The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.
M Scott Peck
To take an in-breath and touch the conditions of happiness that are available, is something that all of us can do. Because of that we can stop and establish ourselves in the present moment. That is the teaching of living happily in the present moment. Please train yourself to make the present moment, the here and the now, into your true home. That is the only home that we have. That is the only place where we can touch life. Everything we are looking for must be found in the here and the now.
Thich Nhat Hahn
The heart is just the heart; thoughts and feelings are just thoughts and feelings. Let things be just as they are! Let form be just form, let sound be just sound, let thought be just thought. Why should we bother to attach to them? If we think and feel in this way, then there is detachment and separateness. Our thoughts and feelings will be on one side and our heart will be on the other. Just like oil and water — they are in the same bottle but they are separate.
Ajahn Chah, Food for the Heart
If you want to build a ship,
don’t gather people together to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work,
but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
What could be more relaxing than letting go of preferences and worries? What can liberate our hopes and fears other than letting them arise and disassemble themselves naturally in the space of an open mind? Meditation leaves plenty of room for everything: all of our hopes, fears, and anxieties as well as our joys and aspirations. There is no need to control our thoughts, because when we practice we have committed ourselves to letting them be—not judging them as good or bad, spiritual or not spiritual, helpful or harmful. The only thing we need to practice is a quiet place to sit: a room, a park bench, or our own bed. The sutras describe a peaceful mango grove as an ideal place to practice. The Buddha and his disciples practiced meditation in such a place. If you think about it, in the midst of our busy lives, any quiet place to sit can be our modern-day mango grove.
Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, Take Charge of Your Practice
Are we using a language in our mind, which is tentative, soft and open or are we using a language which is harsh, strict and compulsive? We will feel differently if in our mind we are saying repeatedly, ‘I must, they must, it has to be, it cannot happen, they should, he never, she always’. The more we use this kind of language internally, the more we will feel tension and rigidity, especially if things do not go according to plan. If instead we were to use more tentative language like ‘I could, he possibly, it might, they sometimes’ we then would encounter reality and circumstances with a more open and creative attitude. We would be open to things going one way, but also happening in a different manner as well. Experience the difference you feel if you think ‘I must go to see this concert’ to ‘I could go to this concert’. With the first version you will fight and strain so that it must happen at all costs. With the second one you are open to it and will rejoice if it happens but if it does not, it will be fine. We can be so stressed by minor things but if we could bring less grasping to our thinking process, we would better evaluate what is essential and not so essential.
Martine Bachelor
