Dilgo Khyentse RinpocheOnce one has found emptiness, it is like the summertime, when the earth becomes warm and all the orchards and forests start to grow naturally without effort. When the nature of awareness has been identified, there is no longer any difference between meditation and the postmeditation experience.
Experiencing connection rather than isolation ~ 17th Karmapa
17th KarmapaWithin each of us there is a deep well of potential goodness — of radiance and nobility. The problem is that we do not always know how to draw from this well or make it a source of ongoing sustenance and support. You could think about it this way: Perhaps when you feel lonely, its is actually your positive qualities that are lonely. It could be your goodness that has become surrounded by adverse factors, unhealthy habits, and cold attitudes. You can surround your own lonely potential for goodness instead with supportive factors and warm attitudes. You can become a friend to your basic radiance and wholeheartedly, unequivocally nurture your own positive qualities. This can bring a quality of warmth and richness to your time alone. Even if no one else is around you, you can experience connection rather than isolation.
Relying on someone who is better than you ~ Longchenpa
LongchenpaFrom the very first step on the path right now, all the way until you have reached the final end, it is of vital importance to rely on someone who is better than yourself. This is in order to direct your mind towards the spiritual practice of past masters and to raise your own level of experience and realisation.
Those who begin by being content and knowing “just this much” and cling to it, whatever insight it may be, will never reach the end of the path, even if they practice in solitude, and will therefore not notice any sidetrack or delusion. Other people may see you as a spiritual person, but for you personally there will be no progress.
We don’t have to force it ~ Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
Dilgo Khyentse RinpocheAwareness will become clearer and clearer of its own accord; we don’t have to force it to become so. In the practice of the Great Perfection, we first recognize the primordial nature of mind, and then become more and more experienced in recognizing it, eventually achieving complete stability in its realization.
Recognition of subtle shifts in mental behavior ~ Mingyur Rinpoche
Mingyur RinpocheThe most important aspect of karma relates to the state of our mind. At some point, whether we meditate or not, we learn that certain activities disturb the mind. When we apply awareness to cause and effect, we cultivate recognition of subtle shifts in mental behavior, and we become more sensitive to how an agitated mind affects other activities. If we don’t pay for our bills, we might become so afraid that the bill collectors will call or knock on the door that we become increasingly anxious, untill we are in serious psychological trouble. In the same way, taking an opportunity to help in small ways, such as helping a lady lift her toddler’s stroller onto a bus, giving up a seat on the subway, even just smiling more than usual, can condition the mind to generate more goodwill and can infuse the whole atmosphere with some subtle sense of kindness.
Embrace your practice with all your heart ~ Atisha
AtishaBe done with doubt and indecision, and embrace your practice with all your heart. Shake off lethargy, dullness and laziness, and strive always with enthusiasm and joy.
Dharma twenty-four-seven ~ Thrangu Rinpoche
Thrangu RinpocheWe shouldn’t feel that Dharma occurs only when we sit down and meditate. Dharma should be present with us all the time. Dharma should be practiced in everything we do and at all times and used in all our actions. Of course, at the moment we can’t act like Milarepa; and the Buddha, but at least we can try to be responsible for our own mind.
Authentic love ~ 17th Karmapa
17th KarmapaWhen you feel authentic love toward others, you will be deeply moved to act. You will not rest until you have found ways to secure the happiness of all those you are able to include in your feelings of love. As you learn to love more and more widely, your love will motivate you to act to benefit not just the few people in your inner circle, but your whole society, and eventually, the whole world. This makes love an immensely powerful basis for social action of any sort.
Has your mind changed ~ Lama Yeshe
Lama YesheBuddhism places prime importance on personal experimentation, putting Dharma methods into action and assessing the effect they have on our minds: Do these methods help? Has your mind changed or is it just as uncontrolled as it ever was? Buddhism works by giving you ideas that you can check out in your own experience to see if they’re true. And this method of checking the mind is called meditation. The Buddha himself said, “Belief is not important. Don’t believe what I say just because I said it.” These were basically his dying words. “I have taught many different methods because there are many different individuals. Before you embrace them, use your wisdom to check that they fit your psychological make-up, your own mind. If my methods seem to make sense and work for you, by all means adopt them. But if you don’t relate to them, even though they might sound wonderful, leave them be. They were taught for somebody else.
Keep a middle course ~ Dudjom Rinpoche
Dudjom RinpocheBe constant amid the ebb and flow of happiness and suffering. Be friendly and even with others. Unguarded, intemperate chatter will put you in their power; excessive silence may leave them unclear as to what you mean. So keep a middle course: don’t swagger with self-confidence, but don’t be a doormat either. Don’t run after gossip without examining the truth of it. People who know how to keep their mouths shut are rare. So don’t chatter about your wishes and intentions; keep them to yourself. And whether you are speaking to an enemy, an acquaintance or a friend, never break a confidence.
