We must be diligent today. To wait until tomorrow is too late.
Death comes unexpectedly. How can we bargain with it?
By Buddha
The wise ones fashioned speech with their thought, sifting it as grain is sifted through a sieve.
By Buddha
Neither from itself nor from another,
Nor from both,
Nor without a cause,
Does anything whatever, anywhere arise
By Nagarjuna
The essence of love and compassion is understanding, the ability to recognize the physical, material, and psychological suffering of others, to put ourselves "inside the skin" of the other. We "go inside" their body, feelings, and mental formations, and witness for ourselves their suffering. Shallow observation as an outsider is not enough to see their suffering. We must become one with the subject of our observation. When we are in contact with another's suffering, a feeling of compassion is born in us. Compassion means, literally, "to suffer with."
By Thich Nhat Hanh
We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world.
By Buddha
Everything changes, nothing remains without change.
By Buddha
I have no rest, but in a nook, with the Book
By Unknown
It is human beings that we conflict with, so special emphasis should be placed on developing compassion for them.
By Tenzin Gyatso
Be Content with what you have; rejoice in the way things are. When you realize there is nothing lacking, the whole world belongs to you.
By Lao Tzu
Your work is to discover your world and then with all your heart give yourself to it.
By Buddha
Take into account that great love and great achievements involve great risk.
When you lose, don't lose the lesson.
Follow the three R's:
- Respect for self.
- Respect for others.
- Responsibility for all your actions.
Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.
Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
Don't let a little dispute injure a great relationship.
When you realize you've made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.
Spend some time alone everyday.
Open your arms to change, but don't let go of your values.
Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.
Live a good, honorable life. Then when you get older and think back, you'll be able to enjoy it a second time.
A loving atmosphere in your home is the foundation for your life.
In disagreements with loved ones, deal only with the current situation. Don't bring up the past.
Share your knowledge. It is a way to achieve immortality.
Be gentle with the earth.
Once a year, go someplace you've never been before.
Remember that the best relationship is one in which your love for each other exceeds your need for each other.
Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.
Approach love and cooking with reckless abandon.
By Dalai Lama XIV
He who experiences the unity of life sees his own Self in all beings, and all beings in his own Self, and looks on everything with an impartial eye.
By Buddha
Personally I'm quite jovial with not much worry. I do my best, which is moderation, and failure doesn't matter.
By Tenzin Gyatso
I believe that the very purpose of life is to be happy. From the very core of our being, we desire contentment. In my own limited experience I have found that the more we care for the happiness of others, the greater is our own sense of well-being. Cultivating a close, warmhearted feeling for others automatically puts the mind at ease. It helps remove whatever fears or insecurities we may have and gives us the strength to cope with any obstacles we encounter. It is the principal source of success in life. Since we are not solely material creatures, it is a mistake to place all our hopes for happiness on external development alone. The key is to develop inner peace.
By Dalai Lama
If someone has a gun and is trying to kill you, it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun.
By Dalai Lama XIV
Just as a bird takes its wings with it wherever it flies, so the monk takes his robes and bowl with him wherever he goes.
By Buddha
All that we are is the result of what we have thought. If a man speaks or acts with an evil thought, pain follows him. If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness follows him, like a shadow that never leaves him.
By Buddha
All conditioned things are impermanent. Work out your own salvation with diligence
By Buddha
A good motivation is what is needed: compassion without dogmatism, without complicated philosophy; just understanding that others are human brothers and sisters and respecting their human rights and dignities. That we humans can help each other is one of our unique human capacities.
By Dalai Lama XIV
If you have a particular faith or religion, that is good. But you can survive without it.
By Dalai Lama
The ultimate authority must always rest with the individual's own reason and critical analysis.
By Dalai Lama
Peace comes from within. Do not seek it without.
By Buddha
Live your daily life in a way that you never lose yourself. When you are carried away with your worries, fears, cravings, anger, and desire, you run away from yourself and you lose yourself. The practice is always to go back to oneself.
By Thich Nhat Hanh
If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito.
By Dalai Lama XIV
All the Buddhas of all the ages have been telling you a very simple fact: Be - don't try to become. Within these two words, be and becoming, your whole life is contained. Being is enlightenment, becoming is ignorance.
