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The trouble with Westerners is that they want to witness their own enlightenment.

Chogyam Trungpa

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Chogyam Trungpa
Age: 47 †
Born: 1940
Born: January 1
Died: 1987
Died: April 4
Erudite
Guru
Painter
Philosopher
Professor
Writer
Peking
Trungpa
Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche
Westerners
Observation
Enlightenment
Witness
Trouble

More quotes by Chogyam Trungpa

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If we go somewhere on foot, we know the way perfectly, whereas if we go by car or airplane, we are hardly there at all. It becomes merely a dream.
Chogyam Trungpa
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The main point of any spiritual practice is to step out of the bureaucracy of ego. This means stepping out of ego's constant desire for a higher, more spiritual, more transcendental version of knowledge, religion, virtue, judgment, comfort, or whatever it is that the particular ego is seeking. One must step out of spiritual materialism.
Chogyam Trungpa
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In Tibetan, authentic presence is wangthang, which literally means, 'field of power'... The cause or the virtue that brings about authentic presence is emptying out and letting go. You have to be without clinging.
Chogyam Trungpa
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In fact, a person always finds when he begins to practice meditation that all sorts of problems are brought out. Any hidden aspects of your personality are brought out into the open, for the simple reason that for the first time you are allowing yourself to see your state of mind as it is.
Chogyam Trungpa
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Real fearlessness is the product of tenderness. It comes from letting the world tickle your heart, your raw and beautiful heart. You are willing to open up, without resistance or shyness, and face the world. You are willing to share your heart with others.
Chogyam Trungpa
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The point of meditation is not merely to be an honest or good person in the conventional sense, trying only to maintain our security. We must begin to become compassionate and wise in the fundamental sense, open and relating to the world as it is.
Chogyam Trungpa
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Enlightenment is ego's ultimate disappointment.
Chogyam Trungpa
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We must begin our practice by walking the narrow path of simplicity, the hinayana path, before we can walk upon the open highway of compassionate action, the mahayana path.
Chogyam Trungpa
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Watchfulness is experiencing a sudden glimpse of something without any qualifications - just the sudden glimpse itself.
Chogyam Trungpa
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The way of cowardice is to embed ourselves in a cocoon, in which we perpetuate our habitual patterns. When we are constantly recreating our basic patterns of habits and thought, we never have to leap into fresh air or onto fresh ground.
Chogyam Trungpa
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You begin to understand that warriorship is a path or a thread that runs through your entire life. It is not just a technique that you apply when you are unhappy or depressed. Warriorship is a continual journey. To be a warrior is to learn to be genuine in every moment of your life. That is the warrior's discipline
Chogyam Trungpa
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If you must begin then go all the way, because if you begin and quit, the unfinished business you have left behind begins to haunt you all the time.
Chogyam Trungpa
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The emphasis on practice is because it is the only time in your life you can steer your karmic situation.
Chogyam Trungpa
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Meditation practice is a way of making friends with ourselves. Whether we are worthy or unworthy, that's not the point. It's developing a friendly attitude to ourselves, accepting the hidden neurosis coming through.
Chogyam Trungpa
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Our life is an endless journey it is like a broad highway that extends infinitely into the distance. The practice of meditation provides a vehicle to travel on that road. Our journey consists of constant ups and downs.
Chogyam Trungpa
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We are threatened by the now so we jump to the past or the future.
Chogyam Trungpa
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We cannot change the way the world is, but by opening ourselves to the world as it is, we may find that gentleness, decency and bravery are available - not only to us, but to all human beings.
Chogyam Trungpa
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Synchronizing mind and body is not a concept or a random technique someone thought up for self-improvement. Rather, it is a basic principle of how to be a human being.
Chogyam Trungpa
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There is no need to struggle to be free the absence of struggle is in itself freedom.
Chogyam Trungpa
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Right mindfulness does not simply mean being aware it is like creating a work of art. You can therefore trust what you are doing you are not threatened by anything. You have room to dance in the space, and this makes it a creative situation. The space is open to you.
Chogyam Trungpa