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It isn’t what happens to us that causes us to suffer; it’s what we say to ourselves about what happens.

Pema Chodron

Feeling irritated, restless, afraid, and hopeless is a reminder to listen more carefully.
PEMA CHODRON

Care Feeling Hope Irritation Listening Reminder
All situations teach you, and often it’s the tough ones that teach you best.
PEMA CHODRON

Best Hard Time Situation Teaching Tough Yourself
Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing.
PEMA CHODRON

Fall Hard Time Healing Kind Perspective
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.
PEMA CHODRON

Angry Disappoint Embarrassment Feeling Hold Irritation Jealous Moments Ourselves Teaching
As our kindness for ourselves grows, so does our kindness for other people.
PEMA CHODRON

Growth Kindness Ourselves People
We can let the circumstances of our lives harden us so that we become increasingly resentful and afraid, or we can let them soften us and make us kinder and more open to what scares us. We always have this choice.
PEMA CHODRON

Choice Circumstance Hard Kind Life Open Scare
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.
PEMA CHODRON

Choice Embrace Human Life Ourselves Situation Suffering
Being satisfied with what we already have is a magical golden key to being alive in a full, unrestricted, and inspired way.
PEMA CHODRON

Alive Inspirational Magic Restriction Satisfaction
Anything we experience, no matter how challenging, can become an open pathway to awakening.
PEMA CHODRON

Awake Challenge Experience Open Path Spiritual
In the end, that’s what we all need more than anything else: to be there for each other, in every kind of situation.
PEMA CHODRON

End Kind Situation Support Togetherness
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.
PEMA CHODRON

Compassionate Path Reality Spiritual Start Suffering Ugly Yourself
Let your curiosity be greater than your fear.
PEMA CHODRON

Curiosity Fear Greatness Yourself
If you follow your heart, you’re going to find that it is often extremely inconvenient.
PEMA CHODRON

Heart Inspirational Yourself
Each person’s life is like a mandala – a vast, limitless circle. We stand in the center of our own circle, and everything we see, hear and think forms the mandala of our life … everything that shows up in your mandala is a vehicle for your awakening.
PEMA CHODRON

Awake Life Limitation Person Stand Thinking Vehicle Yourself
Deep down in the human spirit, there is a reservoir of courage. It is always available, always waiting to be discovered.
PEMA CHODRON

Brave Courage Discover Human Inspirational Motivational Spirit Wait
It isn’t what happens to us that causes us to suffer; it’s what we say to ourselves about what happens.
PEMA CHODRON

Hard Time Ourselves Reaction Suffering

It isn’t what happens to us that causes us to suffer; it’s what we say to ourselves about what happens.

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It isn’t what happens to us that causes us to suffer; it’s what we say to ourselves about what happens.

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