Buddha Positive Quotes

The remedy is not to suppress negative experiences; when they happen, they happen. Rather, it is to foster positive experiences—and in particular, to take them in so they become a permanent part of you.

Like the moon, come out from behind the clouds! Shine.

Why wait to forgive and let go only after you have sufficiently wallowed in your despair? Why not forgive and let go now?

When you find yourself in one of those mystical/devotional frames of mind or in am emergency and you feel you want to pray, then pray. Don’t ever be ashamed to pray or feel prevented by thinking yourself unworthy in any way. Fact is whatever terrible thing you may have done, praying will always turn your energy around for the better. Pray to whomever, whatever, and whenever you choose. Pray to the mountain, pray to the ancestors, pray to the Earth, pray to the Tao (but it won’t listen!), pray to the Great Mother, pray to Jehovah, Allah, Buddha, Jesus, Lakshmi, Siva, pray to the Great Spirit, it makes no difference. Praying is merely a device for realigning the mind, energy, and passion of your local self with the mind, energy and passion of your universal self. When you pray, you are praying to the god or goddess within you. This has an effect on your energy field, which in turn translates into a positive charge that makes something good happen.

Life is to be experienced in totality. Try not to blame others like spouse, parents, friends, fellow beings or situations for any suffering. .. Never allow your vibe to go to a lower level. This way you will attract more and more positive circumstances in your life.

Whatever positive facts you find, bring a mindful awareness to them—open up to them and let them affect you. It’s like sitting down to a banquet: don’t just look at it—dig in!

The statue of the Laughing Buddha act as a good friend. Whenever we are off the track, his smiling face can bring us back to the present moment, to a positive mood.

Zen replaces all objects of belief with one single thing: reality itself. We believe only in this universe. We don't believe in the afterlife. We don't believe in the sovereignty of nations. We don't believe in money or power or fame. We don't believe in our idols. We don't believe in our positions or our possessions. We don't believe we can be insulted, or that our honor or the honor of our family, our nation or our faith can be offended. We don't believe in Buddha. We just believe in reality. Just this.

Atheism is unprovable, so uninteresting. However unlikely it is, we can never be certain that God once existed—and has now shot off to infinity, where no one can ever find him… Like Gautama Buddha, I take no position on this subject.

Some people dance with singing rain; some people get wet with misery and pain.

...when you are constantly prevailing upon the kindness of strangers-as a hitchhiker must-it keeps you in a positive frame of mind. Call it Zen and the Art of Hitchhiking. The Way of the Lift. The chrysanthemum and the Thumb. Heady on beer and the sound of my own voice, the aphorisms spilled out unchecked.

The religious faith that we are born into is largely determined by the region where we live and the ethnic background of our family. In my case, I was born to an African American family in the southern region of the United States. Like most families of our description, we embraced the Baptist religious tradition. Although I went from Baptist to Buddhist, I’ve honored my family’s heritage and cherish the similarities between these two paths. Baptist teachings encouraged me to work toward attaining admission into a heavenly paradise, while Buddhism inspires me to attain the enduring and enlightened life condition of Buddhahood. Although the goals of these two spiritual paths may sound somewhat different, both focus on creating a state of indestructible, eternal happiness. To me, that is an important similarity. I’ve met people from all over the world, from many cultures and faiths, and I believe that all religious traditions share the same basic aspirations at their core—to experience everlasting joy by aligning with the positive forces of the universe. We may describe this ultimate reality as Jehovah, God, Allah, Jesus, Hashem, Tao, Brahma, the Creator, the Mystic Law, the Universe, the Force, Buddha nature, Christ consciousness, or any number of other expressions.

Everyone wants to be happy, and there is a strong energy in us pushing us toward what we think will make us happy. But we may suffer a lot because of this. We need the insight that position, revenge, wealth, fame, or possessions are, more often than not, obstacles to our happiness. We need to cultivate the wish to be free of these things so we can enjoy the wonders of life that are always available — the blue sky, the trees, our beautiful children.

