“Let difficulty transform you. And it will. In my experience, we just need help in learning how not to run away.”

The future is completely open and we are writing it moment to moment.

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.

Inner peace begins the moment you choose not to allow another person or event to control your emotions.

Be kinder to yourself. And then let your kindness flood the world.

The central question of a warrior’s training is not how we avoid uncertainty and fear but how we relate to discomfort.

When things fall apart in your life, you feel as if your whole world is crumbling. But actually it’s your fixed identity that’s crumbling. And as Chögyam Trungpa used to tell us, that’s cause for celebration.

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.

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.

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.

Never give up on yourself. Then you will never give up on others.

You build inner strength through embracing the totality of your experience, both the delightful parts and the difficult parts.

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

The essence of generosity is letting go. Pain is always a sign that we are holding on to something – usually ourselves.

Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know.

Being satisfied with what we already have is a magical golden key to being alive in a full, unrestricted, and inspired way.

Resisting what is happening is a major cause of suffering.

I’m sorry if someone made you feel as though you are difficult to love.

There is no form of prose more difficult to understand and more tedious to read than the average scientific paper.

The art of drawing conclusions from experiments and observations consists in evaluating probabilities and in estimating whether they are sufficiently great or numerous enough to constitute proofs. This kind of calculation is more complicated and more difficult than it is commonly thought to be.

I would not leave anything to a man of action as he would be tempted to give up work; on the other hand, I would like to help dreamers as they find it difficult to get on in life.

One of the things a writer is for is to say the unsayable, speak the unspeakable and ask difficult questions.

Life affords no higher pleasure than that of surmounting difficulties.

I was a little concerned that a lot of people thought I wrote Merchant Ivory movies. I also thought if I was ever going to write something strange and difficult, that was the time.

Past certain ages or certain wisdoms it is very difficult to look with wonder; it is best done when one is a child; after that, and if you are lucky, you will find a bridge of childhood and walk across it.