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.
Your concept or perception of reality is not reality. When you are caught in your perceptions and ideas, you lose reality.
The greatest miracle is to be alive.
Whether the object of your love is your heart, your in-breath, your physical body, or your baby, whether it is your son, your daughter, or your partner, your declaration of love is always the same. It is: “Dear one, I am here for you.
Are you sure of your perceptions?” he asked us. I urge you to write this phrase down on a card and put it up on the wall of your room: “Are you sure of your perceptions?” There is a river of perceptions in you. You should sit down on the bank of this river and contemplate your perceptions.
Any peace talks should begin with making peace with ourselves. First we need to recognize our anger, embrace it, and make peace with it. You don’t fight your anger, because your anger is you. Your anger is the wounded child in you. Why should you fight your anger? The method is entirely nonviolent: awareness, mindfulness, and tenderly holding your anger within you. Like this, your anger will transform naturally.
When we feel anger, irritation, or indignation arising in us, we pause. We stop and come back to our breathing straight away. We do not say or do anything when we are inhabited by this kind of energy, so we don’t escalate the conflict. We wait until we’re calm again. Being able to pause is the greatest gift. It gives us the opportunity to bring more love and compassion into the world rather than more anger and suffering.
Breathe in and tell yourself that a new day has been offered to you, and you have to be here to live it.
The basic condition for us to be able to hear the call of beauty and respond to it is silence.
When we believe that ours is the only faith that contains the truth, violence and suffering will surely be the result... learn and practice nonattachment from views in order to receive others’ viewpoints.
The past is an object of our study, of our meditation, but the way to study it or meditate on it is by remaining anchored in the present moment.
The past is still here in the form of the present. We may think that there isn’t anything we can do about the past anymore, but there is.
Transforming the past is possible, thanks to meditation practice.
Beginning anew” means being determined not to repeat the negative things we have done in the past. A new era begins when we commit ourselves to living in mindfulness. When we vow to ourselves, “I am determined not to behave as I did in the past,” transformation occurs immediately.
If you haven’t been able to be happy, maybe it’s because you’re holding firmly to your idea of happiness.
Suppose we give something to someone. With the wisdom of nondiscrimination, we see that there is no giver and no receiver. If we still think that we’re the giver and the other person is the receiver, then that’s not perfect giving. We give because the other person is in need of what we’re giving and the act is very natural. If we’re really practicing generosity, we won’t say, “He’s not grateful at all.” We won’t have these kinds of ideas.
When you begin to see that your enemy is suffering, that is the beginning of insight. When you see in yourself the wish that the other person stop suffering, that is a sign of real love.
Beginning anew is a wonderful practice. We can all practice beginning anew. We can always start over. With the help of deep looking, we can illuminate the present and gain a better understanding of the past. The past is within our reach, and we can transform it through meditation.
Be in touch with what is wondrous, refreshing, and healing, both inside and around yourself.
My friend, things appear and disappear according to causes and conditions. The true nature of things is not being born, and not dying. Birth and death are nothing more than concepts. Our true nature is the nature of no-birth and no-death, and we must touch our true nature in order to be free.
To love is, first of all, to accept ourselves as we are.