Questioner: Does the soul survive after death? KRISHNAMURTI: If you really want to know, how are you going to find out? By reading what Shankara, Buddha or Christ has said about it? By listening to your own particular leader or saint? They may all be totally wrong. Are you prepared to admit this—which means that your mind is in a position to inquire? You must first

At the same time, these men and women do not hesitate to align themselves with those in power in order to strengthen the position of their church or community. They believe that political power is needed for the well-being of their church or community. They build up a self instead of letting go of the ideas of self. Then they look at this self as absolute truth and dismiss all other spiritual traditions as false. This is a very dangerous attitude; it always leads to conflicts and war. Its nature is intolerance.

Positive experiences can also be used to soothe, balance, and even replace negative ones. When two things are held in mind at the same time, they start to connect with each other. That’s one reason why talking about hard things with someone who’s supportive can be so healing: painful feelings and memories get infused with the comfort, encouragement, and closeness you experience with the other person.

I have no doubt that your acceptance of Christ coincided with some very positive changes in your life. Perhaps you now love other people in a way that you never imagined possible. You may even experience feelings of bliss while praying. I do not wish to denigrate any of these experiences. I would point out, however, that billions of other human beings, in every time and place, have had similar experiences--but they had them while thinking about Krishna, or Allah, or the Buddha, while making art or music, or while contemplating the beauty of nature.

One way the self grows is by equating itself to things—by identifying with them. Unfortunately, when you identify with something, you make its fate your own—and yet, everything in this world ultimately ends. So be mindful of how you identify with positions, objects, and people.

Calming allows us to rest, and resting is a precondition for healing. When animals in the forest get wounded, they find a place to lie down, and they rest completely for many days. They don't think about food or anything else. They just rest, and they get the healing they need. When we humans get sick, we just worry! We look for doctors and medicine, but we don't stop. Even when we go to the beach or the mountains for a vacation, we don't rest, and we come back more tired than before. We have to learn to rest. Lying down is not the only position for resting. During sitting or walking meditation, we can rest very well. Meditation does not have to be hard labor. Just allow your body and mind to rest like an animal in the forest. Don't struggle. There is no need to attain anything. I am writing a book, but I am not struggling. I am resting also. Please read in a joyful, yet restful way. The Buddha said, "My Dharma is the practice of non-practice." Practice in a way that does not tire you out, but gives your body, emotions, and consciousness a chance to rest. Our body and mind have the capacity to heal themselves if we allow them to rest. Stopping, calming, and resting are preconditions for healing. If we cannot stop, the course of our destruction will just continue. The world needs healing. Individuals, communities, and nations need healing.

You may have read or heard about the so-called positive thinkers of the West. They say just the opposite -- they don't know what they are saying. They say, "When you breathe out, throw out all your misery and negativity; and when you breathe in, breathe in joy, positivity, happiness, cheerfulness." Atisha's method is just the opposite: when you breathe in, breathe in all the misery and suffering of all the beings of the world -- past, present and future. And when you breathe out, breathe out all the joy that you have, all the blissfulness that you have, all the benediction that you have. Breathe out, pour yourself into existence. This is the method of compassion: drink in all the suffering and pour out all the blessings. And you will be surprised if you do it. The moment you take all the sufferings of the world inside you, they are no longer sufferings. The heart immediately transforms the energy. The heart is a transforming force: drink in misery, and it is transformed into blissfulness... then pour it out. Once you have learned that your heart can do this magic, this miracle, you would like to do it again and again. Try it. It is one of the most practical methods -- simple, and it brings immediate results. Do it today, and see. That is one of the approaches of Buddha and all his disciples. Atisha is one of his disciples, in the same tradition, in the same line. Buddha says again and again to his disciples, "IHI PASSIKO: come and see!" They are very scientific people. Buddhism is the most scientific religion on the earth; hence, Buddhism is gaining more and more ground in the world every day. As the world becomes more intelligent, Buddha will become more and more important. It is bound to be so. As more and more people come to know about science, Buddha will have great appeal, because he will convince the scientific mind -- because he says, "Whatsoever I am saying can be practiced." And I don't say to you, "Believe it," I say, "Experiment with it, experience it, and only then if you feel it yourself, trust it. Otherwise there is no need to believe.

