By nature, the act of assembly is bound by time—a beginning, a middle, and an end. This book did not exist before, it appears to exist now, and eventually it will fall apart. Similarly, the self that existed yesterday—that is, you—is different from the self that exists today. Your bad mood has become good, you may have learned something, you have new memories, the scrape on your knee has healed a little. Our seemingly continuous existence is a series of beginnings and endings bound by time. Even the very act of creation requires time: a time before existing, a time of coming into existence, and an end to the act of creation.

Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche
from the book What Makes You Not a Buddhist
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Further quotes from the book What Makes You Not a Buddhist:
- Living fully
- Not paranoid but prepared
- Primordial purity
- Buddhist renunciation
- The impossible is possible
- The real source of fear is not knowing
- Driven by ambitions
- Shielding ourselves and others from the truth
- Pride and pity
- Not a buddha yet
- Bound by practicality
- Understanding the nature of enlightenment
- Corrosion begins as soon as creation begins
- What is life?
- Like a child at the cinema
- Fearlessness
- Change is inevitable
- Where will they scatter my ashes
- Being a Buddhist
- Pride and pity