Beginner’s Mind

by Jeff McMahon

The characters for beginner’s mind in calligraphy by Shunryu Suzuki Roshi

What were you thinking the moment you were born?

There was sudden light, a painful rush of sensation—maybe it was cold, maybe it was dry, maybe you were slapped—and then you felt the thrill of doing something for the first time that your body was made to do:

You took a breath.

But it’s unlikely that anything resembling thinking was happening in your original mind. And perhaps for that reason, everything was new, and everything was possible.

A Zen teacher who came to America in 1949—Shunryu Suzuki—emphasized the value of original mind, which he says never leaves us, although it may be obscured by thinking: