Quotes about buddhism

The Way is not in the sky the Way is in the heart.

Don't be so loyal to your mind the mind is not loyal to You.

The Three Kinds of Pride are: (1) thinking I am better than the other(s) (2) thinking I am worse than the other(s) and (3) thinking I am just as good as the other(s).

Long is the night to him who is awake long is a mile to him who is tired long is life to the foolish who do not know the true law.

Concentration is the creation of the instrument meditation is the right use of it contemplation transcends it.

The Buddhas speak the wondrous sound throughout the world the Teachings spoken over countless ages can all be expounded in a single word.

Thoughts don't become things thoughts ARE things.

The secure attachment of Western psychology is actually akin to Buddhist non-attachment avoid-ant attachment is the inverse of being mindful and present and anxious attachment aligns with Buddhist notions of clinging and grasping.

Seeking is endless. It never comes to a state of rest it never ceases.

True change is within leave the outside as it is.

Everything changes nothing is permanent.

Concepts are not real things a conceptualized world is a dead world. Living actualities lose their life when put into concepts.

Who am I? I am not nothing but this moment in the flow of life. This flow of life is not in my control it is the life of the universe itself. The life of the universe flows in me and I just flow with this life and that is myself.

This our worldly life is an activity of Nirvana itself not the slightest distinction exists between them.

All instruction is but as a finger pointing to the moon and he whose gaze is fixed upon the pointer will never see beyond.

The fear of death is the fear of the end of an illusion so long as the illusion persists so long will the fear remain.

The Buddha’s dharma didn’t teach peace and relaxation it taught awakening—often rude awakening.

Buddhism teaches you to embrace change.

Of course, even when you see the world as a trap and posit a fundamental separation between liberation of self and transformation of society, you can still feel a compassionate impulse to help its suffering beings. In that case you tend to view the personal and the political in a sequential fashion. "I'll get enlightened first, and then I'll engage in social action." Those who are not engaged in spiritual pursuits put it differently: "I'll get my head straight first, I'll get psychoanalyzed, I'l

Do not ask for less responsibility to be free and relaxed--Ask for more strenght!

If you want to take care of tomorrow, take better care of today. We always live now. All we have to do is entrust ourselves to the life we now live.

Here's an example: someone says, "Master, please hand me the knife," and he hands them the knife, blade first. "Please give me the other end," he says. And the master replies, "What would you do with the other end?" This is answering an everyday matter in terms of the metaphysical.When the question is, "Master, what is the fundamental principle of Buddhism?" Then he replies, "There is enough breeze in this fan to keep me cool." That is answering the metaphysical in terms of the everyday, and tha

The buddha-dharma does not invite us to dabble in abstract notions. Rather, the task it presents us with is to attend to what we actually experience, right in this moment. You don't have to look "over there." You don't have to figure anything out. You don't have to acquire anything. And you don't have to run off to Tibet, or Japan, or anywhere else. You wake up right here. In fact, you can only wake up right here.So you don't have to do the long search, the frantic chase, the painful quest. You'

What makes human life--which is inseparable from this moment--so precious is its fleeting nature. And not that it doesn't last but that it never returns again.

Salute to the Smiling Faces of the 21st Century.

Like a lamp, dispelling the darkness of ignorance

Monks, even if bandits were to savagely sever you, limb by limb, with a double-handled saw, even then, whoever of you harbors ill will at heart would not be upholding my Teaching. Monks, even in such a situation you should train yourselves thus: 'Neither shall our minds be affected by this, nor for this matter shall we give vent to evil words, but we shall remain full of concern and pity, with a mind of love, and we shall not give in to hatred. On the contrary, we shall live projecting thoughts

Now seen...now gone,The butterfly flits in and outThrough fence-hung flowers;But a life lived so close to themI envy...though it's here and gone.

The victorious ones have saidThat emptiness is the relinquishing of all views.For whomever emptiness is a view,That one has achieved nothing.

There's a limit to my patience with anything that smacks of metaphysics. I squirm at the mention of "mind expansion" or "warm healing energy." I don't like drum circles, public nudity or strangers touching my feet.

Buddha once saw a jackal, a wild dog, run out of the forest where he was staying. It stood still for a while, then it ran into the underbrush, and then out again. Then it ran into a tree hollow, then out again. Then it went into a cave, only to run out again. One minute it stood, the next it ran, then it lay down, then it jumped up. The jackal had the mange. When it stood, the mange would eat into its skin, so it would run. Running, it was still uncomfortable, so it would stop. Standing, it was

There is no miserable place waiting for you, no hell realm, sitting and waiting like Alaska—waiting to turn you into ice cream. But whatever you call it—hell or the suffering realms—it is something that you enter by creating a world of neurotic fantasy and believing it to be real. It sounds simple, but that's exactly what happens.

