We were born alone and we will die alone. Yet even while alone we still have our shadow with us; and alone after death, our consciousness will still have with it the shadow of our actions, good and bad. By the time we are just about to enter the bardo, the intermediate state between death and birth, it will be far too late to begin our Dharma practice. But if we have already prepared ourselves, if we feel confident in our practice and know how to go to a Buddha-field, there will be no suffering in death.

Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche

from the book The Heart Treasure of the Enlightened Ones

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Further quotes from the book The Heart Treasure of the Enlightened Ones:

• Two ways to meditate
• Mastery of the mind
• A lump of earth
• Following the view
• Seeing the truth of the teaching
• The intention to benefit others
• The gift of the Dharma
• Stillness and movement
• Remember death
• Ordinary worldly goals
• No greater virtue
• Three turnings of the wheel of Dharma
• Don’t be like that
• Mind filled with faith
• The spear of mindfulness
• This is very shortsighted
• Cause and effect
• The only way to obtain lasting happiness
• At the time of death