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Pema Chodron Quotes - Page 7

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

The greatest obstacle to connecting with our joy is resentment.

The greatest obstacle to connecting with our joy is resentment.

Joy, Resentment, Obstacles

Pema Chodron (2001). “The Wisdom of No Escape: And the Path of Loving Kindness”, p.31, Shambhala Publications

When there's a disappointment, I don't know if it's the end of the story. It may just be the beginning of a great adventure.

Inspirational, Spiritual, Buddhist

We don't experience the world fully unless we are willing to give everything away.

Giving, World, Willing

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.164, Shambhala Publications

Holding on to beliefs limits our experience of life. That doesn't mean that beliefs or ideas or thinking is a problem; the stubborn attitude of having to have things be a particular way, grasping on to our beliefs and thoughts, all these cause the problems. To put it simply, using your belief system this way creates a situation in which you choose to be blind instead of being able to see, to be deaf instead of being able to hear, to be dead rather than alive, asleep rather than awake.

Attitude, Mean, Thinking

Pema Chodron (1996). “Awakening Loving-Kindness”, p.70, Shambhala Publications

The root of compassion, is compassion for oneself.

Compassion, Roots, Oneself

The real thing that we renounce is the tenacious hope that we could be saved from being who we are.

Real, Who We Are, Renounce

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.54, Shambhala Publications

Meditation isn't really about getting rid of thoughts, it's about changing the pattern of grasping on to things, which in our everyday experience is our thoughts.

Meditation, Everyday, Mindfulness

Right down there in the thick of things, we discover the love that will not die.

Dies, Thick

Pema Chodron (2008). “The Pocket Pema Chodron”, p.87, Shambhala Publications

The essence of our whole path is in that place of discomfort, and what do we do with it?

Essence, Path, Discomfort

Nothing in its essence is one way or the other.

Essence, Way, One Way

Pema Chodron (2001). “The Wisdom of No Escape: And the Path of Loving Kindness”, p.51, Shambhala Publications

The root of suffering is resisting the certainty that no matter what the circumstances, uncertainty is all we truly have.

Roots, Suffering, Matter

Pema Chodron (2003). “Comfortable with Uncertainty: 108 Teachings on Cultivating Fearlessness and Compassion”, p.17, Shambhala Publications

Underneath our ordinary lives, underneath all the talking we do, all the moving we do, all the thoughts in our minds, there's a fundamental groundlessness. It's there bubbling along all the time. We experience it as restlessness and edginess. We experience it as fear. It motivates passion, aggression, ignorance, jealousy, and pride, but we never get down to the essence of it.

Moving, Ignorance, Passion

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.44, Shambhala Publications

While we are sitting in meditation, we are simply exploring humanity and all of creation in the form of ourselves. We can become the world's greatest experts on anger, jealousy, and self-deprecatio n, as well as on joyfulness, clarity, and insight. Everything that human beings feel, we feel. We can become extremely wise and sensitive to all of humanity and the whole universe simply by knowing ourselves, just as we are.

Wise, Self, Knowing

Sometimes we find that we like our thoughts so much that we don't want to let them go.

Attachment, Want, Sometimes

Pema Chodron (2002). “The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times”, p.41, Shambhala Publications

As human beings, not only do we seek resolution, but we also feel that we deserve resolution. However, not only do we not deserve resolution, we suffer from resolution. We don't deserve resolution; we deserve something better than that. We deserve our birthright, which is the middle way, an open state of mind that can relax with paradox and ambiguity.

Buddhist, Mind, Suffering

"When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times". Book by Pema Chodron, December 24, 1996.

WE ALREADY HAVE everything we need. There is no need for self-improvement. All these trips that we lay on ourselves—the heavy-duty fearing that we’re bad and hoping that we’re good, the identities that we so dearly cling to, the rage, the jealousy and the addictions of all kinds—never touch our basic wealth. They are like clouds that temporarily block the sun. But all the time our warmth and brilliance are right here. This is who we really are. We are one blink of an eye away from being fully awake.

Inspiring, Block, Eye

Pema Chodron (2001). “Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living”, p.1, Shambhala Publications

When we protect ourselves so we won't feel pain, that protection becomes like armor, like armor that imprisons the softness of of the heart.

Pain, Heart, Armor

Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.115, Shambhala Publications

Don't worry about achieving. Don't worry about perfection. Just be there each moment as best you can. When you realize you've wandered off again, simply very lightly acknowledge that. This light touch is the golden key to reuniting with our openness.

Keys, Light, Worry

Pema Chodron (2001). “Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living”, p.18, Shambhala Publications

The approach is that the best way to use unwanted circumstances on the path of enlightenment is not to resist but to lean into them.

Enlightenment, Use, Way

Pema Chodron (2001). “Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living”, p.108, Shambhala Publications

A thoroughly good relationship with ourselves results in being still, which doesn't mean we don't run and jump and dance about. It means there's no compulsiveness. We don't overwork, overeat, oversmoke, overseduce. In short, we begin to stop causing harm.

Running, Mean, Good Relationship

Rejoicing in the good fortune of others is a practice that can help us when we feel emotionally shut down and unable to connect with others. Rejoicing generates good will.

Practice, Down And, Helping

Pema Chodron (2007). “No Time to Lose: A Timely Guide to the Way of the Bodhisattva”, p.53, Shambhala Publications

Without loving-kindness for ourselves, it is difficult, if not impossible, to genuinely feel it for others.

Kindness, Impossible, Difficult

Pema Chodron (2002). “The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times”, p.57, Shambhala Publications

One of the main discoveries of meditation is seeing how we continually run away from the present moment, how we avoid being here just as we are. That’s not considered to be a problem. The point is to see it.

Running, Discovery, Meditation

Pema Chodron (2001). “The Wisdom of No Escape: And the Path of Loving Kindness”, p.3, Shambhala Publications

Most spiritual experiences begin with suffering. They begin with groundlessness. They begin when the rug has been pulled out from under us.

Spiritual, Suffering, Has Beens

Peace isn’t an experience free of challenges, free of rough and smooth, it’s an experience that’s expansive enough to include all that arises without feeling threatened.

Peace, Challenges, Feelings

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

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