By OSHO
Smiling is very important. If we are not able to smile, then the world will not have peace. It is not by going out for a demonstration against nuclear missiles that we can bring about peace. It is with our capacity of smiling, breathing, and being peace that we can make peace.
By Thich Nhat Hanh
For those who may not find happiness to exercise religious faith, it's okay to remain a radical atheist, it's absolutely an individual right, but the important thing is with a compassionate heart -- then no problem.
By Dalai Lama
People deal too much with the negative, with what is wrong...Why not try and see positive things, to just touch those things and make them bloom?
By Thich Nhat Hanh
Whether our action is wholesome or unwholesome depends on whether that action or deed arises from a disciplined or undisciplined state of mind. It is felt that a disciplined mind leads to happiness and an undisciplined mind leads to suffering, and in fact it is said that bringing about discipline within one's mind is the essence of the Buddha's teaching.
By Dalai Lama XIV
When something
needs to be done in the world
to rectify the wrongs,
if one is really concerned
with benefiting others,
one needs to be
engaged, involved.
This is action out of compassion.
By Dalai Lama XIV
The tongue like a sharp knife... Kills without drawing blood.
By Buddha
One of the basic points is kindness. With kindness, with love and compassion, with his feeling that is the essence of brotherhood, sisterhood, one will have inner peace. This compassionate feeling is the basis of inner peace.
By Dalai Lama XIV
The ultimate authority must always rest with the individual's own reason and critical analysis
By Dalai Lama XIV
Human beings are of such nature that they should have not only material facilities but spiritual sustenance as well. Without spiritual sustenance, it is difficult to get and maintain peace of mind.
By Dalai Lama
Peace, in the sense of the absence of war, is of little value to someone who is dying of hunger or cold. It will not remove the pain of torture inflicted on a prisoner of conscience. It does not comfort those who have lost their loved ones in floods caused by senseless deforestation in a neighbouring country. Peace can only last where human rights are respected, where the people are fed, and where individuals and nations are free. True peace with oneself and with the world around us can only be achieved through the development of mental peace. The other phenomena mentioned above are similarly interrelated. Thus, for example, we see that a clean environment, wealth or democracy mean little in the face of war, especially nuclear war, and that material development is not sufficient to ensure human happiness.
By Tenzin Gyatso
Good is to practice the Way and to follow the truth. Great is the heart that is in accord with the Way.
By Buddha
The deep root of failure in our lives is to think, 'Oh how useless and powerless I am.' It is essential to think strongly and forcefully, 'I can do it,' without boasting or fretting.
By Tenzin Gyatso
There are twenty difficult things to attain in this world:
1. It is hard for the poor to practice charity.
2. It is hard for the strong and rich to observe the Way.
3. It is hard to disregard life and go to certain death.
4. It is only a favoured few that get acquainted with a Buddhist sutra.
5. It is hard to be born in the age of the Buddha.
6. It is hard to conquer the passions, to suppress selfish desires.
7. It is hard not to hanker after that which is agreeable.
8. It is hard not to get into a passion when slighted.
9. It is hard not to abuse one's authority.
10. It is hard to be even-minded and simple hearted in all one's dealings with others.
11. It is hard to be thorough in learning and exhaustive in investigation.
12. It is hard to subdue selfish pride.
13. It is hard not to feel contempt toward the unlearned.
14. It is hard to be one in knowledge and practice.
15. It is hard not to express an opinion about others.
16. It is by rare opportunity that one is introduced to a true spiritual teacher.
17. It is hard to gain an insight into the nature of being and to practice the Way.
18. It is hard to follow the way of a saviour.
19. It is hard to be always the master of oneself.
20. It is hard to understand thoroughly the Ways of Buddha.
By Buddha
There is pleasure when a sore is scratched, But to be without sores is more pleasurable still. Just so, there are pleasures in worldly desires, But to be without desires is more pleasurable still.
By Nagarjuna
When we start out on a spiritual path we often have ideals we think we're supposed to live up to. We feel we're supposed to be better than we are in some way. But with this practice you take yourself completely as you are. Then ironically, taking in pain - breathing it in for yourself and all others in the same boat as you are - heightens your awareness of exactly where you're stuck.
