"Without accepting the fact that everything changes, we cannot find perfect composure. But unfortunately, although it is true, it is difficult for us to accept it. Because we cannot accept the truth of transience, we suffer"
About this Quote
Suzuki doesn’t offer comfort so much as he offers a diagnosis: composure isn’t a mood you summon, it’s a discipline you earn by making peace with impermanence. The blunt hinge of the line is “accepting the fact.” Not contemplating it, not agreeing with it in theory, but letting it land in the body where anxiety actually lives. In Zen, change isn’t a philosophical abstraction; it’s the operating system. The promise is almost audacious: “perfect composure” is possible, but only on the condition that you stop negotiating with reality.
The subtext is a critique of the modern (and timeless) habit of treating stability as the baseline we’re entitled to. We plan, hoard, cling, refresh our feeds for reassurance, and then act shocked when the world behaves like a world: jobs end, bodies age, relationships shift, attention wanders. Suzuki’s “unfortunately” carries the weight of a teacher who has watched students repeatedly mistake understanding for acceptance. We nod along to “everything changes” until the change is ours.
Context matters: Suzuki, a Japanese Zen priest who helped establish Soto Zen practice in the United States, was speaking to communities of earnest seekers who wanted serenity without surrender, enlightenment without the humiliations of ordinary life. His rhetoric is spare and surgical: suffering isn’t framed as punishment or cosmic tragedy, but as friction. Reality moves; the mind grips; pain is the heat generated by that mismatch. The intent is practical, even sternly compassionate: if you want composure, stop demanding permanence from a universe that doesn’t do it.
The subtext is a critique of the modern (and timeless) habit of treating stability as the baseline we’re entitled to. We plan, hoard, cling, refresh our feeds for reassurance, and then act shocked when the world behaves like a world: jobs end, bodies age, relationships shift, attention wanders. Suzuki’s “unfortunately” carries the weight of a teacher who has watched students repeatedly mistake understanding for acceptance. We nod along to “everything changes” until the change is ours.
Context matters: Suzuki, a Japanese Zen priest who helped establish Soto Zen practice in the United States, was speaking to communities of earnest seekers who wanted serenity without surrender, enlightenment without the humiliations of ordinary life. His rhetoric is spare and surgical: suffering isn’t framed as punishment or cosmic tragedy, but as friction. Reality moves; the mind grips; pain is the heat generated by that mismatch. The intent is practical, even sternly compassionate: if you want composure, stop demanding permanence from a universe that doesn’t do it.
Quote Details
| Topic | Letting Go |
|---|---|
| Source | Shunryu Suzuki — Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind (1970). Passage on impermanence/transience; commonly cited from Suzuki's teaching on accepting change. |
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