A state of total presence ~ Namkhai Norbu Rinpoche
Namkhai Norbu RinpocheEnlightenment, or Nirvana, is nothing other than the state beyond all obstacles, in the same way that from the peak of a very high mountain one always sees the sun. Nirvana is not a paradise or some special place of happiness, but is in fact the condition beyond all dualistic concepts, including those of happiness and suffering.
When all our obstacles have been overcome, and we find ourselves in a state of total presence, the wisdom of enlightenment manifests spontaneously without limits, just like the infinite rays of the sun. The clouds have dissolved, and the sun is finally free to shine once again.
Seeing the real, you are free ~ Nagarjuna
NagarjunaSeeing what is not real, you are bound;
Seeing the real, you are free.
The absence of wisdom and awareness ~ Thrangu Rinpoche
Thrangu RinpocheDue to the absence of wisdom and awareness and due to having failed to learn how phenomena manifest and how they are, the mind has built up and developed the habitual pattern of ignorance since beginningless time and remains entangled in its darkness.
The mind of a buddha is all-pervasive ~ Shri Singha
Shri SinghaThere is no difference between buddhas and sentient beings other than their scope of mind. What is called mind, consciousness, or awareness, is of a single identity. The mind of a sentient being is limited. The mind of a buddha is all-pervasive. So develop a scope of mind that is like the sky, which has no limit to the east, west, north, or south.
Renunciation ~ Padmasambhava
PadmasambhavaTranscendent renunciation is developed by meditating on the preciousness of human life in terms of the ocean of evolutionary possibilities, the immediacy of death, the inexorability of evolutionary causality, and the sufferings of the ignorance-driven, involuntary life cycle. Renunciation automatically occurs when you come face-to-face with your real existential situation, and so develop a genuine sympathy for yourself, having given up pretending the prison of habitual emotions and confusions is just fine. Meditating on the teachings given on these themes in a systematic way enables you to generate quickly an ambition to gain full control of your body and mind in order at least to face death confidently, knowing you can navigate safely through the dangers of further journeys. Wasting time investing your life in purposes that “you cannot take with you” becomes ludicrous, and, when you radically shift your priorities, you feel a profound relief at unburdening yourself of a weight of worry over inconsequential things.
Let appearance and awareness be indivisible ~ Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche
Tulku Urgyen RinpocheDo not divide appearances as being there and awareness as being here. Let appearance and awareness be indivisible.
The tremendous difference between aspiration and actualization ~ Khandro Rinpoche
Khandro RinpocheIt is very common, for western and eastern practitioners alike, to think we want to attain enlightenment and benefit sentient beings. But there is a tremendous difference between aspiration and actualization. We want to, we hope to, we wish to — but we may not actually have the courage to actualize our aspiration. Therefore the tendency is to take an intellectual approach to the teachings. The pitfall, then, is the tendency to come up with many impediments and obstacles to the path of practice.
Change ~ Chagdud Tulku Rinpoche
Chagdud Tulku RinpocheWhatever comes together must fall apart, whatever was born must die. Continual change, relentless change, is constant in our world.
The habits of mindfulness, alertness, carefulness ~ Thrangu Rinpoche
Thrangu RinpocheIt is important, in whatever practice you are doing, to cultivate mindfulness, alertness and carefulness in when you rise from meditation. Through inculcating these habits in your mind, then they will arise for you in the bardo. When the habits of mindfulness, alertness, carefulness, and so forth arise in the bardo, they will cause the appearances of the bardo to be far less overwhelming, you will gain more control over what happens to you, including more control over your rebirth.
A greater sense of possibility ~ 17th Karmapa
17th KarmapaDetermining who we are or how we are doing in life by comparing ourselves to others will never give us a stable or reliable measure of our well-being, because comparative judgments always shift based on who we are comparing ourselves to. We do not need to live our lives measuring ourselves against external standards set for us by others. We do not need to limit ourselves to those options. When we view who we are on the model of interconnectedness, we know that we are no single thing — not a fixed or bounded identity. The options for who we can become are as boundless as the number of points in an open network. Since we are related to all other points, we can strengthen our connections and grow in any directions. We can set our own course in life.
I feel that seeing ourselves as interdependent rather than as separate individuals is more productive because it offers more opportunities for freedom. We do not need to define ourselves by how we stand up to an endlessly moving external measure. Individuality gives a sense of restriction. Interdependence gives a greater sense of possibility.