Unless you have made a clear decision to turn your back on samsara, then however many prayers you recite, however much you meditate, however many years you remain in retreat, it will all be in vain. You may have a long life, but it will be without essence. You may accumulate great wealth, but it will be meaningless. The only thing that is really worth doing is to get steadily closer to enlightenment and further away from samsara. Think about it carefully.
Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
from the book The Heart of Compassion: The Thirty-seven Verses on the Practice of a Bodhisattva
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Further quotes from the book The Heart of Compassion:
- Powerful sources of help
- The importance of relative bodhicitta
- Accepting short-term sufferings
- Phenomena adorn emptiness
- Practice day and night
- Two types of friends
- Seeing clearly how deceiving the ways of the world are
- Cutting through subtler misconceptions
- Just projections of the mind
- Protecting ourselves from future suffering
- Impermanence dawning in your mind
- A practice based on your mind
- The three aspects of diligence
- The children of the buddhas
- Opportunity
- The magnifying glass of your faith and devotion
- I like suffering
- The best opportunity to put the teachings into practice
- Meaningless activities without end
- Nothing to be grasped