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Back to Zen: Stop Trying to Quiet Your Mind | Henry Shukman, with Henry Shukman.

What Does Rumi Mean by Come Back?

Henry Shukman says Rumi's call to come back, in the translation by Coleman Barks, means returning to now after the mind has wandered off. Many mind parts and reactivity can take someone away from the present, and the drift is okay.

The poem says come back, whoever you are: wanderer, worshipper, lover of leavings. It does not matter. Ours is not a caravan of despair. Even if the vows have been broken a thousand times, return yet again. A caravan is both the train of camels crossing the desert and the lodges where the camel trains rest at night or every few days. Come here. It does not matter what has been going on. The wanderer is welcome, there is always hope, and no matter how desperate the feeling, the return is wanted.

Practice is the same return, again and again. More practice shows how far someone goes from just being here now. Instead of despairing about the distance, come back. The return is good, nourishing, and comfortable.

Grokipedia·Rumi·Henry Shukman

Transcript

Zen: Stop Trying to Quiet Your Mind | Henry Shukman ·

The Kevin Rose Show

More from this episode

  1. What Did Suzuki Roshi Teach About Monkey Mind?Henry Shukman says Suzuki Roshi, who wrote Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, taught a different way to meet monkey mind.
  2. Why Does the Great Way Dislike Choosing?Henry Shukman says the great way is the great reality, one single whole that excludes nothing. It has no size.
  3. What Is the Backward Step in Zen?Henry Shukman says the backward step in Zen is disengaging from outward activity.
  4. What Was Henry Shukman's Awakening Like?Henry Shukman had an awakening as a youth, far from home, so complete that he felt he could die that night because his life had already been fulfilled.
  5. How Does Practice Become a Flow State?Henry Shukman says flow states might be some kind of preparatory training.
  6. How Can Someone Walk and Still Go Nowhere?Henry Shukman says a student who declared that Bodhidharma never took a step seems to have found a reality where there is nowhere to go.
  7. Would Kevin Rose Rather Fly the Plane?Kevin Rose would rather fly the plane than ride as a passenger, silly as that sounds. Needing to know shows up as a preference for control.

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