Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/31/2013

"We are like children building a sand castle. We embellish it with beautiful shells, bits of driftwood, and pieces of colored glass. The castle is ours, off limits to others. We're willing to attack if others threaten to hurt it. Yet despite all our attachment, we know that the tide will inevitably come in and sweep the sand castle away. The trick is to enjoy it fully but without clinging, and when the time comes, let it dissolve back into the sea."

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/30/2013

"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."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/29/2013

"The greatest obstacle to connecting with our joy is resentment."

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/27/2013

"It's helpful to remind yourself that meditation is about opening and relaxing with whatever arises, without picking and choosing."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/26/2013

"Meditation is about seeing clearly the body that we have, the mind that we have, the domestic situation that we have, the job that we have, and the people who are in our lives. It's about seeing how we react to all these things. It's seeing our emotions and thoughts just as they are right now, in this very moment, in this very room, on this very seat. It's about not trying to make them go away, not trying to become better than we are, but just seeing clearly with precision and gentleness."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/25/2013

"The only reason we don't open our hearts and minds to other people is that they trigger confusion in us that we don't feel brave enough or sane enough to deal with. To the degree that we look clearly and compassionately at ourselves, we feel confident and fearless about looking into someone else's eyes."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/24/2013

"The future is completely open, and we are writing it moment to moment."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/23/2013

"The most difficult times for many of us are the ones we give ourselves."

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/22/2013

"Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to learn."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/20/2013

"The most fundamental aggression to ourselves, the most fundamental harm we can do to ourselves, is to remain ignorant by not having the courage and the respect to look at ourselves honestly and gently."

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/19/2013

"Opening to the world begins to benefit ourselves and others simultaneously. The more we relate with others, the more quickly we discover where we're blocked."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/18/2013

"I would not look upon anger as something foreign to me that I have to fight. I have to deal with my anger with care, with love, with tenderness, with nonviolence. A further sign of health is that we don't become undone by fear and trembling, but we take it as a message that it's time to stop struggling and look directly at what's threatening us."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/17/2013

"Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing. We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don't really get solved. They come together and they fall apart. Then they come together again and fall apart again. It's just like that. The healing comes from letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief, for misery, for joy."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/16/2013

"If you have rage and righteously act it out and blame it all on others, it's really you who suffers. The other people and the environment suffer also, but you suffer more because you're being eaten up inside with rage, causing you to hate yourself more and more."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/15/2013

"Meditation takes us just as we are, with our confusion and our sanity. This complete acceptance of ourselves as we are is called maitri, or unconditional friendliness, a simple, direct relationship with the way we are."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/13/2013

"Meditation practice isn't about trying to throw ourselves away and become something better. It's about befriending who we are already."

 

~Pema Chödrön

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/12/2013

"In true dialog, both sides are willing to change."

 

~Thich Nhat Hanh

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/11/2013

"Your true home is in the here and the now."

 

~Thich Nhat Hanh

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/10/2013

"Each thought, each action in the sunlight of awareness becomes sacred."

~Thich Nhat Hanh

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/9/2013

"Awareness is like the sun. When it shines on things, they are transformed."

 

~Thich Nhat Hanh

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/8/2013

"Happiness does not come from consumption of things."

 

~Thich Nhat Hanh

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/6/2013

"The problem that faces us is the problem of awakening. What we lack is not an ideology or doctrine that will save the world. What we lack is mindfulness of what we are, of what our situation really is. We need to wake up in order to rediscover our human sovereignty. We are riding a horse that is running out of control. The way of salvation is a new culture in which human beings are encouraged to rediscover their deepest nature."

 

~Thich Nhat Hanh

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/3/2013

"The most precious gift we can offer others is our presence. When mindfulness embraces those we love, they will bloom like flowers."

 

~Thich Nhat Hanh

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/2/2013

"You have to learn how to help a wounded child while still practicing mindful breathing. You should not allow yourself to get lost in action. Action should be meditation at the same time."

~Thich Nhat Hanh

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Early Morning Buddhist Inspiration - 7/1/2013

"Anyone can practice some nonviolence, even soldiers. Some army generals, for example, conduct their operations in ways that avoid killing innocent people; this is a kind of nonviolence. To help soldiers move in the nonviolent direction, we have to be in touch with them. If we divide reality into two camps - the violent and the nonviolent - and stand in one camp while attacking the other, the world will never have peace. We will always blame and condemn those we feel are responsible for wars and social injustice, without recognizing the degree of violence in ourselves. We must work on ourselves and also with those we condemn if we want to have a real impact.

It never helps to draw a line and dismiss some people as enemies, even those who act violently. We have to approach them with love in our hearts and do our best to help them move in a direction of nonviolence. If we work for peace out of anger, we will never succeed. Peace is not an end. It can never come about through non-peaceful means."

 

~Thich Nhat Hanh

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