Bodhidharma’s singular teaching is to know your self-nature, which is undivided, which is neither separate nor profane, which is neither material nor spiritual – which is transcendent, transcendent to all divisions, all dualities. This transcendental in you is your real being. And it has so much energy, so much overflowing power that it brings all kinds of blessings to you without ever being asked. It brings all kinds of beautiful flowers to blossom within your being without being asked. It is simply natural.

Man has been put into an unnatural situation; hence his misery, his suffering, his hell. To be unnatural is to be in hell, and to be in your self-nature is to be in heaven. There is no other hell, there is no other heaven.

These sutras are tremendously significant for all those who want to know their self-nature. Because that is the ultimate wisdom, and out of it, all your actions become beautiful, gracious, good – without any effort on your part, just naturally, as naturally as a roseflower grows out of a rosebush. Goodness, beauty, grace, virtue…everything grows naturally, without any effort, without any action on your part, once you know your self-nature.

This is the greatest knowing in the whole of existence.

Anyone who gives up the transcendent for the mundane, in any of its myriad forms, is a mortal.

To give up the transcendent…. Remember the meaning of the transcendent: that which transcends all dualities. Anyone who forgets the language of oneness with existence unnecessarily becomes a mortal. Then there is death – against life. Then there is body – against spirit. Then everything has its polar opposite. Then there is love as a polar opposite to hate. But remember one fundamental thing: the polar opposites are exchangeable. Love can become hate, hate can become love – and you all know it.

Friendship can turn into enmity, and enmity can become friendship. You all know – happiness can turn into sadness, and sadness can change into happiness. Although they are polar opposites, they are almost like twins, very close. Just a slight change in circumstances and one disappears…the other was just behind it.

So remember the transcendent – existence belongs to the transcendental. Don’t divide it; otherwise you will be continuously tortured by the duality.

A buddha is someone who finds freedom in good fortune and bad.

It does not matter to a man of awareness whether he is successful or unsuccessful, whether he is well known or absolutely unknown, whether he is somebody powerful or just a nobody, a nonentity. To a man of awareness, all these dualities don’t matter at all, because awareness is the greatest treasure. When you have it, you don’t want anything else. You don’t want to become a president of a country, or a prime minister of a country. Those are for children, retarded people, to play the game.