Quote

Pain is not wrong. Reacting to pain as wrong initiates the trance of unworthiness. The moment we believe something is wrong, our world shrinks and we lose ourselves in the effort to combat the pain.

Tara Brach

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Tara Brach
Age: 71
Born: 1953
Born: May 17
Peace Activist
Psychologist
Teacher
Moments
Combat
Something
Buddhist
Believe
Lose
Initiates
World
Loses
Unworthiness
Effort
Trance
Wrong
Initiate
Moment
Reacting
Pain
Shrinks

More quotes by Tara Brach

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I think of desire as the essence that brings forth the whole universe.
Tara Brach
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I speak a lot about what I call the trance of unworthiness which is really epidemic in our culture, this sense of I'm not enough, or something's wrong with me. Most of us have some level of it because our culture has all these standards (handed down through our families) of what it means to be okay.
Tara Brach
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Meditation helps us gain the capacity to relax, to connect with what is going on right here and right now, to connect with other people, to re-access our resourcefulness, our clarity and our ability to focus and keep an open heart.
Tara Brach
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Through the sacred art of pausing, we develop the capacity to stop hiding, to stop running away from our experience. We begin to trust in our natural intelligence, in our naturally wise heart, in our capacity to open to whatever arises.
Tara Brach
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The boundary to what we can accept is the boundary to our freedom.
Tara Brach
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If attachment then carries forward in a way that's not healthy, we need to let it be there without making it wrong and bring as compassionate and honest attention to it as possible. Honor that this is part of being human, but it's important to know when it's getting in the way.
Tara Brach
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If we're not open to losing, we're not open to loving.
Tara Brach
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Perhaps the biggest tragedy of our lives is that freedom is possible, yet we can pass our years trapped in the same old patterns...We may want to love other people without holding back, to feel authentic, to breathe in the beauty around us, to dance and sing. Yet each day we listen to inner voices that keep our life small.
Tara Brach
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Telling each other the truth and being who we are, and having space for the other person's vulnerability in being who they are, allows us to move in a kind of dance together that's very fluid and graceful.
Tara Brach
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If our hearts are ready for anything, we will spontaneously reach out when others are hurting. Living in an ethical way can attune us to the pain and needs of others, but when our hearts are open and awake, we care instinctively.
Tara Brach
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In the collective psyche it is being understood... that we can cultivate wisdom and compassion.
Tara Brach
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My first book, 'Radical Acceptance', grew out of the suffering of feeling personally deficient and unworthy. Because most of us are so quick to turn against ourselves, the teachings and practices of radical acceptance continue as a strong current in 'True Refuge': nurturing a forgiving, understanding heart is a basic step on the path.
Tara Brach
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If I'm judging the attachment, myself, or another person, then I create separation.
Tara Brach
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Our greatest longing is to be intimate.
Tara Brach
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If you can, do a gratitude practice: Each day write down three things you're grateful for. There are different ways to do this. You can have a gratitude buddy, someone with whom, at the end of the day, you exchange messages listing these three things you are grateful for. Also, you can journal it or reflect on it silently.
Tara Brach
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The intimacy that arises in listening and speaking truth is only possible if we can open to the vulnerability of our own hearts. Breathing in, contacting the life that is right here, is our first step. Once we have held ourselves with kindness, we can touch others in a vital and healing way.
Tara Brach
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Where desire ends up causing suffering is when it fixates.
Tara Brach
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Meditation helps us to get out of our thoughts about the future and really be in the present moment.
Tara Brach
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Along with judging myself harshly, I'd also always seen the truth of goodness in me.
Tara Brach
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Stopping the endless pursuit of getting somewhere else is the perhaps most beautiful offering we can make to our spirit.
Tara Brach