The unity of shamatha and vipashyana ~ 3rd Jamgon Kongtrul Rinpoche

What does it mean to practice shamatha and vipashyana together? Shamatha involves letting the mind rest on an object in a state of concentration. Both mind and object lack ultimate reality. This true nature is present at all times, not only when one achieves insight into it through vipashyana meditation. Maintaining this awareness or insight in shamatha meditation – that is, not separating one-pointedness from awareness — is the unity of shamatha and vipashyana.
When a feeling or thought arises, what does it mean to unite “calmness movement, and awareness” through shamatha and vipashyana? Let us take the arising of anger as an example. First one notices that anger has arisen and acknowledges it. This corresponds to shamatha or mental calmness, that is, mindfulness which allows one to notice that a feeling has arisen. Based on this, one examines the feeling or thought by means of vipashyana. Calmness, movement, and awareness are the three phases that one examines. Calmness corresponds to the question: “where does the feeling or thought dwell?,” movement to the question: ”where does the feeling or thought go to?,” and awareness to the question: “what is present between the arising and the subsiding of the thought or feeling?” This form of investigation brings one to the realization that the feeling has no real existence.

3rd Jamgon Kongtrul Rinpoche

Extending gratitude in all directions ~ 17th Karmapa

Even setting aside what it inspires you to do for others, when you cultivate gratitude, you certainly gain a great deal yourself in terms of well-being and happiness. When you feel grateful, you recognize that you are the beneficiary of others’ kindness. You feel fortunate. Gratitude just feels good, and it can be extended in all directions, since not only clothes but every single thing you use comes to you from others. At mealtime, you can feel grateful for each and every ingredient on your plate, for those who did the cooking and the planting, even for sunlight, for rainfall, and for the minerals that enrich the soil.

17th Karmapa

The Six Paramitas ~ Jigme Lingpa

Transcendent generosity is found in contentment;
Its essence is simply letting go.
Discipline is not to displease the Three Jewels.
The best patience is unfailing mindfulness and awareness.
Diligence is needed to sustain all the other perfections.
Concentration is to experience as deities all the appearances to which one clings.
Wisdom is the self-liberation of grasping and clinging;
In it there is neither thinking nor a thinker.
It is not ordinary. It is free from fixed convictions.
It is beyond suffering. It is supreme peace.

Jigme Lingpa

Peerless Teacher, at your feet I bow ~ Patrul Rinpoche

You renounce evil and take up good, as in the teachings on cause and effect.
Your action follows the progression of the Vehicles.
Through your perfect view, you are free from all clinging.
Peerless Teacher, at your feet I bow.

Patrul Rinpoche

Vast silent knowing ~ Tenzin Palmo

Behind the movement of the conceptual mind is vast silent knowing. It is so simple. But we don’t believe it. And it is sad indeed that we miss it. We overlook the simplicity in front of us.

Tenzin Palmo

Rather than being trapped by your perceptions ~ Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

We are naturally attached to comfort and pleasure and bothered by physical and mental suffering. These innate tendencies lead us to seek out, maintain and try to increase whatever gives us pleasure comfortable clothing, delicious food, agreeable places, sensual pleasure – and to avoid or destroy whatever we find unpleasant or painful. Constantly changing and devoid of any true essence, these sensations rest on the ephemeral association of the mind with the body, and it is useless to be attached to them. Rather than being dragged along and trapped by your perceptions, just let them dissolve as soon as they form, like letters traced on the surface of water with your finger disappearing as you draw them.

Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

Real peace ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

If I could not be peaceful in the midst of danger, then the kind of peace I might have in simpler times is meaningless. If I could not find peace in the midst of difficulty, I knew I would never know real peace.

Thich Nhat Hanh

The truth of the path ~ Dudjom Rinpoche

While the causal condition for the path is the Buddha-nature, the dominant condition is the sublime teacher, because the path comes about through practicing his or her teachings, and realization of the ground as it is depends on the teacher. The actual practice of the path depends on the individual; the path itself is virtue that combines skillful means and wisdom and serves as the gateway to liberation.
It is said in the sutras:
Wisdom accompanied by skillful means is the path.
Skillful means accompanied by wisdom is the path.
And in the Abhidharma texts we find:
The path, in brief, is to fully recognize suffering, to abandon the origin of suffering, to realize cessation, and to follow the path of meditation.
It is by energetically and single-mindedly training in the general and specific stages of the path that comprise the Buddha’s doctrine, matching them to one’s own individual capacity, that one will gradually travel the paths of accumulation, joining, seeing, and meditation, all the way to the end. For the actual attainment of the result depends on practice.