He knew that even his own father’s authority was fragile and restricted—a king did not possess true freedom but was imprisoned by his position.

Just as a snake sheds its skin, we must shed our past over and over again.”  ― Gautama Buddha

Well, it’s not like I don’t like people; I just find them disturbing and can’t manage their effects on me, positive or negative.

The desire to feel happy or think positively all the time hinders many people's authentic existence. It lowers resilience.

perpetually positioning our “self” in relationship to other “selves”—

in relationships, it typically takes about five positive interactions to overcome the effects of a single negative one (Gottman 1995).

There is a wager that we must all make; for the small stake of some rewarding mental training, we can attain lasting contentment and contribute to a positive outcome for our planet.

Buddha gave up his throne and renounced his position, that was true renunciation; but there cannot be any question of renunciation in the case of a beggar who has nothing to renounce.

Whatever their temperament, if children are part of your life, encourage them to pause for a moment at the end of the day (or at any other natural interval, such as the last minute before the school bell) to remember what went well and think about things that make them happy (e.g., a pet, their parents’ love, a goal scored in soccer). Then have those positive feelings and thoughts sink in.

The more different someone seems from us, the more unreal they may feel to us. We can too easily ignore or dismiss people when they are of a different race or religion, when they come from a different socioeconomic “class.” Assessing them as either superior or inferior, better or worse, important or unimportant, we distance ourselves. Fixating on appearances—their looks, behavior, ways of speaking—we peg them as certain types. They are HIV positive or an alcoholic, a leftist or fundamentalist, a criminal or power monger, a feminist or do-gooder. Sometimes our typecasting has more to do with temperament—the person is boring or narcissistic, needy or pushy, anxious or depressed. Whether extreme or subtle, typing others makes the real human invisible to our eyes and closes our heart.

And so it came about that the demon king Mara found himself staring at a most unwelcome intruder. He glared at the naked old man sitting in lotus position before his throne. Nothing like it had happened in a long while. “Go away,” Mara growled. “Just because you got here doesn’t mean you can’t be destroyed.” The old man didn’t move. His yogic concentration must have been strong, because his lean brown body, as tough as the sinew showing under its skin, grew sharper in out-line. Mara would have commanded some lesser demons to torment the intruder, but these hermits weren’t so easily dismissed, so Mara bided his time.

He no longer saw the face of his friend Siddhartha, instead he saw other faces, many, a long sequence, a flowing river of faces, of hundreds, of thousands, which all came and disappeared, and yet all seemed to be there simultaneously, which all constantly changed and renewed themselves, and which were still all Siddhartha. He saw the face of a fish, a carp, with an infinitely painfully opened mouth, the face of a dying fish, with fading eyes—he saw the face of a new-born child, red and full of wrinkles, distorted from crying—he saw the face of a murderer, he saw him plunging a knife into the body of another person—he saw, in the same second, this criminal in bondage, kneeling and his head being chopped off by the executioner with one blow of his sword—he saw the bodies of men and women, naked in positions and cramps of frenzied love—he saw corpses stretched out, motionless, cold, void— he saw the heads of animals, of boars, of crocodiles, of elephants, of bulls, of birds—he saw gods, saw Krishna, saw Agni—he saw all of these figures and faces in a thousand relationships with one another, each one helping the other, loving it, hating it, destroying it, giving re-birth to it, each one was a will to die, a passionately painful confession of transitoriness, and yet none of them died, each one only transformed, was always re-born, received evermore a new face, without any time having passed between the one and the other face—and all of these figures and faces rested, flowed, generated themselves, floated along and merged with each other, and they were all constantly covered by something thin, without individuality of its own, but yet existing, like a thin glass or ice, like a transparent skin, a shell or mold or mask of water, and this mask was smiling, and this mask was Siddhartha's smiling face, which he, Govinda, in this very same moment touched with his lips. And, Govinda saw it like this, this smile of the mask, this smile of oneness above the flowing forms, this smile of simultaneousness above the thousand births and deaths, this smile of Siddhartha was precisely the same, was precisely of the same kind as the quiet, delicate, impenetrable, perhaps benevolent, perhaps mocking, wise, thousand-fold smile of Gotama, the Buddha, as he had seen it himself with great respect a hundred times. Like this, Govinda knew, the perfected ones are smiling.

