Share
×
Inspirational Quotes
Authors
Professions
Topics
Tags
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
Share
Change background
T
T
T
Change font
Original
TAGS & TOPICS
Pema Chodron
Age: 88
Born: 1936
Born: July 14
Clergyman
Philosopher
Writer
New York City
New York
Deirdre Blomfield-Brow
Become
Awakening
Good
Buddhist
Awake
Enlightenment
Meditation
Spiritual
Lives
Meditators
Inspirational
Mindfulness
More quotes by Pema Chodron
Whatever happens in your life, joyful or painful, do not be swept away by reactivity. Be patient with yourself and don't lose your sense of perspective.
Pema Chodron
When there's a disappointment, I don't know if it's the end of the story. It may just be the beginning of a great adventure.
Pema Chodron
Our neurosis and our wisdom are made out of the same material. If you throw out your neurosis, you also throw out your wisdom.
Pema Chodron
As each breath goes out, let it be the end of that moment and the birth of something new. . .
Pema Chodron
What you do for yourself, you're doing for others, and what you do for others, you're doing for yourself.
Pema Chodron
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.
Pema Chodron
Being preoccupied with our self-image is like being deaf and blind. It's like standing in the middle of a vast field of wildflowers with a black hood over our heads. It's like coming upon a tree of singing birds while wearing earplugs.
Pema Chodron
The idea is to develop sympathy for your own confusion.
Pema Chodron
We see how beautiful and wonderful and amazing things are, and we see how caught up we are. It isn’t that one is the bad part and one is the good part, but that it’s a kind of interesting, smelly, rich, fertile mess of stuff. When it’s all mixed up together, it’s us: humanness.
Pema Chodron
It's not a terrible thing that we feel fear when faced with the unknown. It is part of being alive, something we all share.
Pema Chodron
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
When we resist change, it’s called suffering. But when we can completely let go and not struggle against it, when we can embrace the groundlessness of our situation and relax into it’s dynamic quality, that’s called enlightenment
Pema Chodron
If someone comes along and shoots an arrow into your heart, it's fruitless to stand there and yell at the person. It would be much better to turn your attention to the fact that there's an arrow in your heart.
Pema Chodron
The second noble truth says that this resistance is the...mechanism of what we call ego, that resisting life causes suffering.
Pema Chodron
The next step is to learn to communicate with the people that you feel are causing your pain and misery- not to learn how to prove them wrong and yourself right but how to communicate from the heart.
Pema Chodron
In a nutshell, when life is pleasant, think of others. When life is a burden, think of others.
Pema Chodron
The Buddha taught that we're not actually in control, which is a pretty scary idea. But when you let things be as they are, you will be a much happier, more balanced, compassionate person.
Pema Chodron
Surrendering, letting go of possessiveness, and complete nonattachment-all are synonyms for accumulating merit.
Pema Chodron
Our true nature is like a precious jewel: although it may be temporarily buried in mud, it remains completely brilliant and unaffected. We simply have to uncover it.
Pema Chodron
Since death is certain and the time of death is uncertain, what is the most important thing?
Pema Chodron
