"There is no such thing as trash"

I've always loved this phrase. It comes from a Japanese zen master named Zuigan Roshi, who is using the phrase to address his novice student, Soko Morinaga. The student has come upon the Roshi sweeping up leaves in the temple garden, and he innocently asks the Roshi if he should gather up the pile and throw it in the trash. "Stupid fool," he barks, "don't you know that there is no such thing as trash?!" The Roshi goes on to separate the leaves from the pebbles and stones, storing the leaves for fire kindling and placing the pebbles and stones under the rain gutters. Then he takes the remaining clods of earth and moss and tamps them into the ground where holes and indentations lie. The huge pile of leaves, pebbles and dirt has now completely disappeared. "Do you see now?" the Roshi thunders, making sure the lesson is not forgotten. "In people and things, there is no such thing as trash."

There is no trash indeed, especially in people. In psychotherapy, the more you talk to patients, the more you realize the wisdom of this statement. Our lives are very much like that haphazard pile of leaves in the temple garden. Clues to an entire chain of critical events in someone's life can be found in a seemingly innocuous word or gesture. Our job as therapists is to gather the "leaves" of thoughts and feelings from the patient and to use them as a kind of fire kindling, and when we can, take some of the "moss" of life experience and fill in some holes that have appeared in the garden of the mind. Patients are patients because someone, somewhere, sometime, took those sacred thoughts and feelings and labeled them as trash. No such thing!

Content from:
"Novice to Master" by Soko Morinaga (2004)