One Wrong Question. One Big Lesson. Never Ask a Zen Master This.

One time during a Zen retreat, we had a Dharma talk where my Zen teacher gave a speech and answered questions from the participants. She had shared a wonderful Zen story during her speech, and because of that, I felt kind of inspired and enthusiastic. Although I didn’t really have a question about Zen or my practice, I just wanted to know and asked her what her favorite Zen story is.

Before I tell you what she answered, let me clarify one thing first. There are two kinds of questions you can ask a spiritual master, be it a Zen master, or an Advaita master, it doesn't matter what tradition. The first type of question is one about something that really comes from an existential longing. A question that comes from your heart. You are desperate for Truth, and you really want to know it. This type of question comes from the same longing that propelled us onto our spiritual paths.

Maybe you are confused about some instructions from your spiritual tradition, or you have doubts about something—whatever it is.The question you are asking is directly connected to your current life situation, your current path, and you hope that the answer from your spiritual teacher will resolve the inner conflict you are experiencing. I think this is the only legitimate type of question you should be asking your spiritual teacher.

The other type, however, has more to do with curiosity. You are asking something that doesn’t really have to do with your situation or your struggle. The motivations can be different—maybe it’s boredom, maybe it’s because you want to be seen asking smart questions, whatever it may be. The reasons can be manifold, since our small self—the self that thinks it's separate from everything else—expresses itself in all kinds of distorted ways. 

The only characteristic of these questions that you can definitely identify is that it doesn’t really have to do with your situation, and you are just asking out of curiosity. In the German language, the word for curiosity is “Neugier.” If literally translated, it means “new” and “greed,” so kind of a greed for something new, a desire for something. If you are a Buddhist, you already know that greed, or seeking, is the very reason why we experience suffering and why we think we are separate from absolute reality.

So asking these kinds of questions doesn’t help. Entertaining these questions will even derail your spiritual path.

The other day, I watched an interview—I can’t remember exactly which one it was—but it was about spirituality, and they discussed a person who asked their master how a blind person would experience reality or enlightenment.

Now, the person who apparently asked this question was not blind. So you can already guess what category this question would belong to based on what I have just said. When I heard this story, I just thought to myself that if that Zen Master who was asked this question would have enough compassion, they would immediately pick out the eyes of the questioner.

I mean, this would be the most direct answer to that question.

Now you might wonder: if the master had enough compassion, they would pick out the eyes of the one asking the question?!

Exactly! An enlightened master's job is to help their students. 

So, if a student comes with a question like this, wouldn’t it be the most compassionate act of the master to answer it in a way where the student can directly experience it? I mean, this is Zen, this is about having a direct experience of reality, and not some intellectual discussion that doesn’t really help anybody. So, just be aware of what type of question you are asking—you may get your eyes picked out.

I definitely got my eyes picked out asking my Zen teacher a question about her favorite Zen story. As you can guess, my question wasn’t of the type of “legitimate” questions.

I felt enthusiastic, I felt a little blissed out since I’d been on retreat for a few days, only meditating the whole day, and instead of following my practice, which is to let go, to not attach, I allowed myself to slip in this question just based on cheap curiosity. As soon as I finished asking this question, without hesitation, she just pointed at me, with wide-open eyes, and shouted, “YOU!”

I was shocked!

At that moment, only hearing these 3 letters, my question had been cut through. I was shown that this was an unnecessary question. It made me aware that I was seeking something, trying to grasp something, thinking about something that’s not really relevant to my practice at that moment.

And I was blatantly exposed for doing that! However, with her endless compassion, she didn’t correct me, or condemn me, or any of that; she guided me and pointed to what’s essential!

It’s about YOU!

Don’t waste your practice thinking about things that aren’t relevant.

It’s really only about YOU!

Every Zen story is only about YOU; it’s not about telling a story of how wonderful the old masters were or how enlightened they were, or any of that nonsense.

Every Zen story has only one purpose: to wake you up to your true self, to make you reflect, to make you turn your awareness around, and to realize your true nature.

So, this is also a type of spiritual practice. Whenever you see a question coming up, really ask yourself if it is a genuine question about your path, or if you are just entertaining yourself.

If you are radical with this, only one question will remain: WHO AM I?

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I hope this was helpful.

Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments; you can also ask questions or just share your favorite Zen story.

However, if you are serious about your path: Unsubscribe from my channel, unsubscribe from YouTube, throw your laptop out the window, and practice Zen until you are enlightened.

I wish you all the best, your friend of the way. Bye.

PS: To make my course more accessible, I've reduced the price. Even if you already have a solid practice, this could help deepen your journey.