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Becoming Yourself: Teachings on the Zen Way of Life
From the beloved author of Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind comes a new book of teachings on the essence of Zen practice
"I felt a burden being lifted from my shoulders just by reading this remarkable book." —Oliver Burkeman
“Our way of sitting is for you to become yourself.”
In this long-awaited book from one of the most influential spiritual teachers of the last century, Shunryu Suzuki Roshi shares simple, warmhearted teachings on a practice that is fundamentally about becoming yourself. In his inimitable style, filled with humor and insight, Becoming Yourself speaks directly to the newest beginners while also serving as a touchstone and a continual source of inspiration for even the most experienced practitioners and Zen teachers.
Becoming Yourself unearths new jewels from the late Suzuki’s lectures and brings to light many of his unpublished teachings.
Becoming yourself is not meant to be understood as an idea; it is meant to be tried out as a way of being. It is “Just to sit,” a practice of wholeheartedly being as you are, moment after moment, no matter what is happening. It is a practice of deeply connecting with how it feels to be alive in your surroundings, whether on a meditation cushion or not, and stepping forward from that connection. It is opening to your life, wherever you are, and finding right there a deep well of innate wisdom, compassion and care.
"I felt a burden being lifted from my shoulders just by reading this remarkable book." —Oliver Burkeman
“Our way of sitting is for you to become yourself.”
In this long-awaited book from one of the most influential spiritual teachers of the last century, Shunryu Suzuki Roshi shares simple, warmhearted teachings on a practice that is fundamentally about becoming yourself. In his inimitable style, filled with humor and insight, Becoming Yourself speaks directly to the newest beginners while also serving as a touchstone and a continual source of inspiration for even the most experienced practitioners and Zen teachers.
Becoming Yourself unearths new jewels from the late Suzuki’s lectures and brings to light many of his unpublished teachings.
Becoming yourself is not meant to be understood as an idea; it is meant to be tried out as a way of being. It is “Just to sit,” a practice of wholeheartedly being as you are, moment after moment, no matter what is happening. It is a practice of deeply connecting with how it feels to be alive in your surroundings, whether on a meditation cushion or not, and stepping forward from that connection. It is opening to your life, wherever you are, and finding right there a deep well of innate wisdom, compassion and care.
207 pages, Kindle Edition
Published July 15, 2025
89 people are currently reading
21 people want to read
About the author
Shunryu Suzuki
42 books680 followersSuzuki Roshi was a Sōtō Zen monk and teacher who helped popularize Zen Buddhism in the United States, and is renowned for founding the first Buddhist monastery outside Asia (Tassajara Zen Mountain Center). Suzuki founded San Francisco Zen Center, which along with its affiliate temples, comprises one of the most influential Zen organizations in the United States. A book of his teachings, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, is one of the most popular books on Zen and Buddhism in the West
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August 12, 2025
If you are in the woods, Suzuki Roshi teaches, “just to sit” is to appreciate the feeling of the woods. If you are in the kitchen or in the car, “just to sit”—or, “becoming yourself”—is to appreciate the feeling of the kitchen or the car. If you are happy, it is to appreciate the feeling of happiness; if you are struggling, it is to appreciate and make room for the actual feeling of being alive with that struggle.
I am an avid absorber of Buddhist thought and wisdom, not a practitioner, so I must be upfront about that; it is like I have a wisdom sieve or sifter in my brain seeking ideas and truths and often find it in Buddhism and many of the Eastern traditions. I don’t want to appropriate “meditation” or “yoga” from these traditions since I don’t follow them strictly, but I think Suzuki Roshi might be okay with that, he sounds like an amazing human and had so much to share.
My theme this year seems to be the celebration of how we use stories to share and communicate and inspire each other, and these short stories and ideas originate from such a beautiful philosophy that transcends time and place. And they aren’t stories, or ideas, or philosophies but ways of being. And they aren’t really ways of being, but just something to practice. They are poems, and poetic thinking, and they aren’t. These are the types of thoughts I get when I read koans and the like, and they make me happy, in a chaotic, circular ride of the monkey brain that exasperates me often, but that also leads me on a chase for something greater, in a beautiful imperfect life.
I believe what Deepak Chopra says, that our minds are naturally bathed in peace and meditation just accesses what we already have, instead of a Western view of harnessing meditation to cause peace. I also have found peace caused by mindfulness and meditation. Paradox. I have added a few photos that connect me to some of the teachings.
