“Meditation isn’t really about getting rid of thoughts, it’s about changing the pattern of grasping on to things, which in our everyday experience is our thoughts.”

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.

One of the deepest habitual patterns that we have is to feel that now is not enough.

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.

The second noble truth says that this resistance is the mechanism of what we call ego, that resisting life causes suffering.

We work on ourselves in order to help others, but also we help others in order to work on ourselves.

Obstacles are our friends: they teach us where we’re stuck.

Use what seems like poison as medicine. Use your personal suffering as the path to compassion for all beings.

Don’t worry about achieving. Don’t worry about perfection. Just be there each moment as best you can.

Every moment is unique, unknown, completely fresh.

It’s safe to say I changed the game and made it out the trenches.

Do things as soon as you can. If a decision needs to be made, make it. It gives you more time to change your mind.

Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter everyday epiphanies, those transcendent moments of awe that change forever how we experience life and the world.

The essential doesn’t change.

He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own disposition will waste his life in fruitless efforts.

A lady who sets her heart upon a lad in uniform must prepare to change lovers pretty quickly, or her life will be but a sad one.

It is a great danger for everyone when what is shocking changes.

Once you start changing a name, you see, there’s no reason ever to stop. One always hears one that sounds better.