Quote

We don’t sit in meditation to become good meditators. We sit in meditation so that we’ll be more awake in our lives.

Pema Chodron

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Pema Chodron
Age: 88
Born: 1936
Born: July 14
Clergyman
Philosopher
Writer
New York City
New York
Deirdre Blomfield-Brow
Spiritual
Lives
Meditators
Inspirational
Mindfulness
Become
Awakening
Good
Buddhist
Awake
Enlightenment
Meditation

More quotes by Pema Chodron

Image
When you begin to touch your heart or let your heart be touched, you begin to discover that it's bottomless, that it doesn't have any resolution, that this heart is huge, vast, and limitless. You begin to discover how much warmth and gentleness is there, as well as how much space.
Pema Chodron
Image
The first noble truth of the Buddha is that when we feel suffering, it doesn’t mean that something is wrong. What a relief.
Pema Chodron
Image
Sticking with uncertainty is how we learn to relax in the midst of chaos, how we learn to be cool when the ground beneath us suddenly disappears. We can bring ourselves back to the spiritual path countless times every day simply by exercising our willingness to rest in the uncertainty of the present moment—over and over again.
Pema Chodron
Image
When you have made good friends with yourself, your situation will be more friendly too.
Pema Chodron
Image
The best spiritual instruction is when you wake up in the morning and say, 'I wonder what's going to happen today.' And then carry that kind of curiosity through your life.
Pema Chodron
Image
As Buddhism moved to the West, one of the big characteristics was the strong place of women. That didn't exist in the countries of origin. It's just a sign of our culture.
Pema Chodron
Image
Tonglen is a way for you to be with people who need you - beginning with yourself.
Pema Chodron
Image
It's hard to know whether to laugh or to cry at the human predicament. Here we are with so much wisdom and tenderness, and—without even knowing it—we cover it over to protect ourselves from insecurity. Although we have the potential to experience the freedom of a butterfly, we mysteriously prefer the small and fearful cocoon of ego.
Pema Chodron
Image
The biggest obstacle to taking a bigger perspective on life is that our emotions capture and blind us.
Pema Chodron
Image
Gloriousness and wretchedness need each other. One inspires us, the other softens us.
Pema Chodron
Image
At the root of all the harm we cause is ignorance.
Pema Chodron
Image
Opening to the world begins to benefit ourselves and others simultaneously. The more we relate with others, the more quickly we discover where we're blocked.
Pema Chodron
Image
Nothing in its essence is one way or the other.
Pema Chodron
Image
Anything we experience, no matter how challenging, can become an open pathway to awakening.
Pema Chodron
Image
Fear is a natural reaction of moving closer to the truth. If we commit ourselves to staying right where we are, then our experience becomes very vivid. Things become very clear when there is nowhere to escape.
Pema Chodron
Image
Things are as bad and as good as they seem. There's no need to add anything extra.
Pema Chodron
Image
We can gradually drop our ideals of who we think we ought to be, or who we think we want to be, or who we think other people think we want to be or ought to be.
Pema Chodron
Image
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
Image
Compassion for others begins with kindness to ourselves.
Pema Chodron
Image
So many of us start along the spiritual path because we are suffering. But you must realize that for real healing to occur, there must first be deep compassion for yourself, especially the parts of yourself you dislike or consider ugly.
Pema Chodron