Just to sit, for me, means being here or there, now, the present moment; when I got a second dog, I lost the ability to hike and sit in nature being there, there is so much distraction, but I still reap the benefit of prior times sitting and nature and being there, and find it in different ways, like a majestic photo that I can look at later that also recreates the moment there.
This also connects to the idea that To find true joy under some limitation is the way to realize the whole universe.If you move along in life, or say, on a trail, and it is easy and there are not challenges, joy can be plentiful, but if you move along in life or a trail and there are boulders to climb, or a wide river racing to the sea you need cross, or a snowfield too icy to cross, or have pain that limits your strength, and you still find joy, then you “realize the whole universe,” that vastness inside and outside.
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Another theme that really resonated with me was derived from: You should find a wider, unselfish desire which is without limitation and which you can extend forever. We all have selfish desires, I am dying for a new dryer to replace my broken one, and I can never get enough new music into my ears and lungs, but the teacher asks us to reject “gaining,” reject “asceticism”, but be “strict with ourselves,” by reflecting on “ourselves and our practice,” and practice for the expansive desire we find, whether for peace or love or kindness or end to wars, not for enlightenment, merit or Nirvana. Anne Morrow Lindbergh writes that ‘only love can be divided endlessly and not diminish.’ When we experience awe and wonder, we open a vastness inside us, our brains, our hearts, minds, souls, whichever word approximates the area we can feel it, and that expansiveness is limitless and can be eternally expanded. Yes.
So much to savor and think about for later.
Because we have so much useless rubbish in our mind, it is hard to share our feelings with people, with things, with trees, or with mountains. Even though we are right in the middle of the woods, it is still hard to appreciate the feeling of the woods. When we can really appreciate the feeling of the woods, that is zazen.
Zen is, in a word, to share our feeling with people, with trees, and with mountains, wherever we are. That is Zen practice.
Buddhist teaching is the teaching that arises from emptiness of mind. In other words, it is what arises from pure mind, or, you may say, “holy mind.” If your words come from pure emptiness, whatever they are, I think they are Buddha’s words. And if you do things with purity of mind, that is Buddha’s activity. It is possible for us to do that. We meditate, recite Buddha’s name, or read scriptures on the one hand in order to empty our mind, and on the other hand in order to appreciate Buddha’s words that arise from empty mind.
We clear our table every day, and even when it is clear, we should continue to make the effort to keep it clear. This is another important point. If you are cleaning your table because you think it is dirty, that mind is dirty. To think something is dirty means your mind is dirty. So we should let go of this kind of mind that discriminates “dirty” or “clean,” “right” or “wrong.” The point is to let go of discrimination. The point is to clean things, not because they are dirty, but just because this is something we should do as long as we are alive.
Things that exist are bound to vanish, and things which you attain cannot be perpetually retained. The only thing that exists forever is that which exists before anything else appears. As long as you seek for something, you will get the shadow of reality and not reality itself. Only when you do not seek for anything will you find it, and only when you do not strive for enlightenment will you have it. Because you try to attain something, you lose it.
The practice of seeing “things as it is,” accepting “things as it is,” and nourishing things as they grow. This is the fundamental purpose of our practice and the meaning of Zen. But it is difficult to see “things as it is.” You may say you are seeing “things as it is” when actually you are not. I don’t mean that your sight is distorted; I mean that as soon as you see something, you already start to intellectualize it. As soon as you intellectualize something, it is already not just what you saw.
The most important point is to acknowledge exactly what Buddha nature is. Buddha nature is not small self; it is big self which is observing what you do and always accepting what you do. Whatever you do, Buddha nature will say, “Ah, that’s good—there is nothing wrong with it.” Enlightenment is to always be aware of that true nature. Most people have the big misunderstanding that through Zen practice they will eventually attain enlightenment and be completely free of evil. A practice based on this misunderstanding is small practice; it has no big mind, and it is not pure practice. True practice is knowing what Buddha nature is, being aware of it, and doing the practice of big mind.
From the intro: “This is because “becoming yourself” is not meant to be understood as an idea; it is meant to be tried out as a way of being. “Becoming yourself” is not a concept to master or a state to achieve. It is an ongoing, embodied practice in the middle of our ordinary daily life. Instead of offering an explanation for us to think about, again and again Suzuki Roshi points to a practice for us to do. “Becoming yourself,” he says, is the practice of “just to sit.” Our way of sitting is for you to become yourself. Just to be yourself is what is meant by just to sit. “Just to sit” is a practice of wholeheartedly being as you are, moment after moment, no matter what is happening. It is a practice of deeply connecting with how it feels to be alive in your surroundings, and stepping forward in your life from that connection. “Just to sit” expresses a traditional meditation practice of sitting still and upright on a black cushion, but in its wider sense it is simply about opening to your life, wherever you are.
