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You Accept That This Civilisation Could Be Abolished And Life Will Begin Later On After A Few Thousand Years Because That Is Something That Has Happened In The History Of This Planet. When You Have Peace In Yourself And Accept, Then You Are Calm Enough To Do Something, But If You Are Carried By Despair There Is No Hope.

-Nhat Hanh

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You Accept That This

Nhat Hanh

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You Accept That This Civilisation Could Be Abolished And Life Will Begin Later On After A Few Thousand Years Because That Is Something That Has Happened In The History Of This Planet. When You Have Peace In Yourself And Accept, Then You Are Calm Enough To Do Something, But If You Are Carried By Despair There Is No Hope.

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The Buddha Called Suffering A Holy Truth, Because Our Suffering Has The Capacity Of Showing Us The Path To Liberation. Embrace Your Suffering And Let It Reveal To You The Way To Peace.

Many Of Us Worry About The Situation Of The World . . . We Need To Remain Calm, To See Clearly. Meditation Is A Means To Be Aware, And To Try To Help.

When We Smile, The Muscles Around Our Mouth Are Stretched And Relaxed, Just Like Doing Yoga. Smiling Is Mouth Yoga. We Release The Tension From Our Face As We Smile. Others Who Run Into Us Notice It, Even Strangers, And Are Likely To Smile Back. It Is A Wonderful Chain Reaction That We Can Initiate, Touching The Joy In Anyone We Encounter. Smiling Is An Ambassador Of Goodwill.

Your Anger Is Like A Flower. In The Beginning You May Not Understand The Nature Of Your Anger, Or Why It Has Come Up. But If You Know How To Embrace It With The Energy Of Mindfulness, It Will Begin To Open. You May Be Sitting, Following Your Breathing, Or You May Be Practicing Walking Meditation To Generate The Energy Of Mindfulness And Embrace Your Anger. After Ten Or Twenty Minutes Your Anger Will Have To Open Herself To You, And Suddenly, You Will See The True Nature Of Your Anger. It May Have Arisen Just Because Of A Wrong Perception Or The Lack Of Skillfulness.

Walking Meditation

We Fear That This Moment Will End, That We Won't Get What We Need, That We Will Lose What We Love, Or That We Will Not Be Safe. Often, Our Biggest Fear Is The Knowledge That One Day Our Bodies Will Cease Functioning. So Even When We Are Surrounded By All The Conditions For Happiness, Our Joy Is Not Complete.

If You're A Politician, You Might Want To Learn The Buddhist Way Of Negotiation. Restoring Communication And Bringing Back Reconciliation Is Clear And Concrete In Buddhism.

I Do Not Watch Television. But I'm In Touch With The World. If Anything Really Important Happens, Someone Will Tell Me.

The Secret To Happiness Is Happiness Itself. Wherever We Are, Any Time, We Have The Capacity To Enjoy The Sunshine, The Presence Of Each Other, The Wonder Of Our Breathing. We Don't Have To Travel Anywhere Else To Do So. We Can Be In Touch With These Things Right Now.

Freedom Is The Real Foundation Of Happiness.

When We Are Angry, Our Anger Is Our Very Self. To Suppress Or Chase Away Our Anger Is To Suppress Or Chase Away Ourselves. When Anger Is Born, We Can Be Aware That Anger Is An Energy In Us, And We Can Change That Energy Into Another Kind Of Energy. If We Want To Transform It, First We Have To Know How To Accept It.

Anxiety, The Illness Of Our Time, Comes Primarily From Our Inability To Dwell In The Present Moment.

The Way Must Be In You; The Destination Also Must Be In You And Not Somewhere Else In Space Or Time. If That Kind Of Self-transformation Is Being Realized In You, You Will Arrive.

Our Role As Gardeners Is To Choose, Plant And Tend The Best Seeds Within The Garden Of Our Consciousness. Learning To Look Deeply At Our Consciousness Is Our Greatest Gift And Our Greatest Need, For There Lie The Seeds Of Suffering And Of Love, The Very Roots Of Our Being, Of Who We Are. Mindfulness...is The Guide And The Practice By Which We Learn How To Use The Seeds Of Suffering To Nourish The Seeds Of Love.

In Every Country In The World, Killing Human Beings Is Condemned. The Buddhist Precept Of Non-killing Extends Even Further, To Include All Living Beings.

It Is Best If We Do Not Listen To Or Look At The Person Whom We Consider To Be The Cause Of Our Anger. Like A Fireman, We Have To Pour Water On The Blaze First And Not Waste Time Looking For The One Who Set The House On Fire. "breathing In, I Know That I Am Angry. Breathing Out, I Know That I Must Put All My Energy Into Caring For My Anger." So We Avoid Thinking About The Other Person, And We Refrain From Doing Or Saying Anything As Long As Our Anger Persists. If We Put All Our Mind Into Observing Our Anger, We Will Avoid Doing Any Damage That We May Regret Later.

Without Full Awareness Of Breathing, There Can Be No Development Of Meditative Stability And Understanding.

It's Very Important That We Re-learn The Art Of Resting And Relaxing. Not Only Does It Help Prevent The Onset Of Many Illnesses That Develop Through Chronic Tension And Worrying; It Allows Us To Clear Our Minds, Focus, And Find Creative Solutions To Problems.