Sometimes we may fulfil our desires for worldly attainments, such as reputation, a high position, relationships, wealth and so forth, but these attainments are deceptive; they continually give rise to many undesirable problems.

By incorporating him (Buddha) into the domain of Hindu traditions, and by depicting him as a Hindu sage who was a glorious incarnation of Lord Vishnu, the Brahmins attempted to secure their position of authority in the society.

Both Christ and Buddha saw the passage as one of suffering, and basically found identical ways out. What they discovered and revealed to us was that each of us has within himself or herself a “stillpoint” – comparable, perhaps to the eye of a cyclone, a spot or center of calm, imperturbability, and non-movement. Buddha articulated this central eye in negative terms as “emptiness” or “void”, a refuge from the swirling cyclone of endless suffering. Christ articulated the eye in more positive terms as the “Kingdom of God” or the “Spirit within”, a place of refuge and salvation from a suffering self. For both of them, the easy out was first to find that stillpoint and then, by attaching ourselves to it, by becoming one with it, to find a stabilizing, balanced anchor in our lives. After that, the cyclone is gradually drawn into the eye, and the suffering self comes to an end. And when there is no longer a cyclone, there is also no longer an eye.

A pozitív gondolkodás fogalma eredetileg egy ősi buddhista hagyomány nyomán jött létre. Fönnmaradt egy legenda, miszerint Buddha és a tanítványai néztek egy döglött kutyát. Mester, nézd, a halál, a bomló hús, a rothadó tetem milyen rettenetesen visszataszító! Milyen undorító, ha csak az marad meg egy lényből, ami belőle a test! - mondták a tanítványok. Buddha odanézett, és azt mondta, hogy igen, de milyen szép fehér foga van! Ez a pozitív gondolkodás alaptörténete. Innen nőtt ki. Vagyis nem arról van szó, hogy a negatív élményeinket, a keserveinket, a bánatainkat hazudjuk el pozitívnak. Arról van szó, hogy fogadjuk el ezeket olyan negatívnak, amilyenek a valóságban, de ha van bennük valami pozitív, akkor azt is vegyük észre.

Personal Power and a Positive attitude after praying, you should also completely men-tally, emotionally and physically “act as if it is already accomplished!” In truth, it already has been accomplished in GOD, and that is the only true “permanent’ reality of life! Taking this one step further, you should even experience this truth with all five senses. See it being real, hear it, touch it, smell it and taste it! As far as you are concerned, for all intents and purposes, the prayer has already been completely answered and you should live your life on every level of your being as if this was the case! If ever you start to slip from this “immaculate conception” in your own mind, you should immediately do an affirmation and positive creative visualization to reaffirm the “Truth of GOD” back into your reality. The other way to reaffirm this truth back into your being is to repeat the prayer! Just the Act of doing the Prayer is an affirmation in and of itself!

New karma is being made all the time. When one acts with a positive motivation, goodness is furthered. When one acts out of negative motivation, negativity is furthered. "We can recondition ourselves to act with wisdom. The important thing to understand here is that you are not a victim. You are your own master. 'As you sow, so shall you reap.

forgiveness is not something we do for other people—we do it for ourselves. So forgive yourself for being a victim. Look positively to the here and now. Put the past behind you and think of it as somewhere you once visited, and possibly didn’t like very much. “Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.” Buddha

When the powerful wisdom that understands the nature of the mind arises, the dark clouds of ego disappear. Beyond the ego—the agitated, uncontrolled mind—lie everlasting peace and satisfaction. That’s why Lord Buddha prescribed penetrative analysis of both your positive and your negative sides. In particular, when your negative mind arises, instead of being afraid, you should examine it more closely.

