Why Do You Eat Every Day?

Why do you eat every day?

Many Zen students easily find the answer to the kong-an after some practice. I have found that merely answering the question correctly is just the first step. On closer inspection, it directs us to a deeper, more fundamental question: Why are you alive? What does it mean for you to live on this earth?

These questions nudge us to look at our own lives more closely. They prick us to wake up from our soporific dullness to the reality of our existence. Without such questions, it is easy to fall into sleepwalking through life.

Awakening to “Why do you eat every day?” and embracing it as a part of our lived experience leads us on a path to a meaningful life. Putting it into practice, moment to moment, is the work of a lifetime.

From Eat? What’s the Point
By Myong An Sunim JDPS