Special thanks to Guy Adams for his computer generated rendition of the 10 Ox Herding pictures of Zen Buddhism. These images illustrate 10 stages on the path to enlightenment and its conclusion, with the ox representing the mind. The pictures are titled:
2. Seeing the Footprints
3. Seeing the Ox
4. Catching the Ox
5. Tending the Ox
6. Riding the Ox
7. Forgetting the Ox
8. Forgetting Ox and One’s Self
9. Return to the Original Place
10. Entering the Marketplace
DEDICATION OF MERIT
May all Beings find the ease of compassion, the jewel of wisdom, the treasure of kindness, and the splendour of enlightenment. May the merit of this endeavour benefit all Beings. May it do honour to my teachers and the people of Thailand and Sri Lanka who supported me as a monk and gave me the opportunity to seek the wisdom of Dharma.
The well of spirituality is like an oasis in a vast desert, crisscrossed with the tracks of all the pilgrims that have sought its location. It is an oasis of cool fresh, life-giving water hidden amidst the dunes of artifice and illusion. As a person trying to help all seekers find that pool of infinite blessings, the saddest thing to know is that so many travelers get lost in the confusion of trails laid down by those that have gone before them. Paths there are that will take them safely through the desert, but many paths end only at the bleached bones of the unfortunate people who failed in their quest to find the oasis. How sad that so many mistook the vessel of religion to be the goal. Seeking the pool hidden in the vastness, their vessels held securely, they thought they would fill them yet died of thirst before ever finding their way. They never realized their vessels had always been full and they had only to drink from that which had always been in their own hands.