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As long as our orientation is toward perfection or success, we will never learn about unconditional friendship with ourselves, nor will we find compassion.

Pema Chodron

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Pema Chodron
Age: 88
Born: 1936
Born: July 14
Clergyman
Philosopher
Writer
New York City
New York
Deirdre Blomfield-Brow
Long
Unconditional
Never
Perfection
Friendship
Toward
Compassion
Success
Learn
Find
Orientation

More quotes by Pema Chodron

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Rejoicing in ordinary things is not sentimental or trite. It actually takes guts. Each time we drop our complaints and allow everyday good fortune to inspire us, we enter the warrior's world.
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If you work with your mind, that will alleviate all the suffering that seems to come from the outside.
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My moods are continuously shifting like the weather.
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True compassion does not come from wanting to help out those less fortunate than ourselves but from realizing our kinship with all beings.
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Let difficulty transform you. And it will. In my experience, we just need help in learning how not to run away.
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We practice to liberate ourselves from a burden.
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Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know. Even if we run a hundred miles an hour to the other side of the continent, we find the very same problem awaiting us when we arrive.
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Difficult people are the greatest teachers.
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If it's painful, you become willing not just to endure it but also to let it awaken your heart and soften you. You learn to embrace it.
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Impermanence is a principle of harmony. When we don't struggle against it, we are in harmony with reality.
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It isn't the things that happen to us in our lives that cause us to suffer, it's how we relate to the things that happen to us that causes us to suffer.
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Treat yourself as your own beloved child.
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We can let the circumstances of our lives harden us so that we become increasingly resentful and afraid, or we can let them soften us and make us kinder and more open to what scares us. We always have this choice.
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We're afraid that this anger or sorrow or loneliness is going to last forever... Instead, acting it out is what makes it last.
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To put it concisely, we suffer when we resist the noble and irrefutable truth of impermanence and death.
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We sow the seeds of our future hells or happiness by the way we open or close our minds right now.
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Let your curiosity be greater than your fear.
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Are you experiencing restlessness? Stay! Are fear and loathing out of control? Stay! Aching knees and throbbing back? Stay! What's for lunch? Stay! I can't stand this another minute! Stay!
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As our kindness for ourselves grows, so does our kindness for other people.
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Suffering begins to dissolve when we can question the belief or the hope that there's anywhere to hide.
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