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Pema Chodron Quotes - Page 12

All Quotes Acceptance Acting Addiction Appreciation Attitude Awakening Awareness Belief Bravery Buddhism Certainty Challenges Change Character Children Choices Clarity Commitment Compassion Confusion Curiosity Desire Determination Disappointment Drama Earth Ego Empathy Energy Enlightenment Experience Fear Feelings Finding Yourself Freedom Giving Giving Up Grief Happiness Healing Heart Honesty Humanity Hurt Identity Ignorance Insecurity Inspirational Inspiring Journey Joy Justice Karma Kindness Learning Letting Go Life Loneliness Meditation Mindfulness Opportunity Pain Peace Peace Of Mind Perfection Perspective Pleasure Prejudice Quality Reality Resentment Revenge Running Sadness Sleep Sorrow Spirituality Struggle Suffering Teaching Train Training Understanding Waiting Warrior Water Wisdom

We are not given any promises that, because of our noble intentions, everything will be okay. We learn that what truly heals is gratitude and tenderness. We [need] to transform our minds and actions for the sake of

We are not given any promises that, because of our noble intentions, everything will be okay. We learn that what truly heals is gratitude and tenderness. We [need] to transform our minds and actions for the sake of other people and for the future of the world.

Gratitude, People, Promise

You must learn to sit with the restless, painful energy and not let the momentum pull you under and cause you to do the same thing over and over that's ruining your life and the lives of those around you.

Life, Learning, Energy

The sad part is that all we're trying to do is not feel that underlying uneasiness. The sadder part is that we proceed in such a way that the uneasiness only gets worse. The message here is that the only way to ease our pain is to experience it fully. Learn to stay. Learn to stay with uneasiness, learn to stay with the tightening, learn to stay with the itch and urge of shenpa, so that the habitual chain reaction doesn't continue to rule our lives, and the patterns that we consider unhelpful don't keep getting stronger as the days and months and years go by.

Pain, Years, Trying

Pema Chodron (2009). “Taking the Leap: Freeing Ourselves from Old Habits and Fears”, p.28, Shambhala Publications

If there's any possibility for enlightenment, it's right now, not at some future time. Now is the time.

Live In The Moment, Enlightenment, Moments

Being preoccupied with our self-image is like being deaf and blind. It's like standing in the middle of a vast field of wildflowers with a black hood over our heads. It's like coming upon a tree of singing birds while wearing earplugs.

Self, Bird, Tree

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.40, Shambhala Publications

Hope and fear come from feeling that we lack something; they come from a sense of poverty. We can’t simply relax with ourselves. We hold on to hope, and hope robs us of the present moment. We feel that someone else knows what is going on, but that there is something missing in us, and therefore something is lacking in our world.

Our World, Missing, Feelings

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.53, Shambhala Publications

We can drop the fundamental hope that there is a better "me" who one day will emerge. We can't just jump over ourselves as if we were not there.

Hope, One Day, Fundamentals

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.53, Shambhala Publications

Things are as bad and as good as they seem. There's no need to add anything extra.

Needs, Add, Extras

Pema Chodron (2002). “The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times”, p.139, Shambhala Publications

The Process of becoming unstuck requires tremendous bravery, because basically we are completely changing our way of perceiving reality.

Reality, Bravery, Way

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.69, Shambhala Publications

We give it up and just look directly with compassion and humor at who we are. Then loneliness is no threat and heartache, no punishment.

Loneliness, Compassion, Punishment

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.76, Shambhala Publications

When we touch the center of sorrow, when we sit with discomfort without trying to fix it, when we stay present to the pain of disapproval or betrayal and let it soften us, these are times that we connect with bohdichitta.

Pain, Betrayal, Sorrow

We can gradually drop our ideals of who we think we ought to be, or who we think we want to be, or who we think other people think we want to be or ought to be.

Buddhism, Thinking, People

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.76, Shambhala Publications

The future is the result of what we do right now.

Results, Right Now, Only Time

"Tea with Pema Chodron in the Mayan Jungle". Interview with Karl Saliter, www.elephantjournal.com. May 11, 2012.

It becomes increasingly clear that we won’t be free of self-destructive patterns unless we develop a compassionate understanding of what they are.

Self, Understanding, Patterns

Pema Chodron (2002). “The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times”, p.34, Shambhala Publications

We can put our whole heart into whatever we do; but if we freeze our attitude into for or against, we're setting ourselves up for stress. Instead, we could just go forward with curiosity, wondering where this experiment will lead. This kind of open-ended inquisitiveness captures the spirit of enthusiasm, or heroic perseverance.

Perseverance, Attitude, Stress

Pema Chodron (2007). “No Time to Lose: A Timely Guide to the Way of the Bodhisattva”, p.226, Shambhala Publications

Hell is just resistance to life.

Resistance, Hell

Pema Chodron (2001). “The Wisdom of No Escape: And the Path of Loving Kindness”, p.41, Shambhala Publications

The idea of karma is that you continually get the teaching that you need to open your heart.

Karma, Teaching, Heart

Allow situations in your life to become your teacher.

Teacher, Situation

Pema Chodron (2001). “Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living”, p.78, Shambhala Publications

As for our inner level of obstacle, perhaps the only enemy we have is that we don't like the way reality is now and therefore wish it would go away fast. But what we need to acknowledge is that nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know.

Reality, Taught Us, Enemy

This is the tendency of all living things: to avoid pain and to cling to pleasure.

Pain, Pleasure, Tendencies

Relaxing with something as familiar as loneliness is good discipline for realizing the profundity of the unresolved moments of our lives. We are cheating ourselves when we run away from the ambiguity of loneliness.....Rather than persecuting yourself or feeling that something terribly wrong is happening, right there in the moment of sadness and longing, could you relax and touch the limitless space of the human heart?

Running, Cheating, Loneliness

Better to join in with humanity than to set ourselves apart.

Life, Loneliness, Humanity

Pema Chodron (2007). “No Time to Lose: A Timely Guide to the Way of the Bodhisattva”, p.154, Shambhala Publications

Ordinarily we are swept away by habitual momentum and don't interrupt our patterns slightly. When we feel betrayed or disappointed, does it occur to us to practice?

Karma, Practice, Doe

Pema Chodron (2002). “The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times”, p.44, Shambhala Publications

Each moment is just what it is. It might be the only moment of our life; it might be the only strawberry we'll ever eat. We could get depressed about it, or we could finally appreciate it and delight in the preciousness of every single moment of our life.

Single Mom, Appreciate, Delight

Pema Chodron (2001). “The Wisdom of No Escape: And the Path of Loving Kindness”, p.32, Shambhala Publications

It isn't the things that happen to us in our lives that cause us to suffer, it's how we relate to the things that happen to us that causes us to suffer.

Spiritual, Perspective, Suffering

"On Faith & Reason" with Bill Moyers, www.pbs.org. August 4, 2006.

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