When Shunryu Suzuki, a fifty-five-year-old Zen Buddhist priest, stepped off of the airplane in San Francisco in May of 1959, bald-headed and in robes, freshly arrived to care for a Japanese American Zen congregation, Buddhism had been in the West for many decades but had not yet permeated mainstream culture. The teachings of his contemporaries, like His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Thich Nhat Hanh, who would eventually become recognized alongside him as global Buddhist giants, were still little-known to the West, where in general Buddhism, mindfulness, Zen, and the like were largely unfamiliar outside of universities and Asian immigrant communities.
He was driven by a profound love for people and a deep faith in the beauty and power of his Soto Zen tradition’s simple core practice: zazen, or “just to sit.” He dreamed of bringing that ancient wisdom forward in a way that was rooted in the tradition but not bound to it, a form open and flexible enough to be able to take root and thrive in the actual lives of ordinary people.
I am an avid absorber of Buddhist thought and wisdom, not a practitioner, so I must be upfront about that; it is like I have a wisdom sieve or sifter in my brain seeking ideas and truths and often find it in Buddhism and many of the Eastern traditions. I don’t want to appropriate “meditation” or “yoga” from these traditions since I don’t follow them strictly, but I think Suzuki Roshi might be okay with that, he sounds like an amazing human and had so much to share.
My theme this year seems to be the celebration of how we use stories to share and communicate and inspire each other, and these short stories and ideas originate from such a beautiful philosophy that transcends time and place. And they aren’t stories, or ideas, or philosophies but ways of being. And they aren’t really ways of being, but just something to practice. They are poems, and poetic thinking, and they aren’t. These are the types of thoughts I get when I read koans and the like, and they make me happy, in a chaotic, circular ride of the monkey brain that exasperates me often, but that also leads me on a chase for something greater, in a beautiful imperfect life.
I believe what Deepak Chopra says, that our minds are naturally bathed in peace and meditation just accesses what we already have, instead of a Western view of harnessing meditation to cause peace. I also have found peace caused by mindfulness and meditation. Paradox. I have added a few photos that connect me to some of the teachings.
Just to sit, for me, means being here or there, now, the present moment; when I got a second dog, I lost the ability to hike and sit in nature being there, there is so much distraction, but I still reap the benefit of prior times sitting and nature and being there, and find it in different ways, like a majestic photo that I can look at later that also recreates the moment there.
This also connects to the idea that To find true joy under some limitation is the way to realize the whole universe.If you move along in life, or say, on a trail, and it is easy and there are not challenges, joy can be plentiful, but if you move along in life or a trail and there are boulders to climb, or a wide river racing to the sea you need cross, or a snowfield too icy to cross, or have pain that limits your strength, and you still find joy, then you “realize the whole universe,” that vastness inside and outside.
[image error]
Another theme that really resonated with me was derived from: You should find a wider, unselfish desire which is without limitation and which you can extend forever. We all have selfish desires, I am dying for a new dryer to replace my broken one, and I can never get enough new music into my ears and lungs, but the teacher asks us to reject “gaining,” reject “asceticism”, but be “strict with ourselves,” by reflecting on “ourselves and our practice,” and practice for the expansive desire we find, whether for peace or love or kindness or end to wars, not for enlightenment, merit or Nirvana. Anne Morrow Lindbergh writes that ‘only love can be divided endlessly and not diminish.’ When we experience awe and wonder, we open a vastness inside us, our brains, our hearts, minds, souls, whichever word approximates the area we can feel it, and that expansiveness is limitless and can be eternally expanded. Yes.
So much to savor and think about for later.
Because we have so much useless rubbish in our mind, it is hard to share our feelings with people, with things, with trees, or with mountains. Even though we are right in the middle of the woods, it is still hard to appreciate the feeling of the woods. When we can really appreciate the feeling of the woods, that is zazen.
Zen is, in a word, to share our feeling with people, with trees, and with mountains, wherever we are. That is Zen practice.