Every Feeling Is A Field Of Energy. A Pleasant Feeling Is An Energy Which Can Nourish. Irritation Is A Feeling Which Can Destroy. Under The Light Of Awareness, The Energy Of Irritation Can Be Transformed Into And Energy Which Nourishes.

Seek Peace. When You Have Peace Within, Real Peace With Others Will Be Possible.

It Is Possible To Live Twenty-four Hours A Day In A State Of Love. Every Movement, Every Glance, Every Thought, And Every Word Can Be Infused With Love.

Life Is Available Only In The Present Moment.

I Promise Myself That I Will Enjoy Every Minute Of The Day That Is Given Me To Live.

Do Not Be Idolatrous About Or Bound To Any Doctrine, Theory, Or Ideology, Even Buddhist Ones. All Systems Of Thought Are Guiding Means; They Are Not Absolute Truth.

Compassion Is Our Most Important Practice. Understanding Brings Compassion. Understanding The Suffering That Living Beings Undergo Helps Liberate The Energy Of Compassion. And With That Energy You Know What To Do.

A Smile Can Change The Situation Of The World.

It Is Not Impermanence That Makes Us Suffer. What Makes Us Suffer Is Wanting Things To Be Permanent When They Are Not.

Follow Your Breathing, Dwell Mindfully On Your Steps, And Soon You Will Find Your Balance.

When We Give Ourselves The Chance To Let Go Of All Our Tension, The Body's Natural Capacity To Heal Itself Can Begin To Work.

Letting Go Gives Us Freedom, And Freedom Is The Only Condition For Happiness. If, In Our Heart, We Still Cling To Anything - Anger, Anxiety, Or Possessions - We Cannot Be Free.

When Reality Is Perceived In Its Nature Of Ultimate Perfection, The Practitioner Has Reached A Level Of Wisdom Called Non-discrimination Mind - A Wondrous Communion In Which There Is No Longer Any Distinction Made Between Subject And Object.

We Will Be More Successful In All Our Endeavors If We Can Let Go Of The Habit Of Running All The Time, And Take Little Pauses To Relax And Re-center Ourselves. And We'll Also Have A Lot More Joy In Living.

Each Moment You Are Alive Is A Gem. It Needs You To Breathe Gently For The Miracles To Be Displayed.

Inspirational Life

You Carry Mother Earth Within You. She Is Not Outside Of You. Mother Earth Is Not Just Your Environment. In That Insight Of Inter-being, It Is Possible To Have Real Communication With The Earth, Which Is The Highest Form Of Prayer.

Breathing In, There Is Only The Present Moment. Breathing Out, It Is A Wonderful Moment.

If You Are Capable Of Brushing Your Teeth In Mindfulness, Then You Will Be Able To Enjoy The Time When You Take A Shower, Cook Your Breakfast, Sip Your Tea.

When It Comes To Health And Well-being, Regular Exercise Is About As Close To A Magic Potion As You Can Get.

We Humans Have Lost The Wisdom Of Genuinely Resting And Relaxing. We Worry Too Much. We Don't Allow Our Bodies To Heal, And We Don't Allow Our Minds And Hearts To Heal.

Transformations Is The Word. We Can Do The Work Of Transformation Only In The Present Moment

It Is Difficult To Explain To Children In The "overdeveloped" Nations That Not All Children In The World Have Such Beautiful And Nourishing Food. Awareness Of This Fact Alone Can Help Us Overcome Many Of Our Own Psychological Pains. Eventually Our Contemplation Can Help Us See How To Assist Those Who Need Our Help So Much.

What Is Most Important Is To Find Peace And To Share It With Others. To Have Peace, You Can Begin By Walking Peacefully. Everything Depends On Your Steps.

The Practice Of Peace And Reconciliation Is One Of The Most Vital And Artistic Of Human Actions.

It Is Often Said That The Buddha's Teaching Is Only A Raft To Help You Cross The River, A Finger Pointing To The Moon. Don't Maistake The Finger For The Moon. The Raft Is Not The Shore. If We Cling To The Raft, If We Cling To The Finger, We Miss Everything. We Cannot, In The Name Of The Finger Or The Raft Kill Each Other. Human Life Is More Precious Than Any Ideology, Any Doctrine.

Our Smile Will Bring Happiness To Us And To Those Around Us. Even If We Spend A Lot Of Money On Gifts For Everyone In Our Family, Nothing We Buy Could Give Them As Much Happiness As The Gift Of Our Awareness, Our Smile. And This Precious Gift Costs Nothing.

When You Love Someone, You Want To Share Everything With Him Or Her. So It Is Your Duty To Say, "i Suffer And I Want You To Know" - And He Will, She Will, Appreciate It.

When You Love Someone

It's Wonderful To Be Alive And To Walk On Earth.

If You Realize That The Other Person Is A Human Being Too, And You Have Exactly The Same Kind Of Spiritual Path, And Then The Two Can Become Good Practitioners. This Appears To Be Practical For Both.

