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Pema Chodron Quotes - Page 5

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

Treat yourself as your own beloved child.

Treat yourself as your own beloved child.

Children, Beloved, Treats

By not knowing, not hoping to know and not acting like we know what's happening, we begin to access our inner strength.

Strength, Buddhist, Knowing

We spend all our energy and waste our lives trying to re-create these zones of safety, which are always falling apart. That's the essence of samsara - the cycle of suffering that comes from continuing to seek happiness in all the wrong places.

Fall, Essence, Safety

Pema Chodron (2003). “Comfortable with Uncertainty: 108 Teachings on Cultivating Fearlessness and Compassion”, p.24, Shambhala Publications

Feelings like disappointment, embarrassment, irritation, resentment, anger, jealousy, and fear, instead of being bad news, are actually very clear moments that teach us where it is that we're holding back.

Disappointment, Buddhism, Irritation

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.16, Shambhala Publications

Ordinarily we are swept away by habitual momentum. We don't interrupt our patterns even slightly. With practice, however, we learn to stay with a broken heart, with a nameless fear, with the desire for revenge. Sticking with uncertainty is how we learn to relax in the midst of chaos, how we learn to be cool when the ground beneath us suddenly disappears.

Revenge, Heart, Practice

Pema Chodron (2003). “Comfortable with Uncertainty: 108 Teachings on Cultivating Fearlessness and Compassion”, p.8, Shambhala Publications

When resistance is gone, the demons are gone.

Inspirational, Gone, Resistance

Everything in our lives has the potential to wake us up or put us to sleep. Allowing it to awaken us is up to us.

Sleep, Our Lives, Allowing

Pema Chodron (2003). “Comfortable with Uncertainty: 108 Teachings on Cultivating Fearlessness and Compassion”, p.39, Shambhala Publications

We can begin to open our hearts to others when we have no hope of getting anything back. We just do it for its own sake.

Freedom, Heart, Inspire

You could begin to notice whenever you find yourself blaming others or justifying yourself. If you spent the rest of your life just noticing that and letting it be a way to uncover the silliness of the human condition-the tragic yet comic drama that we all continually buy into-you could develop a lot of wisdom and a lot of kindness as well as a great sense of humor.

Kindness, Drama, Finding Yourself

Pema Chodron (1996). “Awakening Loving-Kindness”, p.78, Shambhala Publications

Honesty without kindness, humor, and goodheartedness can be just mean. From the very beginning to the very end, pointing to our own hearts to discover what is true isn’t just a matter of honesty but also of compassion and respect for what we see.

Honesty, Kindness, Heart

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.98, Shambhala Publications

Use your life to wake you up.

Positive, Use, Wakes You

Pema Chodron (2001). “The Wisdom of No Escape: And the Path of Loving Kindness”, p.127, Shambhala Publications

How do we cultivate the conditions for joy to expand? We train in staying present.

Joy, Staying, Train

Pema Chodron (2002). “The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times”, p.82, Shambhala Publications

When you open yourself to the continually changing, impermanent, dynamic nature of your own being and of reality, you increase your capacity to love and care about other people and your capacity to not be afraid. You're able to keep your eyes open, your heart open, and your mind open. And you notice when you get caught up in prejudice, bias, and aggression. You develop an enthusiasm for no longer watering those negative seeds, from now until the day you die. And, you begin to think of your life as offering endless opportunities to start to do things differently.

Inspirational, Heart, Eye

Pema Chodron (2008). “The Pocket Pema Chodron”, p.24, Shambhala Publications

Things become clear when there is no escape.

Clear

As our kindness for ourselves grows, so does our kindness for other people.

Kindness, People, Doe

Pema Chodron (2009). “Taking the Leap: Freeing Ourselves from Old Habits and Fears”, p.87, Shambhala Publications

Welcome the present moment as if you had invited it. It is all we ever have, so we night as well work with it rather than struggling against it. We might as well make it our friend and teacher rather than our enemy.

Inspirational, Friends, Teacher

When you have made good friends with yourself, your situation will be more friendly too.

Good Friend, Friendly, Made

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.10, Shambhala Publications

If you ask why we meditate, I would say it's so we can become more flexible and tolerant to the present moment.

Moments, Flexible, Asks

It is possible to move through the drama of our lives without believing so earnestly in the character that we play. That we take ourselves so seriously, that we are so absurdly important in our own minds, is a problem for us. We feel justified in being annoyed with everything. We feel justified in denigrating ourselves or in feeling that we are more clever than other people. Self-importance hurts us, limiting us to the narrow world of our likes and dislikes. We end up bored to death with ourselves and our world. We end up never satisfied.

Hurt, Clever, Drama

Pema Chodron (2002). “The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times”, p.25, Shambhala Publications

Affirmations are like screaming that you're okay in order to overcome this whisper that you're not. That's a big contrast to actually uncovering the whisper, realizing that it's a passing memory, and moving closer to all those fears and all those edgy feelings that maybe you're not okay. Well, no big deal. None of us is okay and all of us are fine. It's not just one way. We are walking, talking paradoxes.

Inspirational, Memories, Moving

"Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living". Book by Pema Chodron, 1994.

Use what seems like poison as medicine. Use your personal suffering as the path to compassion for all beings.

Compassion, Medicine, Suffering

"Be grateful to everyone" is about making peace with the aspects of ourselves that we have rejected... If we were to make a list of people we don't like - people we find obnoxious, threatening, or worthy of contempt - we would discover much about those aspects of ourselves that we can't face... other people trigger the karma that we haven't worked out.

Karma, Grateful, People

"Start where You are: A Guide to Compassionate Living". Book by Pema Chodron, 1994.

Most of us do not take these situations as teachings. We automatically hate them. We run like crazy. We use all kinds of ways to escape - all addictions stem from this moment when we meet our edge and we just can't stand it. We feel we have to soften it, pad it with something, and we become addicted to whatever it is that seems to ease the pain.

Running, Pain, Hate

"When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times". Book by Pema Chodron, September 26, 2000.

We hold on to hope, and hope robs us of the present moment.

Moments, Present Moment

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

Only to the extent that we expose ourselves over and over to annihilation can that which is indestructible in us be found.

Life, Determination, Commitment

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.10, Shambhala Publications

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