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Meditation is not about getting out of ourselves or achieving something better. It is about getting in touch with what you already are.

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
Achieve
Getting
Better
Something
Achieving
Touch
Meditation
Already

More quotes by Pema Chodron

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When we protect ourselves so we won't feel pain, that protection becomes like armor, like armor that imprisons the softness of of the heart.
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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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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This moving away from comfort and security, this stepping out into what is unknown, uncharted and shaky - that's called liberation.
Pema Chodron
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My experience with forgiveness is that it sort of comes spontaneously at a certain point and to try to force it it's not really forgiveness. It's Buddhist philosophy or something spiritual jargon that you're trying to live up to but you're just using it against yourself as a reason why you're not okay.
Pema Chodron
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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
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We work on ourselves in order to help others, but also we help others in order to work on ourselves.
Pema Chodron
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No one ever tells us to stop running away from fear...the advice we usually get is to sweeten it up, smooth it over, take a pill, or distract ourselves, but by all means make it go away. (5)
Pema Chodron
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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
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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.
Pema Chodron
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The central question of a warrior's training is not how we avoid uncertainty and fear but how we relate to discomfort.
Pema Chodron
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Surrendering, letting go of possessiveness, and complete nonattachment-all are synonyms for accumulating merit.
Pema Chodron
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Somehow, in the process of trying to deny that things are always changing, we lose our sense of the sacredness of life. We tend to forget that we are part of the natural scheme of things.
Pema Chodron
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Awareness is the key. Do we see the stories that we're telling ourselves and question their validity?
Pema Chodron
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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
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Just where you are-that's the place to start!
Pema Chodron
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Right down there in the thick of things, we discover the love that will not die.
Pema Chodron
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Appreciate everything, even the ordinary... Especially the ordinary.
Pema Chodron
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Lean into the sharp points and fully experience them. The essence of bravery is being without self-deception. Wisdom is inherent in (understanding) emotions.
Pema Chodron
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Meditation practice isn't about trying to throw ourselves away and become something better. It's about befriending who we are already.
Pema Chodron