Awakening does not mean a change in difficulty, it means a change in how those difficulties are met.

In the first movement, our infancy as a species, we felt no separation from the natural world around us. Trees, rocks, and plants surrounded us with a living presence as intimate and pulsing as our own bodies. In that primal intimacy, which anthropologists call "participation mystique," we were as one with our world as a child in the mother's womb.Then self-consciousness arose and gave us distance on our world. We needed that distance in order to make decisions and strategies, in order to measur

You don't understand. I only prostitute the part of the body that isn't important, and nobody suffers except my karma a little bit. I don't do big harm. You prostitute your mind. Mind is seat of Buddha. What you do is very very bad. You should not use your mind in that way

This will never come again

The way is yours for the asking - the way is yours for the taking. The way is as it should be.

Today's satori:Such a change of mind wouldNot exist withoutMy lifelong habit of havingMy mind immersed in blossoms.

Children I implore youget out of the burning house nowthree carts wait outsideto save you from a homeless liferelax in the village squarebefore the sky everything's emptyno direction is better or worseeast is just as good as westthose who know the meaning of thisare free to go where they want

And this is a Buddhist country?” said Matt, “This is a country of lovingkindness and compassion? Hah. I think the Americans would call this ‘tough love.’ ”“That is the paradox of Buddhism,” said Ranjit, “As a young doctor I would see these violent things and wonder why they happened, knowing that it was not something that Buddhists should do. Then I realized we are not born Buddhist. All the focus on channeling anger and dealing with hardship did not emanate from these people…. It was a lesson t

It was my letting go that gave me a better hold.

The possessions themselves were not the problem, it was my relationship with possessing.

A fearless heart is free of desire, a kind heart finds paradise everywhere.

To forgive does not mean to forget.

Beyond this life andThis world I'll have it tilMy heart's content:The bright moon that passed overThe horizon before I had my fill.

As a friend of mine told me about Real Happiness: you wrote this one in American.

O let us live in joy, in love among those who hate! Among men who hate, let us live in love.

Here bhikkhus, some misguided men learn the Dhamma–discourses, stanzas, expositions, verses, exclamations, sayings, birth stories, marvels, and answers to questions–but having learned the Dhamma, they do not examine the meaning of those teachings with wisdom. Not examining the meaning of those teachings with wisdom, they do not gain a reflective acceptance of them. Instead they learn the Dhamma only for the sake of criticising others and for winning in debates, and they do not experience the goo

As we live out of such a mind, we become generous, with no sense of tolerance. We become patient, with no sense of putting up with anything. We become compassionate, with no sense of separation. And we become wise, with no sense of having to straighten anyone out.

Merchant: 'So you have lived on the possessions of others?'Saddhartha: 'Apparently. The merchant also lives on the possession of others.'Merchant: 'Well spoken...

And so Gotama wandered into the town to obtain alms, and the two Samanas recognized him only by his complete peacefulness of demeanor, by the stillness of his form, in which there was no seeking, no will, no counterfeit, no effort - only light and peace.

Last year, Yoshino,I walked away bending branchesTo point me to blossoms--Which now are everywhere and I canGo where I've never been before.

The religion of the future will be a cosmic religion. It should transcend a personal God and avoid dogmas and theology. Covering both the natural and the spiritual, it should be based on a religious sense arising from the experience of all things, natural and spiritual, as a meaningful unity. Buddhism answers this description.

Knowing life's purpose would invest everything one did with meaning.

The earth is black in front of the cliff, and no orchids grow.Creepers crawl in the brown mud by the path.Where did the birds of yesterday fly?To what other mountain did the animals go?Leopards and pythons dislike this ruined spot;Cranes and snakes avoid the desolation.My criminal thoughts of those days pastBrought on the disaster of today.

Every day Zuigan used to call out to himself, "Master!" and then he answered himself, "Yes, Sir!" And he added, "Awake, Awake!" and then answered, "Yes, Sir! Yes, Sir!""From now onwards, do not be deceived by others!" "No, Sir! I will not, Sir!"

