Quote

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

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
Make
Scare
Always
Choice
Circumstances
Harden
Afraid
Soften
Open
Resentful
Choices
Scares
Lives
Kinder
Become
Increasingly

More quotes by Pema Chodron

Image
To put it concisely, we suffer when we resist the noble and irrefutable truth of impermanence and death.
Pema Chodron
Image
We practice to liberate ourselves from a burden.
Pema Chodron
Image
Don’t get caught up in hopes of what you’ll achieve and how good your situation will be some day in the future. What you do right now is what matters.
Pema Chodron
Image
We don't set out to save the world we set out to wonder how other people are doing and to reflect on how our actions affect other people's hearts.
Pema Chodron
Image
If you're invested in security and certainty, you are on the wrong planet.
Pema Chodron
Image
Never underestimate the power of compassionately recognizing what's going on.
Pema Chodron
Image
While we are sitting in meditation, we are simply exploring humanity and all of creation in the form of ourselves.
Pema Chodron
Image
By the way that we think and by the way that we believe in things, in that way our world is created.
Pema Chodron
Image
A heartfelt sense of aspiring cuts through negativity about yourself it cuts through the heavy trips you lay on yourself.
Pema Chodron
Image
Ordinarily we are swept away by habitual momentum and don't interrupt our patterns slightly. When we feel betrayed or disappointed, does it occur to us to practice?
Pema Chodron
Image
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.
Pema Chodron
Image
Someone needs to encourage us not to brush aside what we feel. Not to be ashamed of the love and grief that it arouses in us. Not to be afraid of pain. Someone needs to encourage us: that this soft spot in us could be awakened, and that to do this would change our lives.
Pema Chodron
Image
So even if the hot loneliness is there, and for 1.6 seconds we sit with that restlessness when yesterday we couldn't sit for even one, that's the journey of the warrior. (68)
Pema Chodron
Image
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
Image
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
Image
The real thing that we renounce is the tenacious hope that we could be saved from being who we are.
Pema Chodron
Image
How will we experience the world a month, a year, or five years from now? Will we be even angrier, more grasping and fearful, or will some shift have occurred? This depends entirely on the tendencies we reinforce today.
Pema Chodron
Image
Since death is certain and the time of death is uncertain, what is the most important thing?
Pema Chodron
Image
We hold on to hope, and hope robs us of the present moment.
Pema Chodron
Image
Whole-heartedn ess is a precious gift, but no one can actually give it to you. You have to find the path that has heart and then walk it impeccably....It' s like someone laughing in your ear, challenging you to figure out what to do when you don't know what to do. It humbles you. It opens your heart.
Pema Chodron