People Sacrifice The Present For The Future. But Life Is Available Only In The Present. That Is Why We Should Walk In Such A Way That Every Step Can Bring Us To The Here And The Now.

In The Light Of Interbeing, Peace And Happiness In Your Daily Life Means Peace And Happiness In The World.

Smile, Breathe, Go Slowly.

Compassion Is A Mind That Removes The Suffering That Is Present In The Other.

The Fact Is That When You Make The Other Suffer, He Will Try To Find Relief By Making You Suffer More. The Result Is An Escalation Of Suffering On Both Sides.

The Best Way To Take Care Of The Future Is To Take Care Of The Present Moment.

When You Sit In A Café, With A Lot Of Music In The Background And A Lot Of Projects In Your Head, You're Not Really Drinking Your Coffee Or Your Tea. You're Drinking Your Projects, You're Drinking Your Worries. You Are Not Real, And The Coffee Is Not Real Either. Your Coffee Can Only Reveal Itself To You As A Reality When You Go Back To Your Self And Produce Your True Presence, Freeing Yourself From The Past, The Future, And From Your Worries. When You Are Real, The Tea Also Becomes Real And The Encounter Between You And The Tea Is Real. This Is Genuine Tea Drinking.

Doubt In My Tradition Is Something That Is Very Helpful. Because Of Doubt, You Can Thirst More And You Will Get A Higher Kind Of Proof.

Sometimes You Have A Flash Of Insight, But It's Not Strong Enough To Survive. Therefore In The Practice Of Buddhism, Samadhi Is The Power To Maintain Insight Alive In Every Moment, So That Every Speech, Every Word, Every Act Will Bear The Nature Of That Insight. It Is A Question Of Cleaning. And You Clean Better If You Are Surrounded By Those Who Are Practicing Exactly The Same.

To Love Our Enemy Is Impossible. The Moment We Understand Our Enemy, We Feel Compassion Towards Him/her, And He/she Is No Longer Our Enemy.

The First Thing I Learned Was That Even If You Have A Lot Of Money And Power And Fame, You Can Still Suffer Very Deeply.

The Kingdom Of God Is Available To You In The Here And The Now. But The Question Is Whether You Are Available To The Kingdom. Our Practice Is To Make Ourselves Ready For The Kingdom So That It Can Manifest In The Here And The Now. You Don't Need To Die In Order To Enter The Kingdom Of Heaven. In Fact, You Have To Be Truly Alive In Order To Do So.

If We Are At War With Our Parents, Our Family, Our Society, Or Our Church, There Is Probably A War Going On Inside Us Also, So The Most Basic Work For Peace Is To Return To Ourselves And Create Harmony Among The Elements Within Us - Our Feelings, Our Perceptions, And Our Mental States. That Is Why The Practice Of Meditation, Looking Deeply, Is So Important.

We Have To Understand In Order To Be Of Help. We All Have Pain, But We Tend To Suppress It, Because We Don't Want It To Come Up To Our Living Room. The Most Important Thing Is That We Need To Be Understood. We Need Someone To Be Able To Listen To Us And To Understand Us, Then We Will Suffer Less, But Everyone Is Suffering, And No One Wants To Listen. We Don't Know How To Express Ourselves So That People Can Understand. Because We Suffer So Much, The Way We Express Our Pain Hurts Other People, And They Don't Want To Listen.

Suppose You Are Drinking A Cup Of Tea. When You Hold Your Cup, You May Like To Breathe In, To Bring Your Mind Back To Your Body, And You Become Fully Present. And When You Are Truly There, Something Else Is Also There - Life, Represented By The Cup Of Tea. In That Moment You Are Real, And The Cup Of Tea Is Real. You Are Not Lost In The Past, In The Future, In Your Projects, In Your Worries. You Are Free From All Of These Afflictions. And In That State Of Being Free, You Enjoy Your Tea. That Is The Moment Of Happiness, And Of Peace.

Each Time You Look At A Tangerine, You Can See Deeply Into It. You Can See Everything In The Universe In One Tangerine. When You Peel It And Smell It, It’s Wonderful. You Can Take Your Time Eating A Tangerine And Be Very Happy.

The Quality Of Our Life Depends On The Quality Of The Seeds That Lie Deep In Our Consciousness.

If You Abandon The Present Moment, You Cannot Live The Moments Of Your Daily Life Deeply.

We Must Look Deeply. When We Buy Something Or Consume Something, We May Be Participating In An Act Of Killing. This Precept [non-killing] Reflects Our Determination Not To Kill, Either Directly Or Indirectly, And Also To Prevent Others From Killing.

Maybe We Have Enough Technology To Save The Planet But It Is Not Enough Because The People Are Not Ready.

Earth Will Be Safe When We Feel In Us Enough Safety.

A Look Filled With Understanding, An Accepting Smile, A Loving Word, A Meal Shared In Warmth And Awareness Are The Things Which Create Happiness In The Present Moment. By Nourishing Awareness In The Present Moment, You Can Avoid Causing Suffering To Yourself And Those Around You. The Way You Look At Others, Your Smile, And Your Small Acts Of Caring Can Create Happiness. True Happiness Does Not Depend On Wealth Or Fame.