For a parallel to the lesson of atomic theory regarding the limited applicability of such customary idealizations, we must in fact turn to quite other branches of science, such as psychology, or even to that kind of epistemological problems with which already thinkers like Buddha and Lao Tzu have been confronted, when trying to harmonize our position as spectators and actors in the great drama of existence.

I have no doubt that your acceptance of Christ coincided with some very positive changes in your life. Perhaps you now love other people in a way that you never imagined possible. You may even experience feelings of bliss while praying. I don’t wish to denigrate any of these experiences. I would point out, however, that billions of other human beings, in every time and place, have had similar experiences - but they had them while thinking about Krishna, or Allah, or the Buddha, while making art or music, or while contemplating the beauty of Nature. There is no question that it is possible for people to have profoundly transformative experiences. And there is no question that it is possible for them to misinterpret these experiences, and to further delude themselves about the nature of reality. You are, of course, right to believe that there is more to life than simply understanding the structure and contents of the universe. But this does not make unjustified (and unjustifiable) claims about its structure and contents any more respectable.

If you have a completely positive attitude about yourself and touch the pure nature of your fundamental reality, your negative projections disappear, and the world improves. Your environment becomes positive, more beautiful, and attractive. So instead of projecting a dangerous world beset by pollution, radiation, and poisoned resources, you project an incredibly beautiful landscape of trees and water and gentle human beings all helping one another, which gives you great pleasure. If you can interpret the world in that way, it will really become a pure land for you.

Eastern spiritual sciences always use negative terminology. This minimizes the imagination. If we use positive terminology, too much imagination will happen. If you say “God,” people will start imagining all kinds of gods. If you say “Kingdom of God,” they will start imagining all kinds of fancy things in their heads. So the Eastern spiritual processes always use negative terminology. Now we say “shoonya,” or emptiness. Not much room left for the imagination, is there? (Laughs) So Gautama, the Buddha, said “nirvana.” Nirvana means non-existence. He is also talking about emptiness in a different way.

Fifteen years ago, a business manager from the United States came to Plum Village to visit me. His conscience was troubled because he was the head of a firm that designed atomic bombs. I listened as he expressed his concerns. I knew if I advised him to quit his job, another person would only replace him. If he were to quit, he might help himself, but he would not help his company, society, or country. I urged him to remain the director of his firm, to bring mindfulness into his daily work, and to use his position to communicate his concerns and doubts about the production of atomic bombs. In the Sutra on Happiness, the Buddha says it is great fortune to have an occupation that allows us to be happy, to help others, and to generate compassion and understanding in this world. Those in the helping professions have occupations that give them this wonderful opportunity. Yet many social workers, physicians, and therapists work in a way that does not cultivate their compassion, instead doing their job only to earn money. If the bomb designer practises and does his work with mindfulness, his job can still nourish his compassion and in some way allow him to help others. He can still influence his government and fellow citizens by bringing greater awareness to the situation. He can give the whole nation an opportunity to question the necessity of bomb production. Many people who are wealthy, powerful, and important in business, politics, and entertainment are not happy. They are seeking empty things - wealth, fame, power, sex - and in the process they are destroying themselves and those around them. In Plum Village, we have organised retreats for businesspeople. We see that they have many problems and suffer just as others do, sometimes even more. We see that their wealth allows them to live in comfortable conditions, yet they still suffer a great deal. Some businesspeople, even those who have persuaded themselves that their work is very important, feel empty in their occupation. They provide employment to many people in their factories, newspapers, insurance firms, and supermarket chains, yet their financial success is an empty happiness because it is not motivated by understanding or compassion. Caught up in their small world of profit and loss, they are unaware of the suffering and poverty in the world. When we are not int ouch with this larger reality, we will lack the compassion we need to nourish and guide us to happiness. Once you begin to realise your interconnectedness with others, your interbeing, you begin to see how your actions affect you and all other life. You begin to question your way of living, to look with new eyes at the quality of your relationships and the way you work. You begin to see, 'I have to earn a living, yes, but I want to earn a living mindfully. I want to try to select a vocation not harmful to others and to the natural world, one that does not misuse resources.' Entire companies can also adopt this way of thinking. Companies have the right to pursue economic growth, but not at the expense of other life. They should respect the life and integrity of people, animals, plants and minerals. Do not invest your time or money in companies that deprive others of their lives, that operate in a way that exploits people or animals, and destroys nature. Businesspeople who visit Plum Village often find that getting in touch with the suffering of others and cultivating understanding brings them happiness. They practise like Anathapindika, a successful businessman who lived at the time of the Buddha, who with the practise of mindfulness throughout his life did everything he could to help the poor and sick people in his homeland.

