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The very first noble truth of the Buddha points out that suffering is inevitable for human beings as long as we believe that things last—that they don’t disintegrate, that they can be counted on to satisfy our hunger for security.

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
Things
Last
Points
Truth
Inevitable
Firsts
Hunger
Human
Noble
Humans
Beings
Disintegrate
First
Security
Counted
Long
Suffering
Buddha
Believe
Lasts
Satisfy

More quotes by Pema Chodron

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It's important to remember, when we're out there aggressively working for reform, that, even if our particular issue doesn't get resolved, we are adding peace to the world. We have to do our best and at the same time give up all hope of fruition.
Pema Chodron
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At some point, we realize that what we do for ourselves benefits others, and what we do for others benefits us.
Pema Chodron
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The approach is that the best way to use unwanted circumstances on the path of enlightenment is not to resist but to lean into them.
Pema Chodron
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The real thing that we renounce is the tenacious hope that we could be saved from being who we are.
Pema Chodron
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The essence of bravery is being without self-deception.
Pema Chodron
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Allow situations in your life to become your teacher.
Pema Chodron
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Peace isn’t an experience free of challenges, free of rough and smooth, it’s an experience that’s expansive enough to include all that arises without feeling threatened.
Pema Chodron
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The truth you believe and cling to makes you unavailable to hear anything new.
Pema Chodron
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You build inner strength through embracing the totality of your experience, both the delightful parts and the difficult parts.
Pema Chodron
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To be fully alive, fully human, and completely awake is to be continually thrown out of the nest.
Pema Chodron
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We are undoing a pattern... It's the human pattern: we project onto the world a zillion possibilities of attaining resolution.
Pema Chodron
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What you do for yourself, you're doing for others, and what you do for others, you're doing for yourself.
Pema Chodron
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If you're invested in security and certainty, you are on the wrong planet.
Pema Chodron
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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.
Pema Chodron
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Patience is not learned in safety.
Pema Chodron
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We have two alternatives: either we question our beliefs - or we don't. Either we accept our fixed versions of reality- or we begin to challenge them. In Buddha's opinion, to train in staying open and curious - to train in dissolving our assumptions and beliefs - is the best use of our human lives.
Pema Chodron
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All the terrible things we do to ourselves and others from alcoholism to character assignation to abuse to murder come from one cause: the inability to stay present with an uncomfortable feeling in the body and seek short-term relief.
Pema Chodron
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Unconditional good heart toward others is not even a possibility unless we attend to our own demons.
Pema Chodron
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Each of us has a soft spot: the place in our experience where we feel vulnerable and tender. This soft spot is inherent in appreciation and love, and it is equally inherent in pain.
Pema Chodron
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Appreciate everything, even the ordinary... Especially the ordinary.
Pema Chodron