The seed of mindfulness is in each one of us, but we usually forget to water it.
We think that happiness is only possible in the future – when we get a house, a car, a Ph.D. We struggle in our mind and body, and we don’t touch the peace and joy that are available right now – the blue sky, the green leaves, the eyes of our beloved.
Thich Nhat Hahn
Each meditation session is a journey of discovery to understand the basic truth of who we are. In the beginning the most important lesson of meditation is seeing the speed of the mind.
But the meditation tradition says that mind doesn’t have to be this way: it just hasn’t been worked with.
Sakyong Mipham
One of the best ways to learn to be mindful is to take the dog for a walk. Dogs are always in the moment. They can take the same walk for 10 years and still experience grass in an entirely new way each day. They’re not worried about the past (“Why didn’t my people give me some of that chicken they had for dinner?”) or the future (” I wonder if my people will give me any chicken when we get home?”). All they think about is what is right in front of them: the smell of the grass, the basset hound in the yard next door, the squirrel in the tree across the street.
Alice Domar & Alice Lesch Kelly: Be Happy without being Perfect: How to break free from the Perfection Domination
Many of us don’t allow ourselves to be relaxed.
Why do we always try to run and run, even while having our breakfast, while having our lunch, while walking, while sitting? There’s something pushing and pulling us all the time. We make ourselves busy in the hopes of having happiness in the future. In the sutra “Knowing the Better Way to Live Alone,” the Buddha said clearly, “Don’t get caught in the past, because the past is gone. Don’t get upset about the future, because the future is not yet here. There is only one moment for you to be alive, and that is the present moment. Go back to the present moment and live this moment deeply, and you’ll be free.”
How do we liberate ourselves in order to really be in the here and the now? Meditation offers the practice of stopping. Let’s try not to run. We run because we’re too afraid.
Thich Nhat Hahn
The biggest obstacle to establishing a meditation practice is the erroneous idea that meditation should calm and focus the mind. Better to assume the attitude that meditation is what you do when you meditate.
There is no doing it right or wrong.
Norman Fischer
[Some] people feel that their real identity is working on themselves, and some work on themselves with such harshness. Like a demented gardener who won’t let the soil settle for anything to grow, they keep raking, tearing away the nurturing clay from their own heart, then they’re surprised that they feel so empty and vacant. Self-compassion is paramount. When you are compassionate with yourself, you trust in your soul, which you let guide your life.
Your soul knows the geography of your destiny. Your soul alone has the map of your future, therefore you can trust this indirect, oblique side of yourself.
If you do, it will take you where you need to go, but more important it will teach you
a kindness of rhythm in your journey.
John O’Donoghue