The Buddha-nature which is ours from the very beginning is like the sun which emerges from the clouds, or like a mirror which, when rubbed, regains its original purity and clarity. (217)

I read of a Buddhist teacher who developed Alzheimer's. He had retired from teaching because his memory was unreliable, but he made one exception for a reunion of his former students. When he walked onto the stage, he forgot everything, even where he was and why. However, he was a skilled Buddhist and he simply began sharing his feelings with the crowd. He said, "I am anxious. I feel stupid. I feel scared and dumb. I am worried that I am wasting everyone's time. I am fearful. I am embarrassing m

The Heart-mantra of Dependent Origination (rten-'brel snying-po [རྟེན་འབྲེལ་སྙིང་པོ]), which liberates the enduring continuum of phenomena and induces the appearance of multiplying relics ('phel-gdung [འཕེལ་གདུང་] and rainbow lights, is:[OṂ] YE DHARMĀ HETUPRABHAVĀHETUN TEṢĀṂ TATHĀGATOHY AVADAT TEṢĀṂ CA YONIRODHO EVAṂ VĀDIMAHĀŚRAMAṆAḤ [YE SVĀHĀ]('Whatever events arise from a cause, the Tathagāta [Buddha, "Thus-gone"] has told the cause thereof, and the great virtuous ascetic has taught their cess

Health, wealth, reputation, and status are all mere ingredients of happiness. The key to true well-being is being able to manage them capably.

The use of market values and technology as a social barometer has devalued the worth of individuals, rendered irrelevant the quality of their lives, and stunted their creativity.

The eternity of "anytime" shines in this moment "now" while the unlimitedness of "anyplace" is manifested in the limits of "here." When the universality of "anyone" dances out in the individual "I," for the first time you have the world of Zen.

In Buddhism there is one word for mind & heart: chitta. Chitta refers not just to thoughts and emotions in the narrow sense of arising from the brain, but also to the whole range of consciousness, vast & unimpeded.

Returning to whereIt used to see blossoms,My mind, changed,Will stay on at Yoshino...Home now, and see anew.

When we are truly able to see and understand life, its reality, its value and beauty as well as its troubles, we are able to accept life dynamically and walk its path with appreciation and gratitude. This way of life is Buddhism.

Much of what animated me in those days I now recognize as the romantic yearnings of an idealistic, alienated, and aimless young man. I endowed these strange, exotic people, about whom I knew little, with all the virtues that my own culture seemed to lack.

For Kerouac, the embodiment of American Zen was Gary Snyder, the Pulitzer Prize-winning Buddhist poet and essayist, who he fictionalized as Japhy Ryder in The Dharma Bums. Snyder was a practicing Buddhist and a translator of classic Chinese texts before Kerouac met him. He was the Zen guru of the Beats at the same time that Alan Watts popularized Buddhism for middle-class Americans in best-selling books and magazine articles of the late 1950s. Snyder had studied with Watts for a while but though

Enlightenment was not just Gautama Buddha's, but you too, individually, must find this new perspective of life, this new point of view in your life and in all things." -

There is no "I" as such apart from others.

The study of the self. This is the foundational practice of Buddhism. Basically it's the whole point. So what is the point... What is this really about? To study the self addresses everything we encounter in life. We can't encounter anything but the self actually. It's about our entire experience of living. Of life and death. It addresses questions such as Who am I?, What is the nature of my suffering? ... And my well-being, What is my place in this world?, What is my relationship to the things

The reality of nature, the reality of life is oneness. But we humans have such a strong egotistic nature. We are the ones who create dualism; we are the ones who talk about two sides: front and back, right and wrong, me and you. As soon as life is dichotomized, tension is created.

Oneness and individuality coexist. There is no question about the importance and uniqueness of each individual life. However, difference is no difference. The very difference is equality, is one.

Only when I see myself truly is Gautama Buddha is present in me.

For me, Buddhism is like a living organism. If it is to flourish outside self-enclosed ghettos of believers, it will have to meet the challenge of understanding, interacting with, and adapting to an environment that is strikingly different from those in which it has evolved.

Forget self pity, live life! Be the artist of your own life.

May we be free of the tyranny of our expectations of others.

We do not understand that we are literally able to live and enjoy life only because of other people and things. If one really understands this truth, he cannot help but become humble and appreciate others.

We must find the way of love rather than that of being loved.

I was encouraged to ask in all seriousness what this life is for, what matters most for myself and others, what non-negotiable values I might even be willing to die for. At the same time, I started to notice the poignant ephemerality of things. I sensed the immanence of death in my bones. I felt the urgency of knowing that this day on earth might be my last. Yet rather than making me gloomy and morbid, such reflections intensified my sense of being alive. They induced a kind of rapture, which sn

No claims were made by him [Buddha] to any unalterable truth, nor did he demand that his teachings should simply be accepted, taken on trust or acquired through an act of faith. Instead he [Buddha] encouraged those who wished to make the spiritual journey he himself had undertaken to experiment for themselves as individuals, retaining what was useful to them and abandoning what was not.

