There is a saying: ‘Wholesome deeds performed with selfish aims are just like poisoned food.’ Poisoned food might look delicious and even taste good, but it quickly leads to certain death.
Thinking of an enemy as someone to be hated, thinking of a friend as someone to be loved, being jealous of others’ happiness and good fortune: all this is rooted in ego clinging. And wholesome actions, infiltrated by a clinging to the ‘I’ conceived as something real and solid, turn to poison. We should try to forsake all self-centeredness.
Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
from the book Enlightened Courage: An Explanation of the Seven-Point Mind Training
translated by Padmakara Translation Group
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Further quotes from the book Enlightened Courage:
- Anger is an illusion
- Signs of realization
- Well rewarded
- The degree of self-clinging
- Failing to use the instructions as an antidote
- Morning pledge
- Bodhicitta practice
- Taking advantage of suffering
- Honest examination
- The vows of the Mind Training
- Give up hoping for results
- All Dharma has a single goal
- The three essential factors on which the accomplishment of the Dharma depends
- Begin the training sequence with yourself
- Using illness on the path
- The impurity of our perception
- Always be sustained by cheerfulness
- Delusion
- Antidote to our ego-clinging