The truth you believe and cling to makes you unavailable to hear anything new.
PEMA CHODRONIt isn’t what happens to us that causes us to suffer; it’s what we say to ourselves about what happens.
More Pema Chodron Quotes
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The second noble truth says that this resistance is the mechanism of what we call ego, that resisting life causes suffering.
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If someone comes along and shoots an arrow into your heart, it’s fruitless to stand there and yell at the person. It would be much better to turn your attention to the fact that there’s an arrow in your heart.
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Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know.
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Be kinder to yourself. And then let your kindness flood the world.
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By the way that we think and by the way that we believe in things, in that way our world is created.
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I can’t overestimate the importance of accepting ourselves exactly as we are right now, not as we wish we were or think we ought to be.
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The best spiritual instruction is when you wake up in the morning and say, ‘I wonder what’s going to happen today.’ And then carry that kind of curiosity through your life.
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Only to the extent that we expose ourselves over and over to annihilation can that which is indestructible in us be found.
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Appreciate everything, even the ordinary. Especially the ordinary.
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In meditation, you learn how to get out of your own way long enough for there to be room for your wisdom to manifest.
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Let difficulty transform you. And it will. In my experience, we just need help in learning how not to run away.
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Resisting what is happening is a major cause of suffering.
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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.
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Inner peace begins the moment you choose not to allow another person or event to control your emotions.
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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.
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All you need to know is that the future is wide open and you are about to create it by what you do.
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Our true nature is like a precious jewel: although it may be temporarily buried in mud, it remains completely brilliant and unaffected. We simply have to uncover it.
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Deep down in the human spirit, there is a reservoir of courage. It is always available, always waiting to be discovered.
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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.
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All the wars, all the hatred, all the ignorance in the world come out of being so invested in our opinions.
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If you follow your heart, you’re going to find that it is often extremely inconvenient.
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The greatest obstacle to connecting with our joy is resentment.
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Feelings like disappointment, embarrassment, irritation, resentment, anger, jealousy, and fear, instead of being bad news, are actually very clear moments that teach us where it is that we’re holding back.
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The essence of generosity is letting go. Pain is always a sign that we are holding on to something – usually ourselves.
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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.
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We have a choice. We can spend our whole life suffering because we can’t relax with how things really are, or we can relax and embrace the open-endedness of the human situation, which is fresh, unfixated, unbiased.
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