By Pema Chodron
Be gentle first with yourself - if you wish to be gentle with others.
By Lama Yeshe
So if we love someone, we should train in being able to listen. By listening with calm and understanding, we can ease the suffering of another person. [True Love. A Practice for Awakening the Heart.]
By Thich Nhat Hanh
FIRST keep thyself in peace, and then shalt thou be able to be a peacemaker towards others. A peaceable man doth more good than a well-learned. A passionate man turneth even good into evil and easily believeth evil; a good, peaceable man converteth all things into good. He who dwelleth in peace is suspicious of none, but he who is discontented and restless is tossed with many suspicions, and is neither quiet himself nor suffereth others to be quiet. He often saith what he ought not to say, and omitteth what it were more expedient for him to do. He considereth to what duties others are bound, and neglecteth those to which he is bound himself. Therefore be zealous first over thyself, and then mayest thou righteously be zealous concerning thy neighbour.
By Thomas Kempis
Just as a candle cannot burn without fire, men cannot live without a spiritual life.
By Buddha
The only reason we don't open our hearts and minds to other people is that they trigger confusion in us that we don't feel brave enough or sane enough to deal with. To the degree that we look clearly and compassionately at ourselves, we feel confident and fearless about looking into someone else's eyes.
By Pema Chodron
Because we all share this planet earth, we have to learn to live in harmony and peace with each other and with nature. This is not just a dream, but a necessity.
By Dalai Lama XIV
Without health life is not life; it is only a state of langour and suffering - an image of death.
By Buddha
I would not look upon anger as something foreign to me that I have to fight...I have to deal with my anger with care, with love, with tenderness, with nonviolence.
By Thich Nhat Hanh
When an evil-man, seeing you practise goodness, comes and maticiously insults you, you should patiently endure it and not feel angry with him, for the evil-man is insulting himself by trying to insult you.
By Buddha
Without the way , there is no going; without the truth, there is no knowing; without the life, there is no living.
By Thomas Kempis
He who loves with purity considers not the gift of the lover, but the love of the giver
By Thomas Kempis
Do not brood over your past mistakes and failures as this will only fill your mind with grief, regret and depression. Do not repeat them in the future.
By Swami Sivananda
Purity and simplicity are the two wings with which man soars above the earth and all temporary nature.
By Thomas Kempis
I don't know whether the universe, with its countless galaxies, stars and planets, has a deeper meaning or not, but at the very least, it is clear that we humans who live on this earth face the task of making a happy life for ourselves. Therefore, it is important to discover what will bring about the greatest degree of happiness.
By Dalai Lama XIV
One problem with our current society is that we have an attitude towards education as if it is there to simply make you more clever, make you more ingenious... Even though our society does not emphasize this, the most important use of knowledge and education is to help us understand the importance of engaging in more wholesome actions and bringing about discipline within our minds. The proper utilization of our intelligence and knowledge is to effect changes from within to develop a good heart.
By Dalai Lama XIV
Chaos is inherent in all compounded things. Strive on with diligence.
By Buddha
Those who have passions are never able to preceive the Way; for it is like stirring up clear water with hands; people may come there wishing to find a reflection of their faces, which, however, they will never see. A mind troubled and vexed with the passions is impure, and on that account it never sees the Way. O monks, do away with passions. When the dirt of passion is removed the Way will manifest itself.
By Buddha
Your body is precious. It is our vehicle for awakening. Treat it with care.
By Buddha
The way to change others' minds is with affection, and not anger.
By Dalai Lama XIV
First keep the peace within yourself, then you can also bring peace to others.
By Thomas Kempis
All that we are is the result of what we have thought. If a man speaks or acts with an evil thought, pain follows him. If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness follows him, like a shadow that never leaves him.
By Buddha
A family is a place where minds come in contact with one another. If these minds love one another the home will be as beautiful as a flower garden. But if these minds get out of harmony with one another it is like a storm that plays havoc with the garden.
By Buddha
Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.
By Buddha
Without inner peace, outer peace is impossible. We all wish for world peace, but world peace will never be acheived unless we first establish peace within our own minds. We can send so-called 'peacekeeping forces' into areas of conflict, but peace cannot be oppossed from the outside with guns. Only by creating peace within our own mind and helping others to do the same can we hope to achieve peace in this world.
