Fear is a universal experience. Even the smallest insect feels it. We wade in the tidal pools and put our finger near the soft open bodies of sea anemones and they close up. Everything spontaneously does that. It’s not a terrible thing that we feel fear when faced with the unknown. It is part of being alive, something we all share. We react against the possibility of loneliness, of death, of not having anything to hold on to. Fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to the truth.

Pema Chödron

from the book When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times

Read a random quote or see all quotes by Pema Chödron.

Further quotes from the book When Things Fall Apart:

• Becoming unstuck
• Abandoning hope
• Drive all blames into oneself
• What is in front of us right in the moment
• It’s just like that
• How are you
• Just being here again and again and again
• Cultivating Peace
• Disappointment
• Undoing of old ways of seeing
• The perfect teacher
• The courage to look at ourselves honestly and gently
• Opening our hearts and minds beyond limit
• Awakening is essential
• Being with us
• The Possibility of Egolessness
• The path of true awakening
• Finding out what is true
• Flooding the world with your kindness