself from it.”

— Dōgen

31. “The recognition of the coming and going of things is a first step in training and practice.”

— Dōgen

32. “To start from the self and try to understand all things is delusion. To let the self be awakened by all things is enlightenment.”

— Dōgen

33. “If you do not get it from yourself, where will you go for it?”

— Dōgen

34. “When you walk in the mist, you get wet.”

— Dōgen

35. “When you find your place where you are, practice occurs, actualizing the fundamental point.”

— Dōgen

36. “Forgetting oneself is opening oneself.”

— Dōgen

37. “You should study not only that you become a mother when your child is born, but also that you become a child.”

— Dōgen

38. “Zazen is an activity that is an extension of the universe. Zazen is not the life of an individual, it’s the universe that’s breathing.”

— Dōgen

39. “Why abandon a seat in your own home to wander in vain through dusty regions of another land? If you make one false step, you miss what is right before your eyes.”

— Dōgen

40. “Nothing in the entire universe is hidden.”

— Dōgen

41. “What you think in your own mind to be good, or what people of the world think is good, is not necessarily good.”

— Dōgen

42. “Working with plants, trees, fences and walls, if they practice sincerely they will attain enlightenment.”

— Dōgen

43. “There are thousands upon thousands of students who have practiced meditation and obtained its fruits. Do not doubt its possibilities because of the simplicity of the method. If you can not find the truth right where you are, where else do you expect to find it?”

— Dōgen

44. “We must always be disturbed by the truth.”

— Dōgen

45. “What is reality? An icicle forming in fire.”

— Dōgen

46. “There is no beginning to practice nor end to enlightenment; There is no beginning to enlightenment nor end to practice.”

— Dōgen

47. “That you carry yourself forward and experience the myriad things is delusion. That the myriad things come forward and experience themselves is awakening.”

— Dōgen

48. “I haven’t got any Buddhism. I live by letting things happen.”

— Dōgen

49. “Inside the treasury of the dharma eye a single grain of dust.”

— Dōgen

50. “Do not miss the opportunity of offering even a single drop into the ocean of merit or a grain atop the mountain of the roots of beneficial activity.”

— Dōgen