Lama YesheDon’t bring your materialistic way of life to your Dharma practice. It doesn’t work. Before meditating, check and correct your motivation. If you do this, your meditation will become much easier and more worthwhile, and your right action will bring realizations. You don’t need to be hungry for realizations, grasping, “Oh, if I do this, will I get some fantastic realizations?” You don’t need expectation; realizations will come automatically. Once you’ve set your mind on the right path, realizations will come of their own accord.
Tag Archives: grasping
Like a homeless prince ~ Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche
Dzigar Kongtrul RinpocheGrasping to a non-existent self, we misread our world and lose the true treasure of our mind. Because of our belief in a self that must be preserved at all costs, ego controls our every mental, emotional, verbal, and physical act. Although our wisdom mind is completely radiant at all times, we become like a homeless prince: a monarch who lives like a vagabond, unaware of his own inheritance.
Like rainbows in the summer skies ~ Gyelse Tokme Zangpo
Gyelse Tokme ZangpoThe practice of all the bodhisattvas is to let go of grasping
When encountering things one finds pleasant or attractive,
Considering them to be like rainbows in the summer skies —
Beautiful in appearance, yet in truth devoid of any substance.
Nothing wrong with having pleasures ~ Lama Yeshe
Lama YesheContrary to what some people might believe, there is nothing wrong with having pleasures and enjoyments. What is wrong is the confused way we grasp onto these pleasures, turning them from a source of happiness into a source of pain and dissatisfaction.
Building Inner Strength ~ Pema Chödron
Pema ChödronYou build inner strength through embracing the totality of your experience, both the delightful parts and the difficult parts. Embracing the totality of your experience is one definition of having loving kindness for yourself. Loving kindness does not mean making sure you’re feeling good all the time – trying to set up your life so that you’re comfortable every moment. Rather, it means setting up your life so that you have time for meditation and self-reflection, for kindhearted, compassionate self-honesty. In this way you become more attuned to seeing when you’re biting the hook, when you’re getting caught in the undertow of emotions, when you’re grasping and when you’re letting go. This is the way you become a true friend to yourself just as you are, with both your laziness and your bravery. There is no step more important than this.
Living fully ~ Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche
Dzongsar Khyentse RinpocheIf one knows that everything is impermanent, one does not grasp, and if one does not grasp, one will not think in terms of having or lacking, and therefore one lives fully.
Opposite direction to dharma ~ Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche
Dzongsar Khyentse RinpocheHowever beneficial a practice appears to be, however politically correct or exciting, if it does not contradict your habit of grasping at permanence, or looks harmless but insidiously encourages you to forget the truth of impermanence and the illusory nature of phenomena, it will inevitably take you in the opposite direction to dharma.
The need for dualistic practice ~ Tulku Thondup Rinpoche
Tulku Thondup RinpocheWhy do we need dualistic practices, such as generating merit, to reach a state that transcends duality? Because we have to start from where we are. Our mind’s true nature is covered by karmic turbulence caused by our grasping at self and our negative mental habits. “Grasping at a self” refers to the way we grasp at mental objects as truly existing, perceiving them dualistically as subject and object. The aspect of our mind that perceives this way is conceptual mind. Conceptual mind and the true nature of mind are like the surface and depths of the ocean: The surface is choppy with wind-tossed waves; beneath it is still and peaceful.
Most of us can’t glimpse into the depths, our true nature, because our conceptual mind is constantly churning out turbulence. Grasping at self tricks us, like a nightmare, into believing that we are separate from the world and each other. This triggers negative emotions, from craving and anxiety to jealousy and aggression, which spill out into unhealthy words and actions.
Every dualistic perception, every negative thought, feeling, word, and deed, leaves a negative karmic imprint in our conceptual mind that walls us off from our true nature. On the other hand, positive mentalities leave positive karmic imprints that open our mind, loosen grasping at self, and thin out the barriers to our true nature.
As long as we have dualistic concepts and emotions, the world is solid to us. Our suffering is all too real. Circumstances matter. If our surroundings are chaotic, it will be hard to find tranquillity. If we experience peace and joy, however, we will be inspired to generate even more peace and joy. Then whatever we say and do will be the words and deeds of joy and peace. We progressively loosen our grasping at self, and eventually we glimpse the luminous nature of our mind. If we perfect this realization, we uproot grasping at self and become fully awakened.
The happiness we seek is already here ~ Pema Chödron
Pema ChödronThe happiness we seek is our birthright. To discover it we need to be more gentle with ourselves, more compassionate toward ourselves and our universe. The happiness we seek cannot be found through grasping, trying to hold on to things. It cannot be found through getting serious and uptight about wanting things to go in the direction we think will bring happiness. We are always taking hold of the wrong end of the stick. The point is that the happiness we seek is already here and it will be found through relaxation and letting go rather than through struggle.
Cultivating equanimity ~ Pema Chödron
Pema ChödronTo cultivate equanimity we practice catching ourselves when we feel attraction or aversion, before it hardens into grasping or negativity.
Lean In ~ Pema Chödron
Pema ChödronThe next time you lose heart and you can’t bear to experience what you’re feeling, you might recall this instruction: change the way you see it and lean in. Instead of blaming our discomfort on outer circumstances or on our own weakness, we can choose to stay present and awake to our experience, not rejecting it, not grasping it, not buying the stories that we relentlessly tell ourselves. This is priceless advice that addresses the true cause of suffering — yours, mine, and that of all living beings.
Ego finds a name for itself ~ Chögyam Trungpa
Chögyam TrungpaThe ego feels rather lonely and, at the same time, keeps busy trying to defend itself. It finds that it consists of a collection of desires, expectations, ideas, conclusions, memories, and many other things. This collection is too complicated for the ego to grasp; therefore, it conveniently constructs “I am” or “I am the ego” and puts this label on itself as if it were a real individual entity. Having found a name for itself, the ego has to constantly work to secure itself, because fundamentally it knows that it is not real and sound.
There is blue sky all the time ~ Chögyam Trungpa
Chögyam TrungpaThe absence of grasping and fixation is like flying in an airplane. When we rise above the clouds, we begin to realize that upstairs there is a blue sky all the time. We realize that the sun is always shining, even when it is cloudy and rainy down below. There is blue sky all the time, and that blue sky is free from clouds.
Positive Attachment ~ 14th Dalai Lama
14th Dalai LamaIf your engagement with others is tainted by strong attachment, craving, aversion, anger, and so forth, then that form of grasping is undesirable. But on the other hand, when you are interacting with other living beings and become aware of their needs or suffering or pain, then you need to fully engage with that and be compassionate. So there can be positive attachment in this sense of active engagement.
Buddhist masters have long used the term attachment to describe the quality of compassion for others. For example, a verse from Haribhadra’s Clear Meaning Commentary refers to compassion that is attached to other living beings. And as we have seen, Nagarjuna teaches that attachment for other living beings will arise spontaneously in the person who realizes emptiness.