Once detachment, viveka, is interpreted mainly in this internal sense, it appears perhaps easier to achieve it today than in a more normal and traditional civilization. One who is still an 'Aryan' spirit in a large Eu­ropean or American city, with its skyscrapers and asphalt, with its poli­tics and sport, with its crowds who dance and shout, with its exponents of secular culture and of soulless science and so on-among all this he may feel himself more alone and detached and nomad than he would have done in the rime of the Buddha, in conditions of physical isolation and of actual wandering. The greatest difficulty, in this respect, lies in giving this sense of internal isolation, which today may occur to many almost spontaneously, a positive, full, simple, and transparent charac­ter, with elimination of all traces of aridity, melancholy, discord, or anxiety. Solitude should not he a burden, something that is suffered, that is borne involuntarily, or in which refuge is taken by force of cir­cumstances, but rather, a natural, simple, and free disposition, in a text we read: 'Solitude is called wisdom [ekattam monam akkhatarin], he who is alone will find that he is happy'; it is an accentuated version of 'beata solitudo, sofa beatitudo'.

The whole history of India and Hinduism. First comes Krishna. Seeing his charisma, the whole country follows him. Then comes Buddha who is completely opposite ideology. But seeing his charisma and ability to lead people into enlightenment experience, the whole country followed him. Then came Shankara. Just his ability to lead people into experience, simply the whole country followed him. Then came Nagarjuna who is completely opposite to Shankara. But his ability to lead people to experience, the whole country followed him. So, we never followed any infrastructure, organization. We followed the beings’ ability to lead us into the next level.

Buddha gave up his throne and renounced his position, that was true renunciation; but there cannot be any question of renunciation in the case of a beggar who has nothing to renounce. So we must always be careful about what we really mean when we speak of this non-resistance and ideal love. We must first take care to understand whether we have the power of resistance or not. Then, having the power, if we renounce it and do not resist, we are doing a grand act of love; but if we cannot resist, and yet, at the same time, try to deceive ourselves into the belief that we are actuated by motives of the highest love, we are doing the exact opposite.

On the American desert are horses which eat the locoweed and some are driven made by it; their vision is affected, they take enormous leaps to cross a tuft of grass or tumble blindly into rivers. The horses which have become thus addicted are shunned by the others and will never rejoin the herd. So it is with human beings: those who are conscious of another world, the world of the spirit, acquire an outlook which distorts the values of ordinary life; they are consumed by the weed of non-attachment. Curiosity is their one excess and therefore they are recognized not by what they do, but by what they refrain from doing, like those Araphants or disciples of Buddha who are pledged to the "Nine Incapabilities." Thus they do not take life, they do not compete, they do not boast, they do not join groups of more than six, they do not condemn others; they are "abandoners of revels, mute, contemplative" who are depressed by gossip, gaiety and equals, who wait to be telephoned to, who neither speak in public, nor keep up with their friends, nor take revenge upon their enemies. Self-knowledge has taught them to abandon hate and blame and envy in their lives, and they look sadder than they are. They seldom make positive assertions because they see, outlined against any statement, as a painter sees a complementary color, the image of its opposite. Most psychological questionnaires are designed to search out these moonlings and to secure their non-employment. They divine each other by a warm indifference for they know that they are not intended to forgather, but, like stumps of phosphorus in the world's wood, each to give forth his misleading radiance.