Dudjom Rinpoche

Realizing the nature of mind ~ Buddha Shakyamuni

If you realize the nature of mind, you have already become a buddha. There is no need to seek buddha elsewhere.

Buddha Shakyamuni

Entering the Dharma Gate ~ Milarepa

Though grief in the Ocean of Samsara
Is preached, and its renunciation is urged,
Few people are really convinced
And renounce it with determination.
Though knowing that life will ever turn to death,
Few feel uneasy, or think that it will end.
Though their life is blessed with good prospects,
Few can practice abstention for a day.
Though the Bliss of Liberation is expounded
And Samsara’s pains are stressed,
Few can really enter the Dharma Gate.
Though the profound Pith-Instructions
Of the Whispered Lineage are given without stint, few
Without fail can practice them.
Though the teaching of Mahamudra is expounded
And the Pointing-out demonstration is exercised,
Few can really understand the Essence of Mind.
To the hermit’s life and the Guru’s wish
One can always aspire, but few
Can put them into practice.
The perfect, skillful path of Naropa
May be shown, without concealment,
But those who can really follow it
Are very few. My dear lad,
You should follow in my footsteps
If in this life you want to do
Something that is worthwhile.

Milarepa

Overcoming problems that confront us ~ 14th Dalai Lama

No matter how difficult the situation may be, we should employ science and human ingenuity with determination and courage to overcome the problems that confront us. Faced with threats to our health and well-being, it is natural to feel anxiety and fear. Nevertheless, I take great solace in the following wise advice to examine the problems before us: If there is something to be done — do it, without any need to worry; if there’s nothing to be done, worrying about it further will not help.

14th Dalai Lama

Peace, joy, and happiness right where we are ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

Spirituality is not religion. It is a path for us to generate happiness, understanding, and love, so we can live deeply each moment of our life. Having a spiritual dimension in our lives does not mean escaping life or dwelling in a place of bliss outside this world but discovering ways to handle life’s difficulties and generate peace, joy, and happiness right where we are, on this beautiful planet.

Thich Nhat Hanh

The root of samsara and nirvana ~ Saraha

Realize the nature of mind,
Because it is at the root of both samsaric suffering
And nirvanic bliss.
When you realize this,
Rest the mind without meditating,
Because only deluded people seek enlightenment
By abandoning their own minds.

Saraha

Seeing a student’s potential ~ Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche

A guru should be able to see a student’s potential and know that any negative quality the student exhibits can be transformed and that therefore that student is a worthy recipient of aspiration. There should be no competition, no preference for some students to get enlightened faster; it’s not a race. If the guru judges too much, valuable time will be wasted. Excessive judgment indicates a lack of understanding of the fundamental view of dependent arising and equanimity. A path designed by such a guru will have a panicky and finicky quality.

Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche

Yearning for the Dharma ~ Buddha Shakyamuni

Beings who yearn for the Dharma
And generate effort for the sake of the Dharma are rare.
Anyone who makes the wheel of Dharma turn
Will attain supreme wisdom.

Buddha Shakyamuni

There is no limit to our spiritual potential ~ 14th Dalai Lama

In spiritual matters, we should not allow ourselves to be too easily content, because truly there is no limit to our spiritual potential. All of us — any of us — can develop infinitely; and any of us can attain buddhahood. The mind we possess right now, though it may presently be full of ignorance and suffering, can eventually become the mind of an enlightened being, of a buddha. Where our material possessions are concerned, finding contentment makes sense. But since there is no limit to our spiritual potential and there is a limit to the span of our life, we must make every effort to utilize what little time we have as well as we possibly can with this precious human lifetime.

14th Dalai Lama

Transmission ~ Mingyur Rinpoche

The Guru or teacher is of utmost importance because of the interdependent connection between teacher and disciple. The Buddha who lived thousands of years ago cannot guide us to our own Buddhahood as effectively and expediently as the Guru. The living teacher embodies the wisdom of the practice lineage and functions like a lit lamp that has the energetic power to ignite the mind of the student. If you make a connection, you will get lit, too. This is what we call transmission.

Mingyur Rinpoche

Using illness on the path ~ Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

There is no certainty that we will not fall victim to disease, evil forces and so on. If we are afflicted by serious illness, we should think, “There are countless beings in this world suffering in the same way as I.” In this way we should generate strong feelings of compassion. If, for example, we are struck by heart disease, we should think, “Wherever space pervades, there are beings suffering like this,” and imagine that all their illnesses are concentrated in our own hearts.
If we are struck by evil forces, we should think, “By making me suffer, these evil beings are helping me to practise Bodhichitta; they are of great importance for my progress on the path, and rather than being expelled, they should be thanked.” We should be as grateful to them as we are towards our Teachers.