Your happiness and suffering depend on your actions and not on my wishes for you.

Whatever we cultivate in times of ease, we gather as strength for times of change.

Weigh the true advantages of forgiveness and resentment to the heart. Then choose.

In the end, forgiveness simply means never putting another person out of our heart.

At the end of our life our questions are simple: Did I live fully? Did I love well?

We do not have to improve ourselves; we just have to let go of what blocks our heart.

Compassion is our deepest nature. It arises from our interconnection with all things.

We can bring a heart of understanding and compassion to a world that needs it so much.

Skill in concentrating and steadying the mind is the basis for all types of meditation.

There are no holy places and no holy people, only holy moments, only moments of wisdom.

Embodied courage chooses not to wait until illness or notice of death demands attention.

The first level of practice is illuminated by the qualities of courage and renunciation.

Virtue and integrity are necessary for genuine happiness. Guard your integrity with care.

Wisdom says we are nothing. Love says we are everything. Between these two our life flows.

You need a community. They remind you when you forget, and you remind them when they forget.

We must especially learn the art of directing mindfulness into the closed areas of our life.

Have respect for yourself, and patience and compassion. With these, you can handle anything.

Most people discover that when hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with their own pain.

Each moment of every day is new and then it vanishes. Where is that day? Where is that moment?

To live fully is to let go and die with each passing moment, and to be reborn in each new one.

Everything that has a beginning has an ending. Make your peace with that and all will be well.

Live in joy, luminosity, and peace even among the troubles of the world. Remember who you are.

Though outer events may be difficult, the key to our happiness is how our mind responds to them.

Westerners, more than most Asians, are prone to feelings of fear, self-hatred, and unworthiness.

We have only now, only this single eternal moment opening and unfolding before us, day and night.

Meditation is a vehicle for opening to the truth of this impermanence on deeper and deeper levels.

Yet I knew that spiritual practice is impossible without great dedication, energy, and commitment.

Within each of us there is a silence as vast as the universe. We long for it. We can return to it.

Breathing meditation can quiet the mind, open the body, and develop a great power of concentration.

Where we tended to be judgmental, we became more judgmental of ourselves in our spiritual practice.

All of spiritual practice is a matter of relationship: to ourselves, to others, to life's situations.

Everybody needs to take some time, in some way, to quiet themselves and really listen to their heart.

Only a deep attention to the whole of our life can bring us the capacity to love well and live freely.

The words of the Buddha offer this truth: ∼ Hatred never ceases by hatred but by love alone is healed.

To understand ourselves and our life is the point of insight meditation: to understand and to be free.

Anger shows us precisely where we are stuck, where our limits are, where we cling to beliefs and fears.

There are many ways up the mountain and each of us must choose a practice that feels true to our heart.

As we learn to bow, we discover that the heart holds more freedom and compassion than we could imagine.

We are awakened to the profound realization that the true path to liberation is to let go of everything.

Letting go does not mean not caring about things. It means caring about them in a flexible and wise way.

With mindfulness, we are learning to observe in a new way, with balance and a powerful disidentification.

To live in this precious animal body on this earth is as great a part of spiritual life as anything else.

We don't know all the reasons that propel us on a spiritual journey, but somehow our life compels us to go.

A second quality of mature sirituality is kindness. It is based on a fundamental notion of self-acceptance.

As desire abates, generosity is born. When we are connected and present, what else is there to do but give?

In Buddhist practice, the outward and inward aspects of taking the one seat meet on our meditation cushion.

A factor that greatly supports the opening of energy in practice is exercise and care of the physical body.

It is our commitment to wholeness that matters, the willingness to unfold in every deep aspect of our being.

It is not enough to know that love and forgiveness are possible. We have to find ways to bring them to life.

When we get too caught up in the busyness of the world, we lose connection with one another - and ourselves.

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