In the West, we are very goal oriented. We know where we want to go, and we are very directed in getting there. This may be useful, but often we forget to enjoy ourselves along the route.
Even when we’re sitting still, with no external stimuli, an endless internal dialogue may be going on in our head. we’re constantly consuming our thoughts. Cows, goats, and buffalo chew their food, swallow it, then regurgitate and rechew it multiple times. We may not be cows or buffalo, but we ruminate just the same on our thoughts – unfortunately, primarily negative thoughts. We eat them, and then we bring them up to chew again and again, like a cow chewing its cud.
I am convinced that happiness is not possible unless it is based on freedom.
Whatever the tasks, do them slowly and with ease, in mindfulness.
Without suffering, we do not have the opportunity to cultivate compassion and understanding; and without understanding, there can be no true love. So.
Feeling the heat of anger right now, I close my eyes and look into the future. Three hundred years from now, where will you, where will I, be?
We cannot be by ourselves alone. We can only inter-be with everything else in the cosmos.
Buddhist teachings are meant to awaken our true self, not merely to add to our storehouse of knowledge. From.
We absorb and reflect what is around us. If we live in a place where people are angry and violent, then eventually we’ll become like them.
Attachment to views, attachment to ideas, attachment to perceptions are the biggest obstacle to the truth.
Often we either don’t plan at all, or we get caught up in obsessive planning because we fear the future and its uncertainty.
The best position for practicing this is lying down. You focus your attention on a part of your body, such as your heart. As you breathe in, you become aware of your heart, and as you breathe out, you smile towards it. You send it your love, your tenderness.
Precepts in Buddhism and commandments in Judiasm and Christianity are important jewels that we need to study and practice. They provide guidelines that can help us transform our suffering.
If learning is not followed by reflecting and practicing, it is not true learning.
See that the most essential thing is life and that killing or oppressing one another will not solve anything.
Whatever the tasks, do them slowly and with ease, in mindfulness. Don’t do any task in order to get it over with. Resolve to do each job in a relaxed way, with all your attention.
We wanted peace. We did not care about anyone’s victory or defeat. We just wanted the bombs to stop falling on us.
Friends, being lost in thoughts is one of the things that prevents us from making true contact with life. If you are ruled by worry, frustration, anxiety, anger, or jealousy, you will lose the chance to make real contact with all the wonders of life.
When we have hatred and anger in ourselves, they rebound to all quarters. When we have peace and joy in ourselves, our peace and joy will radiate throughout the whole cosmos.
The most basic precept of all is to be aware of what we do, what we are, each minute. Every other precept will follow from that.