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 con-firmed 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