Buddhist teaching is the teaching that arises from emptiness of mind. In other words, it is what arises from pure mind, or, you may say, “holy mind.” If your words come from pure emptiness, whatever they are, I think they are Buddha’s words. And if you do things with purity of mind, that is Buddha’s activity. It is possible for us to do that. We meditate, recite Buddha’s name, or read scriptures on the one hand in order to empty our mind, and on the other hand in order to appreciate Buddha’s words that arise from empty mind.
We clear our table every day, and even when it is clear, we should continue to make the effort to keep it clear. This is another important point. If you are cleaning your table because you think it is dirty, that mind is dirty. To think something is dirty means your mind is dirty. So we should let go of this kind of mind that discriminates “dirty” or “clean,” “right” or “wrong.” The point is to let go of discrimination. The point is to clean things, not because they are dirty, but just because this is something we should do as long as we are alive.
Things that exist are bound to vanish, and things which you attain cannot be perpetually retained. The only thing that exists forever is that which exists before anything else appears. As long as you seek for something, you will get the shadow of reality and not reality itself. Only when you do not seek for anything will you find it, and only when you do not strive for enlightenment will you have it. Because you try to attain something, you lose it.
The practice of seeing “things as it is,” accepting “things as it is,” and nourishing things as they grow. This is the fundamental purpose of our practice and the meaning of Zen. But it is difficult to see “things as it is.” You may say you are seeing “things as it is” when actually you are not. I don’t mean that your sight is distorted; I mean that as soon as you see something, you already start to intellectualize it. As soon as you intellectualize something, it is already not just what you saw.
The most important point is to acknowledge exactly what Buddha nature is. Buddha nature is not small self; it is big self which is observing what you do and always accepting what you do. Whatever you do, Buddha nature will say, “Ah, that’s good—there is nothing wrong with it.” Enlightenment is to always be aware of that true nature. Most people have the big misunderstanding that through Zen practice they will eventually attain enlightenment and be completely free of evil. A practice based on this misunderstanding is small practice; it has no big mind, and it is not pure practice. True practice is knowing what Buddha nature is, being aware of it, and doing the practice of big mind.
From the intro: “This is because “becoming yourself” is not meant to be understood as an idea; it is meant to be tried out as a way of being. “Becoming yourself” is not a concept to master or a state to achieve. It is an ongoing, embodied practice in the middle of our ordinary daily life. Instead of offering an explanation for us to think about, again and again Suzuki Roshi points to a practice for us to do. “Becoming yourself,” he says, is the practice of “just to sit.” Our way of sitting is for you to become yourself. Just to be yourself is what is meant by just to sit. “Just to sit” is a practice of wholeheartedly being as you are, moment after moment, no matter what is happening. It is a practice of deeply connecting with how it feels to be alive in your surroundings, and stepping forward in your life from that connection. “Just to sit” expresses a traditional meditation practice of sitting still and upright on a black cushion, but in its wider sense it is simply about opening to your life, wherever you are.
When Shunryu Suzuki, a fifty-five-year-old Zen Buddhist priest, stepped off of the airplane in San Francisco in May of 1959, bald-headed and in robes, freshly arrived to care for a Japanese American Zen congregation, Buddhism had been in the West for many decades but had not yet permeated mainstream culture. The teachings of his contemporaries, like His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Thich Nhat Hanh, who would eventually become recognized alongside him as global Buddhist giants, were still little-known to the West, where in general Buddhism, mindfulness, Zen, and the like were largely unfamiliar outside of universities and Asian immigrant communities.
He was driven by a profound love for people and a deep faith in the beauty and power of his Soto Zen tradition’s simple core practice: zazen, or “just to sit.” He dreamed of bringing that ancient wisdom forward in a way that was rooted in the tradition but not bound to it, a form open and flexible enough to be able to take root and thrive in the actual lives of ordinary people.
November 1, 2025
The Zen Way of Becoming Your True Self
This book is a true awakening to me and so many others that have walked the path through Green Gulch. I was fortunate to have been accepted into the Kitchen Apprenticeship in 2019. I was blessed to know those who taught Zazen. It showed me to open my heart and to be accepted as a Cook in the Mercy Ships in Senegal. Thank you, Shunryu Suzuki, for this life-affirming awakening.
This book is a true awakening to me and so many others that have walked the path through Green Gulch. I was fortunate to have been accepted into the Kitchen Apprenticeship in 2019. I was blessed to know those who taught Zazen. It showed me to open my heart and to be accepted as a Cook in the Mercy Ships in Senegal. Thank you, Shunryu Suzuki, for this life-affirming awakening.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews