Chögyam TrungpaTo benefit from meditation, you need more than just a glimpse. You need to make a commitment to training yourself in meditation. Otherwise, there will be a lot of gaps and missing the point, and you will experience unnecessary confusion. So it’s important to stick with the practice and follow the instructions that you receive. It might be best to look at meditation as a way of life. If you stick with the practice and go along with exertion and patience, you will have a chance to realize yourself, to understand yourself.
Intelligence ~ 17th Karmapa
17th KarmapaHuman beings are the most intelligent and resourceful species on earth. If we use our intelligence to cause more suffering, rather than to bring some real benefit to others and ourselves, we are no better than beasts.
Realizing chaos ~ Chögyam Trungpa
Chögyam TrungpaNo one can save us from the state of chaos or samsara unless we understand the meaning of chaos and confusion, unless we have experienced it and suffered from it. Otherwise, although we may be in the midst of chaos, we don’t notice it. You don’t begin to notice chaos until you are already on the path. Then you begin to feel uncomfortable. You feel that something is a nuisance. Something’s bugging you constantly. You realize the chaos when you are already making the journey.
A long journey through the six realms of samsara ~ Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
Dilgo Khyentse RinpocheWe have a long journey to make through the six realms of samsara. We should approach the Dharma like a sailor making his meticulous preparations for a voyage around the world, and prepare ourselves properly for our far longer journey, through death and rebirth.
The enemy within ~ Chögyam Trungpa
Chögyam TrungpaWe tend to think that the threats to our society or to ourselves are outside of us. We fear that some enemy will destroy us. But a society is destroyed from the inside, not from an attack by outsiders. We imagine an enemy coming with spears and machine guns to kill us, massacre us. In reality, the only thing that can destroy us is within ourselves. If we have too much arrogance, we will destroy the possibility of being awake, and then we cannot use our intuitive openness to extend ourselves in situations properly. Instead, we generate tremendous aggression.
Genuine smiles ~ 14th Dalai Lama
14th Dalai LamaI love smiles. Because of this I have the problem of knowing how to make more friends and how to get more smiles, in particular, genuine smiles. For there are many kinds of smile, such as sarcastic, artificial or diplomatic smiles. Many smiles produce no feeling of satisfaction, and sometimes they can even create suspicion or fear, can’t they? But a genuine smile really gives us a feeling of freshness and is, I believe, unique to human beings. If these are the smiles we want, then we ourselves must create the reasons for them to appear.
Relationships in the absence of attachment ~ 17th Karmapa
17th KarmapaThe wish to pull in or push away what we perceive around us is a big force in our relationships. Rather than relaxing and appreciating the other person, we engage in a constant struggle to get what we want from them, and to avoid getting what we do not want. For that reason, in order to build healthy relationships we need to deal with our attachment as well as our aversion.
It might be useful to start by looking at our assumptions about attachment and also about non attachment. Conventional wisdom leads many people to question whether or not relationships are even possible without attachment. I have heard people say that if there were no attachment, they would have no close relationships. People try to induce attachment in others as a basis for starting a relationship with them. They wield a attachment like a hook, trying to pull people towards them and literally get them hooked.
If you find it hard to imagine how a warm and healthy relationship could exist in the absence of attachment, this indicates confusion between being detached and being free of attachment. Detachment is very different from non attachment. Detachment suggests an unfeeling indifference. By contrast, when there is an absence of attachment, healthy feelings have ample room to blossom. This is because attachment causes you to be totally consumed by something or someone.
Perceiving all sounds as empty echoes ~ Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
Dilgo Khyentse RinpocheIf you are the target of some harsh criticism or insulting talk, for example, the harder you try to avoid being exposed to it, the more of it you seem to hear. The best thing would be to be like the great sages of the past, who felt neither upset when criticised, nor pleased when praised, because they were able to perceive all sounds as empty echoes, and to hear all criticism and praise about themselves just as though people were speaking about a person who had died long ago.
The value of having a good heart ~ 14th Dalai Lama
14th Dalai LamaI try always to express the value of having a good heart. This simple aspect of human nature can be nourished to great power. With a good heart and wisdom you have right motivation and will automatically do what needs to be done. If people begin to act with genuine compassion for every one, we can still protect each other and the natural environment. This is much easier than having to adapt to the severe and incomprehensible environmental conditions projected for the future.
Recognizing our shared humanity ~ Pema Chödron
Pema ChödronCompassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others.
Giving and Receiving ~ 17th Karmapa
17th KarmapaWe may talk about the equality of ourselves and others, or exchanging ourselves with others, but we do not understand that this happens in everyday life. We think that it is something special or extraordinary, yet it is happening in our lives on a daily basis. We give something, and that opens the possibility of receiving: we naturally receive something when we give. This is how we live, whether it is in the business world, in our social lives, or in any other context. Giving and taking is happening all the time. Living is dependent on giving: we give and therefore we receive. This interdependence is natural; however, it takes a special effort to train our mind to know this well enough so that our understanding is clear and strong.
Please keep this in mind ~ Longchenpa
LongchenpaIn short, at all times and in all situations, let whatever you do accord with the sacred Dharma and dedicate all virtue towards enlightenment. If you do so, you will fulfill the vision of your lamas and be of service to the teachings. You will repay the kindness of your parents and spontaneously benefit yourself and others. Please keep this in mind.
Illusion of our separateness ~ Thich Nhat Hanh
Thich Nhat HanhWe are here to awaken from the illusion of our separateness.
Losing confidence in oneself ~ Mingyur Rinpoche
Mingyur RinpocheWhen the underlying causes that produced and perpetuated an experience of happinesss change, most people end up blaming either external conditions or themselves. However, because it reflects a loss of confidence in oneself, or in the things we’re taught to believe should bring us happiness, blame only makes the search for happiness more difficult.
Three higher trainings ~ Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche
Dzongsar Khyentse RinpocheTraining in discipline purifies wrongdoing and wrong thinking; training in meditation stabilises right view, right motivation and right action; and training in wisdom liberates us from the root of ignorance.
Importance of dhamma practice ~ Ajahn Chah
Ajahn ChahYou say that you are too busy to meditate. Do you have time to breathe? Meditation is your breath. Why do you have time to breathe but not to meditate? Breathing is something vital to people’s lives. If you see that dhamma practice is vital to your life, then you will feel that breathing and practising the dhamma are equally important.
Liberating others ~ Buddha Shakyamuni
Buddha ShakyamuniIt is impossible to liberate others while you are bound. It is possible to liberate others when you are free.
Supreme Example ~ Chögyam Trungpa
You take refuge in the Buddha not as a savior – not with the feeling that you found something to make you secure – but as an example, as someone you can emulate. He is an example of an ordinary human being who saw through the deceptions of life, both on the ordinary and spiritual levels.
Love ~ 14th Dalai Lama
14th Dalai LamaEven more important than the warmth and affection we receive,is the warmth and affection we give. It is by giving warmth and affection, by having a genuine sense of concern for others, in other words through compassion, that we gain the conditions for genuine happiness. More important than being loved, therefore, is to love.
Dissolving our self-importance ~ Pema Chödron
Pema ChödronThe fixed idea that we have about ourselves as solid and separate from each other is painfully limiting. It is possible to move through the drama of our lives without believing so earnestly in the character that we play. That we take ourselves so seriously, that we are so absurdly important in our own minds, is a problem for us. We feel justified in being annoyed with everything. We feel justified in denigrating ourselves or in feeling that we are more clever than other people. Self-importance hurts us, limiting us to the narrow world of our likes and dislikes. We end up bored to death with ourselves and our world. We end up never satisfied.
We have two alternatives: either we question our beliefs — or we don’t. Either we accept our fixed versions of reality, or we begin to challenge them. In Buddha’s opinion, to train in staying open and curious — to train in dissolving our assumptions and beliefs — is the best use of our human lives.