“Much of the hatred and fear of sexuality found in religions stems from the idea that sex is a thing of the body and that the body must be denied so that the spirit may be elevated. In Buddhism there is no notion that the body is made of inferior matter while the spirit flies free within.”

The thinking brain influences the body’s responses and it makes a neat little loop.

I mean, I can do that all day long. I can tell you the Vulcan’s are not actually devoid of emotion. That they work hard to suppress their emotions. And of course, there actually are no real Vulcan’s, though I know the ins and outs of them as fictional characters.

What attracted me to Zen was my first teacher, Tim McCarthy. He was extremely genuine. It wasn’t even really a Zen thing, that sort of came along later.

Zen practice is about not getting high on anything and in so doing getting high on absolutely everything. We then find that everything we encounter – bliss or nonbliss – possesses a tremendous depth and beauty that we usually miss.

Do what you do as well as you possibly can. That’s Buddhist morality.

Truly compassionate action arises spontaneously without thought and is carried out in real action with no anticipation of reward and, indeed, no concept of a doer of that action.

Real morality is based on a single criterion: right action, appropriate action, in the present moment and present situation.

I used to worry when I was a teenager, even into my twenties, after I’d heard something about schizophrenia and how people just suddenly become schizophrenic that I was insane.

Everything you have, whether it’s money or stuff, is an obligation. It is as much your duty to care for and nurture any object you own as it would be if that object were your child. All possessions come with responsibilities. More possessions equals greater responsibility.

It’s sort of another innovation, probably a good innovation, of Western culture to separate the ideas between science and philosophy, but it’s important to remember they weren’t always separate realms of inquiry.

Suffering occurs when your ideas about how things ought to be don’t match how they really are.

Leaving home’ to me means adopting the attitude that the pursuit of the truth is more vital than the pursuit of what society – your home – tells you is important.

Faith keeps you going, but doubt keeps you from going off the deep end.

I was very attracted to the way that Zen did not go into the imagination land. And now I’ve forgotten what your first question was and how we were going to tie this together.

All of the religions – with the exception of Tibetan Buddhism, which doesn’t believe in a heaven – teach that heaven is a better place. At the end of the program, I say that heaven is a place where you are happy. All of the religions have that in common.

I haven’t got any Buddhism. I live by letting things happen.

To study Buddhism is to study ourselves. To study ourselves is to forget ourselves.

I’ve tried Buddhism, Scientology, Numerology, Transcendental Meditation, Qabbala, t’ai chi, feng shui and Deepak Chopra but I find straight gin works best.

Therefore we have to train our mind. The meditation practice in Buddhism is all about training one’s own mind.

Suttas are not meant to be ‘sacred scriptures’ that tell us what to believe.

Instead of becoming the world’s expert on Buddhism, just let go, let go, let go.

To define Buddhism without a lot of words and phrases, we can simply say, ‘Don’t cling or hold on to anything. Harmonize with actuality, with things as they are.’