To Be Beautiful Means To Be Yourself. You Don’t Need To Be Accepted By Others. You Need To Accept Yourself.

In Mindfulness One Is Not Only Restful And Happy, But Alert And Awake. Meditation Is Not Evasion; It Is A Serene Encounter With Reality.

If We Can Not Smile, We Cannot Help Other People To Smile.

The Larger Your Beloved Community, The More You Can Accomplish In The World.

Beloved Community

Because If The Manifestations That Happen In The Present Moment Are Beautiful And Good, Their Continuation In The Future Will Be Also Good And Beautiful.

Without Understanding, Your Love Is Not True Love. You Must Look Deeply In Order To See And Understand The Needs, Aspirations, And Suffering Of The One You Love.

To Live In The Present Moment Is A Miracle. The Miracle Is Not To Walk On Water. The Miracle Is To Walk On The Green Earth In The Present Moment, To Appreciate The Peace And Beauty That Are Available Now.

People Suffer Because They Are Caught In Their Views. As Soon As We Release Those Views, We Are Free And We Don't Suffer Anymore.

Wisdom Is A Living Stream, Not An Icon To Be Preserved In A Museum. Only When A Practitioner Finds The Spring Of Wisdom In His Or Her Own Life Can It Flow To A Future Generation

The Buddha Said, 'nothing Can Survive Without Food.' This Is A Very Simple And Very Deep Truth. Love And Hate Are Both Living Phenomena. If We Do Not Nourish Our Love, It Will Die And May Turn Into Hate. If We Want Love To Last, We Have To Nurture It And Give It Food Every Day. Hate Is The Same; If We Don't Feed It, It Cannot Survive.

No Thought About The Past Or Future Can Pull You Away From Your Present Peace And Joy. The Universe Exists In This Present Moment. No Desire Can Pull You Away From This Present Peace, Not Even The Desire To Become A Buddha Or The Desire To Save All Beings. Know That To Become A Buddha And To Save All Beings Can Only Be Realized On The Foundation Of The Pure Peace Of The Present Moment.

If You Do Not Give Right Attention To The One You Love, It Is A Kind Of Killing. When You Are In The Car Together, If You Are Lost In Your Thoughts, Assuming You Already Know Everything About Her, She Will Slowly Die.

When You Enter Deeply Into This Moment, You See The Nature Of Reality, And This Insight Liberates You From Suffering And Confusion. Peace Is Already There To Some Extent: The Problem Is Whether We Know How To Touch It.

The Kingdom Of God Is Available To You In The Here And The Now. But The Question Is Whether You Are Available To The Kingdom.

Meditation Is Not Meant To Help Us Avoid Problems Or Run Away From Difficulties. It Is Meant To Allow Positive Healing To Take Place. To Meditate Is To Learn How To Stop—to Stop Being Carried Away By Our Regrets About The Past, Our Anger Or Despair In The Present, Or Our Worries About The Future.

May We Awaken From The Dream That We Are Different.

The Source Of Love Is Deep In Us And We Can Help Others Realize A Lot Of Happiness. One Word, One Action, One Thought Can Reduce Another Person’s Suffering And Bring That Person Joy.

When The Energy Of Compassion And Love Touches Us, Healing Establishes Itself.

That Is Why Those Who Are Not Capable Of Being There In The Present Moment, They Don't Really Live Their Life - They Live Like Dead People.

As Long As You Find Something Beautiful, Good, And True To Believe In And Abide By, You Have The Equivalent Of God In Your Life.

Deep Listening Is The Kind Of Listening That Can Help Relieve The Suffering Of Another Person. You Can Call It Compassionate Listening. You Listen With Only One Purpose: To Help Him Or Her To Empty His Heart. Even If He Says Things That Are Full Of Wrong Perceptions, Full Of Bitterness, You Are Still Capable Of Continuing To Listen With Compassion. Because You Know That Listening Like That, You Give That Person A Chance To Suffer Less.

Nirvana Is The Complete Silencing Of Concepts.

If You Have The Insight Of Non-self, If You Have The Insight Of Impermanence, You Should Make That Insight Into A Concentration That You Keep Alive Throughout The Day. Then What You Say, What You Think, And What You Do Will Then Be In The Light Of That Wisdom And You Will Avoid Making Mistakes And Creating Suffering.

When Practiced To Its Fullest, Mindful Eating Turns A Simple Meal Into A Spiritual Experience, Giving Us A Deep Appreciation Of All That Went Into The Meal's Creation As Well A Deep Understanding Of The Relationship Between The Food On Our Table, Our Own Health, And Our Planet's Health.

Eating Mindfully Is A Most Important Practice Of Meditation. We Can Eat In A Way That We Restore The Cookie Of Our Childhood. The Present Moment Is Filled With Joy And Happiness. If You Are Attentive, You Will See It.

Once You Develop The Practice Of Smiling, You May Not Need A Reminder. You Will Smile As Soon As You Hear A Bird Singing Or See The Sunlight Streaming Through The Window.

If We Are Not Fully Ourselves, Truly In The Present Moment, We Miss Everything.

When We Change Our Daily Lives - The Way We Think, Speak And Act - We Change The World.

