Develop confidence in your innate qualities and believe that these qualities will be brought to fruition.
In fact there are beautiful people in this world doing incredibly selfless acts over and over and over. Dedicating their lives completely for the welfare and happiness of others.
We only think about the difficult people and the horrible things that happen. That's what gets all the media attention.
Try to develop some genuine love and compassion, some real caring for others.
If we want to be musicians, dancers or sportspeople, we can download a certain amount and watch DVDs and read books, but in the end we need someone to assess us and give us personal instruction. The two go together.
I was born in England and brought up in London. When I was 18 I read a book and came across the Dharma. I was halfway through the book when I turned to my mother and said, "I'm a Buddhist," to which she replied, "Oh are you dear? Well finish the book and then you can tell me about it." I realised I'd always been Buddhist but I just hadn't known it existed, because in those days not even the word 'Buddha' was ever spoken. This was in in the 1960s, so there wasn't that much available, even in London.
All of the external circumstances and the rude and difficult people we meet, instead of getting angry, upset, or frustrated, we see that we can take them all and use them on the path in a way that actually invigorates and strengthens us, rather than defeats us. It's all very practical advice, and that's why I talk a lot about how to make our daily life into Dharma practice, otherwise it's easy to feel hopeless and helpless.
There are certain people who people think are enlightened. The problem with the word enlightenment is what you mean by it.
Keep your practice very simple and don't be too ambitious.
There are many wonderfully qualified teachers out there, but that doesn't mean that each teacher is suitable to the same person, anymore than people fall in love with the same person.
Our pure awareness is not male or female.
Distraction is the main problem for us all - what the Buddha called the monkey mind. We need to tame this monkey mind.
My mother's love was really not based on attachment. Her love was genuine love. To make me happy, not how I will make her happy.
If you don't find that people find you're easier to live with than you were before, if you don't find that your heart is feeling warmer toward others and if your negative emotions are not getting any better, then there's something wrong. That is always the touchstone of the Dharma practice.
If we could turn around and stand back, then we would see the whole complete pattern. And therefore what we have to do in this lifetime is to perfect this pattern, so that it will continue a most beautiful pattern next time and next time and next time and next time because we vowed until samsara is empty! Now, that's going to be a long time, so you'd better get prepared for the long haul, and the best way to do that is to really prepare yourself as much as possible in this lifetime, and not waste your opportunities so that we can genuinely benefit beings, endlessly, endlessly, endlessly.
We all have our own karma and so different teachers will be meaningful to different students.
We have produced many of our problems through our confused mental states.
Actually we've got countless lifetimes, so relax.
The future of Dharma is in women's hands now because they have this energy which was never really tapped.
First you have to help yourself.
You can still practice to be a better and kinder and happier person. That's perfectly possible.
Buddhism helps us to overcome our endless ego grasping mind to open up to something so much more spacious and genuinely meaningful.
The purpose of dharma is to help your mind to expand, to grow, to clarify. It should uphold us and create an inner sense of peace, joy, and clarity.
The Buddha himself said, "I still use conceptual thinking, but I'm not formed by it." And that's the Buddha.
It's interesting to see people's projections because one lives very much in the world of projections.
