With a depressed expression
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Sawaki Rôshi:
What is the meaning of complaining with a depressed face: "I have no money, nothing to eat, only debts..."? It is because you are stingy that you think that you should have more fun and a happier life, and that is why you always complain about your misery.
You are not even hungry, still you complain that you have nothing to eat! Thus you will become really hungry. Everyone gets fooled by words. Names and words are the cause of our confusion.
Also beggars laugh, and millionairs cry. So what is all the excitement about?
Uchiyama Rôshi:
Seven or eight years ago a man about 30 years old visited Antaiji one evening with a depressed expression on his face: "I have nothing to eat."
We were just having some rice soup for dinner, therefore I invited him to eat with us first and then talk afterwards. His reply struck me as strange: "I have nothing to eat, but I am not really hungry."
When I talked with him after dinner, I learned that he was living with his wife and his mother, and had a job, although the company he was working for was not too big. Still, he had an income and was certainly not starving. Therefore I told him: "Do not say that you have nothing to eat when you are not even hungry! You should rather say that your income is not enough to gratify your vanity."
He wound up staying with us for one week, but finally he returned back home, saying happily: "At home, my life is still better than your life here."
The life here in the temple must have struck him as really poor. But that is alright. Unless you really have nothing to eat, you will be happier if you life your life without a depressed expression on your face.