At The Moment Of Waking Up, Before Getting Out Of Bed, Get In Touch With Your Breath

The Present Moment Is Filled With Joy And Happiness. If You Are Attentive, You Will See It. (21)

You Who Are Journalists, Writers, Citizens, You Have The Right And Duty To Say To Those You Have Elected That They Must Practice Mindfulness, Calm And Deep Listening, And Loving Speech. This Is Universal Thing, Taught By All Religions.

The Real Power Of The Buddha Was That He Had So Much Love. He Saw People Trapped In Their Notions Of Small Separate Self, Feeling Guilty Or Proud Of That Self, And He Offered Revolutionary Teachings That Resounded Like A Lion's Roar, Like A Great Rising Tide, Helping People To Wake Up And Break Free From The Prison Of Ignorance.

Those Who Are Without Compassion Cannot See What Is Seen With The Eyes Of Compassion.

When We Are Present, Life Is Also Present.

There's No Way I Can Be Tossed Around Like A Bottle Slapped Here And There On The Waves.

I Do Many Kinds Of Work, And If You Forbid Me From Binding Books, From Gardening, From Writing Poetry, From Practicing Walking Meditation, From Teaching Children, I Will Be Very Unhappy. To Me, Work Is Pleasant. Pleasant Or Unpleaseant Depends On Our Way Of Looking.

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.

Do Not Say That I'll Depart Tomorrow Because Even Today I Still Arrive. Look At Me: I Arrive In Every Second To Be A Bud On A Spring Branch, To Be A Tiny Bird Whose Wings Are Still Fragile, Learning To Sing In My New Nest, To Be A Caterpillar In The Heart Of A Flower, To Be A Jewel Hiding Itself In A Stone.

If You Are A Poet, You Will See Clearly That There Is A Cloud Floating In This Sheet Of Paper? ?to Be? Is To Inter-be. We Cannot Just Be By Ourselves Alone. We Have To Inter-be With Every Other Thing. This Sheet Of Paper Is, Because Everything Else Is.

Just Breathing And Smiling Can Make Us Very Happy, Because When We Breathe Consciously We Recover Ourselves Completely And Encounter Life In The Present Moment.

I Will Practice Coming Back To The Present Moment...not Letting Regrets And Sorrow Drag Me Back Into The Past Or Letting Anxieties, Fears, Or Cravings Pull Me Out.

Anger Is The Energy That People Use In Order To Act. But When You Are Angry, You Are Not Lucid, And You Might Do Wrong Things. That Is Why Compassion Is A Better Energy.

When Another Person Makes You Suffer, It Is Because He Suffers Deeply Within Himself, And His Suffering Is Spilling Over. He Does Not Need Punishment; He Needs Help. That's The Message He Is Sending.

If You Are Truly Present And Know How To Take Care Of The Present Moment As Best You Can, You Are Doing Your Best For The Future Already.

True Self Is Non-self, The Awareness That The Self Is Made Only Of Non-self Elements. There's No Separation Between Self And Other, And Everything Is Interconnected. Once You Are Aware Of That You Are No Longer Caught In The Idea That You Are A Separate Entity.

When You Look Deeply Into Your Anger, You Will See That The Person You Call Your Enemy Is Also Suffering. As Soon As You See That, The Capacity Of Accepting And Having Compassion For Them Is There.

If We Chew Every Morsel Of Our Food, In That Way We Become Grateful, And When You Are Grateful, You Are Happy.

The Practice Of Zen Is To Eat, Breathe, Cook, Carry Water, And Scrub The Toilet — To Infuse Every Act Of Body, Speech, And Mind — With Mindfulness, To Illuminate Every Leaf And Pebble, Every Heap Of Garbage, Every Path That Leads To Our Mind's Return Home.

Enlightenment Is Always There. Small Enlightenment Will Bring Great Enlightenment. If You Breathe In And Are Aware That You Are Alive - That You Can Touch The Miracle Of Being Alive - Then That Is A Kind Of Enlightenment.

Understanding And Love Are Not Two Separate Things, But Just One. To Develop Understanding, You Have To Practice Looking At All Living Beings With The Eyes Of Compassion. When You Understand, You Cannot Help But Love. And When You Love, You Naturally Act In A Way That Can Relieve The Suffering Of People.

Listening To And Understanding Our Inner Sufferings Will Resolve Most Of The Problems We Encounter.

Deep Listening Is The Kind Of Listening That Can Help Relieve The Suffering Of Another Person. You Can Call It Compassionate Listening. You Listen With Only One Purpose: To Help Him Or Her To Empty His Heart.

Mother Earth Is Very Talented.

When You Have A Toothache, You Think That Not Having A Toothache Will Make You Very Happy. But When You Don't Have A Toothache, Often You Are Still Not Happy. If You Practice Awareness, You Suddenly Become Very Rich, Very Very Happy.

When You Drop Bombs On The Enemy, You Drop Those Same Bombs On Yourself, Your Own Country.

I Am In The Present. I Don't Think Of The Past. I Don't Think Of The Future.

As You Embrace Your Pain, You Get Relief And You Find Out How To Handle That Emotion. And If You Know How To Handle The Fear, Then You Have Enough Insight In Order To Solve The Problem. The Problem Is To Not Allow That Anxiety To Take Over.

When We Walk Like (we Are Rushing), We Print Anxiety And Sorrow On The Earth. We Have To Walk In A Way That We Only Print Peace And Serenity On The Earth... Be Aware Of The Contact Between Your Feet And The Earth. Walk As If You Are Kissing The Earth With Your Feet.

Birth Is Okay And Death Is Okay, If We Know That They Are Only Concepts In Our Mind. Reality Transcends Both Birth And Death.

Happiness Is Not An Individual Matter.

Without Collective Awakening The Catastrophe Will Come. I Think People In The Mass Media, Journalists, Film Makers And Others, You Can Contribute To The Collective Awakening If You Are Awake And Then Your Life Will Embody That Awakening.

Meditation Is To Be Aware Of What Is Going On - In Our Bodies, In Our Feelings, In Our Minds, And In The World. Each Day...children Die Of Hunger.... Yet The Sunrise Is Beautiful, And The Rose That Bloomed This Morning Along The Wall Is A Miracle. Life Is Both Dreadful And Wonderful. To Practice Meditation Is To Be In Touch With Both Aspects. Please Do Not Think We Must Be Solemn In Order To Meditate. In Fact, To Meditate Well, We Have To Smile A Lot.

At Any Moment, You Have A Choice, That Either Leads You Closer To Your Spirit Or Further Away From It.

I Think, Therefore I Am ... Not Here.

Let Us Look At Wealth And Poverty. The Affluent Society And The Deprived Society Inter-are. The Wealth Of One Society Is Made Of The Poverty Of The Other. "this Is Like This, Because That Is Like That." Wealth Is Made Of Non-wealth Elements, And Poverty Is Made By Non-poverty Elements. [...] So We Must Be Careful Not To Imprison Ourselves In Concepts. The Truth Is That Everything Contains Everything Else. We Cannot Just Be, We Can Only Inter-be. We Are Responsible Fo Everything That Happens Around Us.

Silence Is Something That Comes From Your Heart, Not From Outside. Silence Doesn't Mean Not Talking And Not Doing Things; It Means That You Are Not Disturbed Inside. If You're Truly Silent, Then No Matter What Situation You Find Yourself In You Can Enjoy The Silence.

Our Mind Is The Foundation Of All Our Actions, Whether They Are Actions Of Body, Speech, Or Mind, I.e., Thinking. Whatever We Think, Say, Or Do Arises From Our Mind. What Our Consciousness Consumes Becomes The Substance Of Our Life, So We Have To Be Very Careful Which Nutriments We Ingest.

We Inter-breath With The Rain Forests, We Drink From The Oceans. They Are Part Of Our Own Body.

When We Speak, We Want To Say Something Sweet, But We Don't Say Something Sweet Because Something Is Ordering Us From Deep Down To Say Something Unkind. We Want To Open Our Hearts To People, But We Can't Do It, Because We Are Being Ordered Around By The Sufferings We Have Concealed Deep In Our Consciousness.

Real Love Means Loving Kindness And Compassion, The Kind Of Love That Does Not Have Any Conditions.

You Are Like A Candle. Imagine You Are Sending Light Out All Around You. All Your Words, Thoughts And Actions Are Going In Many Directions. If You Say Something Kind, Your Kind Words Go In Many Directions, And You Yourself Go With Them. We Are ...transforming And Continuing In A Different Form At Every Moment.

The Mind Can Go In A Thousand Directions, But On This Beautiful Path, I Walk In Peace. With Each Step, The Wind Blows. With Each Step, A Flower Blooms.

You Would Not Cry If You Knew That By Looking Deeply Into The Rain You Would Still See The Cloud.

We Should Be Able To Bring The Practice Of Meditation Hall Into Our Daily Lives. We Need To Discuss Among Ourselves How To Do It. Do You Practice Breathing Between Phone Calls? Do You Practice Smiling While Cutting Carrots? Do You Practice Relaxation After Hard Hours Of Work? These Are Practical Questions. If You Know How To Apply Meditation To Dinner Time, Leisure Time, Sleeping Time, It Will Penetrate Your Daily Life, And It Will Also Have A Tremendous Effect On Social Concerns.

One Included All, And All Were Contained In One.

We Really Have To Understand The Person We Want To Love. If Our Love Is Only A Will To Possess, It Is Not Love. If We Only Think Of Ourselves, If We Know Only Our Own Needs And Ignore The Needs Of The Other Person, We Cannot Love.

In All The Practice Centers In The Tradition Of Plum Village Whenever The Phone Rings Or The Clock Chimes In The Dining Hall, People Stop Everything They Are Doing And Breathe Consciously, Releasing All Thinking And Any Tension.

In Buddhism, We Talk Of Meditation As An Act Of Awakening, To Be Awake To The Fact That The Earth Is In Danger And Living Species Are In Danger.

Silence Is Essential. We Need Silence Just As Much As We Need Air, Just As Much As Plants Need Light. If Our Minds Are Crowded With Words And Thoughts, There Is No Space For Us.

You Can Practice Deep Listening In Order To Relieve The Suffering In Us, And In The Other Person. That Kind Of Listening Is Described As Compassionate Listening. You Listen Only For The Purpose Of Relieving Suffering In The Other Person.

We Can Help Many People Suffer Less And Realize A Lot Of Happiness Without Being Rich Or Influential. If Love And Compassion Are In Out Hearts, Every Thought, Word, And Deed Can Bring About A Miracle

Be Angry, It's Okay. To Be Angry, That Is Very Human. And To Learn How To Smile At Your Anger And Make Peace With Your Anger Is Very Nice.

When We Respect Our Blood Ancestors And Our Spiritual Ancestors, We Feel Rooted. If We Find Ways To Cherish And Develop Our Spiritual Heritage, We Will Avoid The Kind Of Alienation That Is Destroying Society, And We Will Become Whole Again. ... Learning To Touch Deeply The Jewels Of Our Own Tradition Will Allow Us To Understand And Appreciate The Values Of Other Traditions, And This Will Benefit Everyone.

Look Deeply; I Arrive In Every Second To Be A Bud On A Spring Branch ... To Be A Jewel Hiding Itself In A Stone.

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.

You Have To Learn How To Help A Wounded Child While Still Practicing Mindful Breathing. You Should Not Allow Yourself To Get Lost In Action. Action Should Be Meditation At The Same Time.

They Criticize The Silent Ones. They Criticize The Talkative Ones. They Criticize The Moderate Ones. There Is No One In The World Who Escapes Criticism.

Many Communist Government Officials Have A Rigid, Dictatorial Power, But They Live In Constant Suspicion And Fear Of Anything That Might Undermine The Power They Have.

May All Beings Learn How To Nourish Themselves With Joy Each Day.

The Reason We Might Lose Love Is Because We Are Always Looking Outside Of Us, Thinking That The Object Or Action Of Love Is Out There. That Is Why We Allow The Love, The Harmony, The Mature Understanding, To Slip Away From Ourselves.

There Is No Way To Happiness - Happiness Is The Way.

You Must Love In Such A Way That The Person You Love Feels Free.

Positive Thinking

To Be Or Not To Be Is Not The Question. The Question Is Whether You Can Transcend These Notions.

Be Or Not To Be

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."

Every One Of Us Needs A Home. The World Needs A Home. There Are So Many Young People Who Are Homeless. They May Have A Building To Live In, But They Are Homeless In Their Hearts. That Is Why The Most Important Practice Of Our Time Is To Give Each Person A Home.

If You Have Not Suffered Hunger, You Do Not Appreciate Having Something To Eat. If You Have Not Gone Through A War, You Don't Know The Value Of Peace. That Is Why We Should Not Try To Run Away From One Thing After Another Thing. Holding Our Suffering, Looking Deeply Into It, We Find A Way To Happiness.

Wrong Perceptions Cannot Be Removed By Guns And Bombs. They Should Be Removed By Deep Listening, Compassionate Listening, And Loving Space.

Often We Tell Ourselves, "don't Just Sit There, Do Something!" But When We Practice Awareness, We Discover That The Opposite May Be More Helpful: "don't Just Do Something, Sit There!"

When We Eat Mindfully, We Consume Exactly What We Need To Keep Our Bodies, Our Minds, And The Earth Healthy. When We Practice Like This, We Reduce Suffering For Ourselves And For Others.

You Need The Practice Of Mindfulness To Bring Your Mind Back To The Body And Establish Yourself In The Moment. If You Are Fully Present, You Need Only Make A Step Or Take A Breath In Order To Enter The Kingdom Of God. And Once You Have The Kingdom, You Don't Need To Run After Objects Of Your Craving, Like Power, Fame, Sensual Pleasure, And So On. Peace Is Possible. Happiness Is Possible.

If We Take The Time To Look Deeply, We See That Understanding And Compassion Arise From Suffering. Understanding Is The Understanding Of Suffering, And Compassion Is The Kind Of Energy That Can Transform Suffering. If Suffering Is Not There, We Have No Means To Cultivate Our Understanding And Our Compassion. This Is Something Quite Simple To See

The Seven Factors Of Awakening Are Mindfulness, Investigation Of Phenomena, Diligence, Joy, Ease, Concentration, And Letting Go.

If You Come To Plum Village In The Summertime, You See Many Lotus Flowers. Without The Mud The Lotus Flowers Cannot Grow. You Cannot Separate Lotus Flowers From The Mud. It Is The Same With Understanding And Love. These Are Two Kinds Of Flowers That Grow On The Ground Of Suffering

Dealing With Our Overweight - Or With Any Of Our Life's Difficulties, For That Matter - Is Not A Battle To Be Fought. Instead, We Must Learn How To Make Friends With Our Hardships And Challenges. They Are There To Help Us; They Are Natural Opportunities For Deeper Understanding And Transformation, Brining Us More Joy And Peace As We Learn To Work With Them.

The Miracle Is Not To Walk On Water, Or In The Air, Or On Burning Charcoal. The Miracle Is To Walk On Earth. You Breathe In, You Become Aware Of The Fact That You Are Alive. You Are Alive And You Are Walking On This Beautiful Planet. The Greatest Of Of All Miracles Is To Be Alive.

Freedom From Suffering Is A Great Happiness.

