We are looking for happiness and running after it in such a way that creates anger, fear and discrimination. So when you attend a retreat, you have a chance to look at the deep roots of this pollution of the collective energy that is unwholesome.
Letting go gives us freedom, and freedom is the only condition for happiness. If, in our heart, we still cling to anything – anger, anxiety, or possessions – we cannot be free.
Our own life has to be our message.
We are here to awaken from our illusion of separateness.
Only the present moment contains life.
Life is available only in the present moment.
It is not impermanence that makes us suffer. What makes us suffer is wanting things to be permanent when they are not.
The Buddha always reminds us that our afflictions, including our fear and our desiring, are born from our ignorance. That is why in order to dissipate fear, we have to remove wrong perception.
If you realize that the other person is a human being too, and you have exactly the same kind of spiritual path, and then the two can become good practitioners. This appears to be practical for both.
Fear is born from ignorance. We think that the other person is trying to take away something from us. But if we look deeply, we see that the desire of the other person is exactly our own desire – to have peace, to be able to have a chance to live.
If the people who hurt us have anger or desperation within them then they suffer. When you see that someone suffers, you might be motivated by a desire to help him not to suffer anymore.
Be angry, it’s okay. To be angry, that is very human. And to learn how to smile at your anger and make peace with your anger is very nice.
There is no real separation between self or no-self. Anything you do for yourself you do for the society at the same time. And anything you do for society you do for yourself also.
Loving ourselves means loving our community. When we are capable of loving ourselves, nourishing ourselves properly, not intoxicating ourselves, we are already protecting and nourishing society.
We ourselves need love; it’s not only society, the world outside, that needs love. But we can’t expect that love to come from outside of us. We should ask the question whether we are capable of loving ourselves as well as others.
By taking a look at your anger it can be transformed into the kind of energy that you need – understanding and compassion.
The only answer to fear is more understanding. And there is no understanding if there is no effort to look more deeply to see what is there in our heart and in the heart of the other person.
Buddhism is in your heart. Even if you don’t have any temple or any monks, you can still be a Buddhist in your heart and life.
I don’t have to hate any person because I can always start anew, I can always reconcile.
The way must be in you; the destination also must be in you and not somewhere else in space or time. If that kind of self-transformation is being realized in you, you will arrive.
To be beautiful means to be yourself. You don’t need to be accepted by others. You need to accept yourself.