As we learn to relax with groundlessness, this enthusiasm will emerge. We practice what is called the threefold purity – no big deal about the doer, no big deal about the action, no big deal about the result. This joyful exertion is rooted in no expectation, no ambition, no hope of fruition. We just eagerly put one foot in front of the other and are not discouraged when we fall flat on our faces. We act without self-congratulation or self-censure, without fearing criticism or expecting applause. Through continual practice we find out how to cross over the boundary between stuckness and waking up. It depends on our willingness to experience directly feelings we’ve been avoiding for many years. This willingness to stay open to what scares us weakens our habits of avoidance. It’s the way that ego-clinging becomes ventilated and begins to fade.
Pema Chödron
from the book The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times
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Further quotes from the book The Places That Scare You:
- The queasy feeling of being in the middle of nowhere
- The anxiety of opening
- Everyday uncertainty
- Cultivating equanimity
- Happiness
- Life preferences
- The root of happiness
- Awakening our unlimited potential
- Dissolving our self-importance
- Dissolving our fear
- At least until you die
- The first mark of existence
- Being in the middle of nowhere
- A flexible identity
- Our Shared Humanity
- Idiot Compassion
- Cultivating equanimity
- Compassion takes courage
- Abiding in openness
- The essence of generosity