Great Happiness

When We Say, "i Take Refuge In The Buddha," We Should Also Understand That "the Buddha Takes Refuge In Me," Because Without The Second Part The First Part Is Not Complete. The Buddha Needs Us For Awakening, Understanding, And Love To Be Real Things And Not Just Concepts. They Must Be Real Things That Have Real Effects On Life. Whenever I Say, "i Take Refuge In The Buddha," I Hear "the Buddha Takes Refuge In Me."

Many Of Us Have Been Running All Our Lives. Practice Stopping.

Our Life Is A Manifestation, And We Can Very Well Make That Manifestation Beautiful And Meaningful And Have A Good Influence.

Be Yourself. Life Is Precious As It Is. All The Elements For Your Happiness Are Already Here. There Is No Need To Run, Strive, Search, Or Struggle. Just Be.

To Take Care Of The Environment, We Must First Take Care Of The Environmentalist.

Thanks To Impermanence, Everything Is Possible.

Nothing Lasts Forever

Infinite Possibilities

The More We See, The More We Understand. The More We Understand, The Easier It Is For Us To Have Compassion And Love. Understanding Is The Source Of Love. Understanding Is Love Itself. Understanding Is Another Name For Love; Love Is Another Name For Understanding.

When We Live In The Spirit Of Gratitude, There Will Be Much Happiness In Our Life. The One Who Is Grateful Is The One Who Has Much Happiness While The One Who Is Ungrateful Will Not Be Able To Have Happiness.

There Is No Enlightenment Outside Of Daily Life.

In The Mountains Of Wisdom No Climbing Is In Vain.

Mindfulness Helps You Go Home To The Present. And Every Time You Go There And Recognize A Condition Of Happiness That You Have, Happiness Comes.

To Be Beautiful Means To Be Yourself.you Don't Need To Be Accepted By Others. You Need To Accept Yourself. When You Are Born A Lotus Flower, Be A Beautiful Lotus Flower, Don't Try To Be A Magnolia Flower. If You Crave Acceptance And Recognition And Try To Change Yourself To Fit What Other People Want You To Be, You Will Suffer All Your Life. True Happiness And True Power Lie In Understanding Yourself, Accepting Yourself, Having Confidence In Yourself.

Nothing Is More Precious Than Being In The Present Moment. Fully Alive, Fully Aware.

Knowing That Anger Makes Me Ugly, I Smile Instead. I Return To Myself And Meditate On Love.

Looking Deeply Into The Wrong Perceptions, Ideas, And Notions That Are At The Base Of Our Suffering Is The Most Important Practice In Buddhist Meditation.

Every Day We Touch What Is Wrong, And, As A Result, We Are Becoming Less And Less Healthy. That Is Why We Have To Learn To Practice Touching What Is Not Wrong—inside Us And Around Us. When We Get In Touch With Our Eyes, Our Heart, Our Liver, Our Breathing, And Our Non-toothache And Really Enjoy Them, We See That The Conditions For Peace And Happiness Are Already Present.

You Can Use Your Life In A Very Useful And Intelligent Way. You Can Very Well Transform That Negative Energy Into A Positive Energy That Empowers You And Makes Life Meaningful.

The Other Person Has Wrong Perceptions About Himself And About Us. And We Have Wrong Perceptions About Ourselves And The Other Person. And That Is The Foundation For Violence And Conflict And War.

In Us, There Is A River Of Feelings, In Which Every Drop Of Water Is A Different Feeling, And Each Feeling Relies On All The Others For Its Existence. To Observe It, We Just Sit On The Bank Of The River And Identify Each Feeling As It Surfaces, Flows By, And Disappears.

In Buddhism, Mindfulness Is The Key. Mindfulness Is The Energy That Sheds Light On All Things And All Activities, Producing The Power Of Concentration, Bringing Forth Deep Insight And Awakening. Mindfulness Is The Base Of Buddhist Practice

‎we Have A Lamp Inside Us. The Oil Of That Lamp Is Our Breathing, Our Steps, And Our Peaceful Smile. Our Practice Is To Light Up The Lamp.

Anger Is Like A Storm Rising Up From The Bottom Of Your Consciousness. When You Feel It Coming, Turn Your Focus To Your Breath. Breathe In Deeply To Bring Your Mind Home To Your Body. Then Look At, Or Think Of, The Person Triggering This Emotion: With Mindfulness, You Can See That They Are Unhappy And Suffering. You Can See Their Wrong Perceptions. You'll Feel Motivated By A Desire To Say Or Do Something To Help The Other Person Suffer Less. This Means Compassionate Energy Has Been Born In Your Heart. And When Compassion Appears, Anger Is Deleted.

Walk As If You Are Kissing The Earth With Your Feet.

Meditation Is Not To Avoid Society; It Is To Look Deep To Have The Kind Of Insight You Need To Take Action. To Think That It Is Just To Sit Down And Enjoy The Calm And Peace, Is Wrong.

If You Have The Chance To Be Exposed To A Loving, Understanding Environment Where The Seed Of Compassion, Loving Kindness, Can Be Watered Every Day, Then You Become A More Loving Person.

Your Presence Is A Miracle.

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