In a shadowy zendo as day falls into night, a single voice pierces the silence with the thunderous words of the evening gatha:
Let me respectfully remind you,
Life and death are of supreme importance.
Time swiftly passes by and opportunity is lost.
Each of us should strive to awaken. Awaken!
Take heed. Do not squander your life.
Hearing this urgent reminder late in a day of practice when our heads are nodding toward slumber, we’re at least a little more awake than we might have been a moment before. Waking up is the ultimate aim of Buddhism, but what does it mean to be awake? How, when, and where do we wake up? These are important questions because they lead us back to practice, where we can wake up and see for ourselves.
In a conventional sense, we know what it means to be awake. Simply put, we’re awake when we open our eyes. And we know what dreaming is. We dream when our eyes are closed. But in Buddhism, waking up is more subtle and profound than that. Indeed, it’s called because it transcends the subject–object duality with which we usually perceive
