The sages of all the great spiritual traditions were not born as sages; they were no different than any one of you. Once they awakened to the true nature of their own awareness, greed and fear naturally fell away. What did they not already possess? Since there was nothing outside of their own minds, what was there to fear?

If you want to awaken, let go of everything. When conceptualization ceases, the myriad things cease, and all that remains is your own pure and clear awareness. It has never been hidden from you. Now is the time, here is the place.

~The Flatbed Sutra of Louie Wing

Good friends, post-kensho practice and enlightenment is what taking the path of Zen is all about. If the path of Zen called only for achieving a state of emptiness or pure awareness or some other static condition, it would be the station of Zen rather than the path of Zen. You should not follow teachings that urge you to cling to the bliss of emptiness, making heroic efforts to detach from the world or sustain ‘pure awareness'. That would be what Dogen calls passing time in vain. Once you have awakened to your true nature, you should follow the instruction of all the sages and never waste another day.

Good friends, the truth itself is not separate from you here and now. To fail to continue along the Zen path of practice and enlightenment for the sake of the truth is to fail to realize or make real, your own true self. Once you have awakened to the true nature of your own mind through the realization of nonthinking, and learned to use your observing prajna, you should apply it in order to master the buddha-dharma or the truth of reality.

The Flatbed Sutra of Louie Wing