By Geshe Kelsang Gyatso
With realization of one's own potential and self-confidence in one's ability, one can build a better world.
By Dalai Lama
Do not follow the ideas of others, but learn to listen to the voice within yourself. Your body and mind will become clear and you will realize the unity of all things.
By Dogen
When we come into contact with the other person, our thoughts and actions should express our mind of compassion, even if that person says and does things that are not easy to accept. We practice in this way until we see clearly that our love is not contingent upon the other person being lovable.
By Thich Nhat Hanh
Grant your blessing so that my mind may become one with the Dharma.
By Dagpo Lha-je Gampopa
Compassionate action starts with seeing yourself when you start to make yourself right and when you start to make yourself wrong. At that point you could just contemplate the fact that there is a larger alternative to either of those, a more tender, shaky kind of place where you could live. - In the Gap Between Right and Wrong
By Pema Chodron
If you knew what I know about the power of giving, you would not let a single meal pass without sharing it in some way.
By Buddha
Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.
By Buddha
Our enemies provide us with a precious opportunity to practice patience and love. We should have gratitude toward them.
By Tenzin Gyatso
Human use, population, and technology have reached that certain stage where mother Earth no longer accepts our presence with silence.
By Dalai Lama XIV
Life without a purpose is a languid, drifting thing; every day we ought to review our purpose, saying to ourselves, 'This day let me make a sound beginning, for what we have hitherto done is naught
By Thomas Kempis
Life can be found only in the present moment. The past is gone, the future is not yet here, and if we do not go back to ourselves in the present moment, we cannot be in touch with life.
By Thich Nhat Hanh
Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense.
By Buddha
How seldom we weigh our neighbor in the same balance with ourselves
By Thomas Kempis
Meditate. Live purely. Be quiet. Do your work with mastery. Like the moon, come out from behind the clouds! Shine.
By Buddha
Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity cannot survive.
By Dalai Lama
Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them, humanity cannot survive.
By Dalai Lama XIV
A bodhisattva is someone who has compassion within himself or herself and who is able to make another person smile or help someone suffer less. Every one of us is capable of this.
By Thich Nhat Hanh
We can never obtain peace in the outer world until we make peace with ourselves.
By Dalai Lama
The ultimate authority must always rest with the individual's own reason and critical analysis.
By Dalai Lama
We can live without religion and meditation, but we cannot survive without human affection.
By Dalai Lama
Whatever words we utter should be chosen with care for people will hear them and be influenced by them for good or ill.
By Buddha
In dealing with those who are undergoing great suffering, if you feel "burnout" setting in, if you feel demoralized and exhausted, it is best, for the sake of everyone, to withdraw and restore yourself. The point is to have a long-term perspective.
By Dalai Lama
Whatever words we utter should be chosen with care for people will hear them and be influenced by them for good or ill.
By Buddha
Drink your tea slowly and reverently, as if it is the axis
on which the world earth revolves - slowly, evenly, without
rushing toward the future. Live the actual moment.
Only this moment is life.
By Thich Nhat Hanh
Do not confuse peace of mind with spaced-out insensitivity. A truly peaceful mind is very sensitive, very aware.
By Tenzin Gyatso
All that we are is the result of what we have thought. If a man speaks or acts with an evil thought, pain follows him. If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness follows him, like a shadow that never leaves him.
By Buddha
Understanding unity helps to solve humanity's biggest challenges. There is no such thing as an isolated problem. By injuring any part of the world's system, you injure yourself. There is no such thing as a win/lose situation.
Think of life on this planet in terms of systems and not detached elements. Broaden your field of vision and assimilate the knowledge you have. See that the environment does not belong to any single country to exploit and then disregard.
You cannot afford to think of your relationship with the earth as a one-night stand. There's no such thing as a free glass of milk. It's time to buy the cow.
By Za Rinpoche
Hard times build determination and inner strength. Through them we can also come to appreciate the uselessness of anger. Instead of getting angry nurture a deep caring and respect for troublemakers because by creating such trying circumstances they provide us with invaluable opportunities to practice tolerance and patience.
By Dalai Lama XIV