In mindfulness meditation, the self that needs protection is put into neutral. The observing self slips into the space between the ego and the dissociated aspects of the personality and observes from there. The breath, or sound, becomes the central object of focus, as opposed to thought. Thinking becomes one more thing to observe in the field of awareness but is robbed of its preeminent position. Do not grasp after the pleasant or push away the unpleasant, but give equal attention to everything there is to observe, taught the Buddha. This is difficult at first but becomes remarkably easy once one gets the hang of it. One learns first to bring one’s attention to the neutral object and then to relax into a state of choiceless awareness rather than always trying to maintain control. As the ego’s position is weakened, waking life takes on aspects of dream life to the extent that new surprises keep unexpectedly emerging.

Finally, the inner accessibility and reflectiveness of theoretical knowledge which cannot basically be withheld from anybody, as can certain emotions and volitions, has a consequence that directly offsets its practical results. In the first place, it is precisely because of their general accessibility that factors quite independent of personal capacities decide on the factual utilization of knowledge. This leads to the enormous preponderance of the most unintelligent 'educated' person over the cleverest proletarian. The apparent equality with which educational materials are available to everyone interested in them is, in reality, a sheer mockery. The same is true of the other freedoms accorded by the liberal doctrines which, though they certainly do not hamper the individual from gaining goods of any kind, do however disregard the fact that only those already privileged in some way or another have the possibility of acquiring them. For just as the substance of education - in spite of, or because of it general availability - can ultimately be acquired only through individual activity, so it gives rise to the most intangible and thus the most unassailable aristocracy, to a distinction between high and low which can be abolished neither (as can socioeconomic differences) by a decree or a revolution. Thus it was appropriate for Jesus to say to the rich youth: 'Give away your goods to the poor', but not for him to say: 'Give your education to the underprivileged'. There is no advantage that appears to those in inferior positions to be so despised, and before which they feel so deprived and helpless, as the advantage of education. For this reason, attempts to achieve practical equality very often and in so many variations scorn intellectual education. This is true of Buddha, the Cynics, certain currents in Christianity, down to Robespierre's 'nous n'avons pas besoin de savants'. In speech and writing - which, viewed abstractly, are a manifestation of its communal nature - makes possible its accumulation, and, especially, its concentration so that, in this respect, the gulf between high and low is persistently widened. The intellectually gifted or the materially independent person will have all the more chances for standing out from the masses the larger and more concentrated are the available educational materials. Just as the proletarian today has many comforts and cultural enjoyments that were formerly denied to him, while at the same time - particularly if we look back over several centuries and millennia - the gulf between his way of life and that of the higher strata has certainly become much deeper, so, similarly, the rise in the general level of knowledge as a whole does not by any means bring about a general levelling, but rather its opposite.

In your own mind, what do you usually think about at the end of the day? The fifty things that went right, or the one that went wrong? Such as the driver who cut you off in traffic, or the one thing on your To Do list that didn’t get done . . . In effect, the brain is like Velcro for negative experiences, but Teflon for positive ones. That shades implicit memory—your underlying feelings, expectations, beliefs, inclinations, and mood—in an increasingly negative direction. Which is not fair, since most of the facts in your life are probably positive or at least neutral. Besides the injustice of it, the growing pile of negative experiences in implicit memory naturally makes a person more anxious, irritable, and blue—plus it gets harder to be patient and giving toward others. But you don’t have to accept this bias! By tilting toward the good—toward that which brings more happiness and benefit to oneself and others—you merely level the playing field. Then, instead of positive experiences washing through you like water through a sieve, they’ll collect in implicit memory deep down in your brain.