The four abiding abodes,The ideal attitude for a follower of the Buddhist teaching to maintain towards other living beings.

Life's Journeys Inward seeking moves towards being-time Outward seeking journies among life's ornaments

Aggression, Violence, Exploitation, Depression, Despair, Prejudice, War, Intolerance, Poverty, Are all a result of a misunderstanding of the nature of Self.

Mind is a forerunner of all actions.All deeds are led by mind, created by mind.If one speaks or acts with corrupt mind, suffering follows,As the wheel follows the hoof of an ox pulling a cart.Mind is the forerunner of all actions. All deeds are led by mind, created by mind.If one speaks or acts with a serene mind, happiness follows,As surely as one's shadow.'He abused me, he mistreated me, defeated me, robbed me.'Harboring such thoughts keeps hatred alive.'He abused me, he mistreated me, defeate

The one who praises you is a thief. The one who criticizes you is your true friend.

Yellow leaves hang on your tree of life. The messengers of death are waiting. You are going to travel far away. Have you any provisions for the journey?

Two kinds of selfish people: the unwise and the wise. Unwise selfish people think only of themselves, and the result is confusion and pain. Wise selfish people know that the best thing they can do for themselves is to be there for others. As a result, they experience joy.

By incorporating him (Buddha) into the domain of Hindu traditions, and by depicting him as a Hindu sage who was a glorious incarnation of Lord Vishnu, the Brahmins attempted to secure their position of authority in the society.

Unlike most other world religions, Buddhism has never been too rigid in its structure.

The most important and uniquely glorious element of Buddha’s character was that, he did not compel his pupils to be slaves either to his teachings or to himself, but like a conscientious human, demanded from his followers to accept his words not merely out of regard for him but after subjecting them to a thorough examination. And this is where Buddha stands out from the crowd of self-proclaimed prophets.

Those who had seen eyes like hers before understood instantly that she was a woman who had suffered, but wore it well, with dignity and grace. Rather than dragging her down into depression, her pain had lifted her into a peaceful place. She was not a Buddhist, but shared philosophies with them, in that she didn’t fight what happened to her, but instead drifted with it, allowing life to carry her from one experience to the next. It was that depth and wisdom that shone through her work. An accepta

Animosity does not eradicate animosity. Only by loving kindness is animosity dissolved. This law is ancient and eternal. (attributed to Buddha)

We can only suppose that Buddhism has been so much admired mainly for what it is not. A well known modem writer on the subject has remarked that “Buddhism in its purity ignored the existence of a God; it denied the existence of a soul; it was not so much a religion as a code of ethics”. We can understand the appeal of this on the one hand to the rationalist and on the other to the sentimentalist. Unfortunately for these, all three statements arc untrue, at least in the sense in which they are me

Beginners will first meditate upon equanimity. Once that is established, they will then meditate upon the remaining three [immeasurable qualities of love, compassion, and joy]....First, toward all those who are relatives, attachment is to be abandoned as though they were neutral. Then abandon aversion for enemies as though they were neutral and remain without partiality. In order to be free from delusion even toward the neutral, have the intention to dispel the passions of beings all at once. Me

We are shaped by our thoughts; we become what we think. When the mind is pure, joy follows like a shadow that never leaves.

Long before man traveled into space, rabbis debated how one would observe Shabbat there-not because they anticipated space travel but because Buddhists strive to live with questions and Jews would rather die.

It is the ultimate religion, through which all humans neuropsychologically morph into Buddhas, or Enlightened Beings.

We can see that there are many ways in which we actively contribute to our own experience of mental unrest and suffering. Although, in general, mental and emotional afflictions themselves can come naturally, often it is our own reinforcement of those negative emotions that makes them so much worse. For instance when we have anger or hatred towards a person, there is less likelihood of its developing to a very intense degree if we leave it unattended.However, if we think about the projected injus

I have found that this is pretty radical notion for anyone who was raised with a strong Christian background. Within that religious tradition there is an emphasis on original sin, which dictates that we area bacically not good at all but must work for our salvation. Within the Buddhist tradition we are saying the opposite: actually you are basically good. You are basically wise. You are basically kind. You just need to discover that truth and develop confidence in it.