If you ask a child what he/she likes to be when he/she grows up. The answer varies. If you ask Zen practitioners what they like to be. All answers point to the same one: become an enlighten being and reach immortality.
How to reach it with a right understanding? Zen Master Miao Tsan has a straightforward answer for it.
“We can achieve immortality, but first we must let go of the attachment we have developed during the impermanent, brief existence of our individual selves. Phenomena are always in a constant state of flux. To grasp any impermanent phenomenon is to act against the eternal nature of the essence of life. Instead, we must grasp the ever-changing functioning that arises from the essence of life. Our existence is not permanent because it must obey the law of impermanence. If we place hope for immortality in a future phenomenon, we are bound to face the cruel reality: The future, like the present, cannot escape dissolution.
All that is created is impermanent. Whether it is in some distant future, in a certain Pure Land or in a heavenly abode, it is governed by the law of all phenomena: arising, abiding, deteriorating, and disappearing. However, the eternity of life is certain because it is the primordial nature of the Mind. It is the ever-present light of the unchanging, and the essence of all phenomena. Only that which has the nature of eternity can manifest eternity; other than that, no amount of effort can accomplish it.”
Fa Hwa
