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Yu Yi: The Desire to Feel Intensely Again

yù yī – 玉衣

n. the desire to see with fresh eyes, and feel things just as intensely as you did when you were younger—before expectations, before memory, before words.

"The first note is always the loudest. How quickly each feeling seems to fade as you adjust your expectations and protect yourself by gradually tuning out the world. Sometimes you reach a point where you can't feel anything at all. Just a ringing in your ears - until, like Beethoven, you find yourself pounding the keys of your life to feel anything at all. Trying to make the ground thunder below your feet. Makes you wish you could look around with fresh eyes and feel things just as powerfully as you did when you felt them for the first time... Before expectations. Before memory. Before words."

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Comments (2)

I think Shunryu Suzuki said much the same in Zen Mind Beginner’s Mind. How would we see the world if we could always see things afresh with a new mind?

Absolutely true– Zen practice, I believe, is a very effective way to bring that wonder back into our life and see with new eyes (to the extent that we can handle it). Thanks for the comment, Phil!

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