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Sticking with that uncertainty, getting the knack of relaxing in the midst of chaos, learning not to panic-this is the spiritual path.

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
Path
Relaxing
Getting
Knack
Spiritual
Sticking
Panic
Uncertainty
Midst
Chaos
Learning

More quotes by 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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Compassion practice is daring. It involves learning to relax and allowing ourselves to move gently toward what scares us.
Pema Chodron
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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
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Every small problem most likely stems from the same root as large problems, and so there is no need to always go deep. One can use anything for the therapeutic process and/if this link is made.
Pema Chodron
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You must learn to sit with the restless, painful energy and not let the momentum pull you under and cause you to do the same thing over and over that's ruining your life and the lives of those around you.
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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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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Surrendering, letting go of possessiveness, and complete nonattachment-all are synonyms for accumulating merit.
Pema Chodron
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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
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That nothing is static or fixed, that all is fleeting and impermanent, is the first mark of existence. Everything is in process.
Pema Chodron
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It isn't the things that are happening to us that cause us to suffer, it's what we say to ourselves about the things that are happening. The truth you believe and cling to makes you unavailable to hear anything new.
Pema Chodron
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When we scratch the wound and give into our addictions we do not allow the wound to heal.
Pema Chodron
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We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem, but the truth is that things don't really get solved. They come together and they fall apart.
Pema Chodron
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Finding the courage to go to the places that scare us cannot happen without compassionate inquiry into the workings of ego... Openness doesn't come from resisting our fears but from getting to know them well.
Pema Chodron
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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
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There is no cultivation of patience when your pattern is to just try to seek harmony and smooth everything out. Patience implies willingness to be alive rather than trying to seek harmony.
Pema Chodron
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Impermanence is a principle of harmony. When we don't struggle against it, we are in harmony with reality.
Pema Chodron
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The third noble truth says that the cessation of suffering is letting go of holding on to ourselves.
Pema Chodron
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None of us is ever OK, but we all get through everything just fine.
Pema Chodron
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In truth, there is enormous space in which to live our everyday lives.
Pema Chodron