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Samsara is the mind turned outwardly, lost in its projections. Nirvana is the mind turned inwardly, recognizing its true nature.

Sogyal Rinpoche

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Sogyal Rinpoche
Died: 2019
Died: August 28
Actor
Lama
Writer
Recognizing
Buddhist
Turned
Samsara
Lost
Projections
True
Outwardly
Nature
Inwardly
Mind
Nirvana
Projection

More quotes by Sogyal Rinpoche

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Why, if we are as pragmatic as we claim, don't we begin to ask ourselves seriously: Where does our real future lie?
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Tomorrow or the next life - which comes first, we never know.
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The absolute truth cannot be realized within the domain of the ordinary mind, and the path beyond the ordinary mind is the path of the heart.
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Real devotion is an unbroken receptivity to the truth
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Just as if you put your finger into water, it will get wet, and if you put it into fire, it will burn, so if you invest your mind in the wisdom mind of the Buddhas, it will transform into their wisdom nature.
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Once an old woman came to Buddha and asked him how to meditate. He told her to remain aware of every movement of her hands as she drew the water from the well, knowing that if she did, she would soon find herself in that state of alert and spacious calm that is meditation.
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Sit, then, as if you were a mountain, with all the unshakeable, steadfast majesty of a mountain. A mountain is completely natural and at ease with itself, however strong the winds that try to bother it, however thick the dark clouds that swirl around its peak. Sitting like a mountain, let your mind rise and fly and soar
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Yet is our deepest desire is truly to live and go on living, why do we blindly insist that death is the end? Why not at least try and explore the possibility that there may be a life after?
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Death is like a mirror in which the true meaning of life is reflected.
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Although we have been made to believe that if we let go we will end up with nothing, life reveals just the opposite: that letting go is the real path to freedom.
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In this complex world, the best way to survive is to be genuine.
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Two people have been living in you all your life. One is the ego, garrulous, demanding, hysterical, calculating - the other is the hidden spiritual being, whose still voice of wisdom you have only rarely heard or attended to - you have uncovered in yourself your own wise guide.
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Just because we go through a difficult situation, it doesn’t mean that the future is predetermined. The future is very much in our hands, in our actions.
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Even though the meditator may leave the meditation, the meditation will not leave the meditator.
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What we have to learn, in both meditation and in life, is to be free of attachment to the good experiences, and free of aversion to the negative ones.
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When we finally know we are dying, and all other sentient beings are dying with us, we start to have a burning, almost heartbreaking sense of the fragility and preciousness of each moment and each being, and from this can grow a deep, clear, limitless compassion for all beings.
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Looking at the world today, we might easily forget that the main purpose of our life - you could call it the heart of being human - is to be happy. All of us share the same wish, and the same right, to seek happiness and avoid suffering. Even following a spiritual path, or the religious life, is a quest for happiness.
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So often we want happiness, but the very way we pursue it is so clumsy and unskillful that it brings only more sorrow. Usually we assume we must grasp in order to have that something that will ensure our happiness. [...] Learning to live is learning to let go.
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The gift of learning to meditate is the greatest gift you can give yourself in this life. For it is only through meditation that you can undertake the journey to discover your true nature, and so find the stability and confidence you will need to live, and die, well Meditation is the road to enlightenment.
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What the world needs more than anything are Bodhisattvas of peace, lawyers, politicians, teachers working tirelessly for the enlightenment of themselves and others.
Sogyal Rinpoche