How easy it is to blame the present on the past, and allow history to shape the future. How many of us justify our current behaviour by reference to events long gone? Is this true within your relationship? Are you allowing past mistakes to dictate your destiny? If pain has been inflicted by a loved one, you may search for reasons and explanations that simply can’t be found. You pick away at the scar that is trying to heal, and cause the blood to flow again. You seek reassurances that you may never truly believe. The scar becomes ragged and ugly to all who can see it, and you become the walking wounded, waiting to be hurt again. Accept that your history has changed you. Rejoice in your survival. Let the wounds heal to form a stronger, more resilient you, and remember that forgiveness is not something we do for other people—we do it for ourselves. So forgive yourself for being a victim. Look positively to the here and now. Put the past behind you and think of it as somewhere you once visited, and possibly didn’t like very much. “Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.” Buddha

Joy The Pali word sukkha (Sanskrit su-kha) is usually translated as happiness. As the opposite of duhkha, however, it connotes the end of all suffering, a state of being that is not subject to the ups and downs of change – that is, abiding joy. It would be difficult to find a more thoroughly researched definition of joy than the Buddha’s. If we can trust that at least the outline of truth remains in the legends of his life, then his questionings just before going forth to the Four Noble Sights were chiefly concerned with the search for absolute joy. What anyone could want of worldly happiness, Prince Siddhartha surely had, with the promise of much more. But the young prince scrutinized the content of worldly happiness much more closely than the rest of us, and his conclusion was that what people called joy was a house of cards perched precariously on certain preconditions. When these preconditions are fulfilled, the pleasure we feel lasts but a moment, for the nature of human experience is to change. And when they are not fulfilled, there is longing and a frustratingly elusive sense of loss; we grasp for what we do not have and nurse the gnawing desire to have it again. To try to hold on to anything – a thing, a person, an event, a position – merely exposes us to its loss. Anything that changes, the Buddha concluded, anything in our experience that consists of or is conditioned by component sensations – the Buddha’s word was samskaras – produces sorrow, not joy. Experience promises happiness, but it delivers only

Naval’s Laws The below is Naval’s response to the question “Are there any quotes you live by or think of often?” These are gold. Take the time necessary to digest them. “These aren’t all quotes from others. Many are maxims that I’ve carved for myself.” Be present above all else. Desire is suffering (Buddha). Anger is a hot coal that you hold in your hand while waiting to throw it at someone else (Buddhist saying). If you can’t see yourself working with someone for life, don’t work with them for a day. Reading (learning) is the ultimate meta-skill and can be traded for anything else. All the real benefits in life come from compound interest. Earn with your mind, not your time. 99% of all effort is wasted. Total honesty at all times. It’s almost always possible to be honest and positive. Praise specifically, criticize generally (Warren Buffett). Truth is that which has predictive power. Watch every thought. (Always ask, “Why am I having this thought?”) All greatness comes from suffering. Love is given, not received. Enlightenment is the space between your thoughts (Eckhart Tolle). Mathematics is the language of nature. Every moment has to be complete in and of itself. A Few of Naval’s Tweets that are Too Good to Leave Out “What you choose to work on, and who you choose to work with, are far more important than how hard you work.” “Free education is abundant, all over the Internet. It’s the desire to learn that’s scarce.” “If you eat, invest, and think according to what the ‘news’ advocates, you’ll end up nutritionally, financially, and morally bankrupt.” “We waste our time with short-term thinking and busywork. Warren Buffett spends a year deciding and a day acting. That act lasts decades.” “The guns aren’t new. The violence isn’t new. The connected cameras are new, and that changes everything.” “You get paid for being right first, and to be first, you can’t wait for consensus.” “My one repeated learning in life: ‘There are no adults.’ Everyone’s making it up as they go along. Figure it out yourself, and do it.” “A busy mind accelerates the passage of subjective time.

We usually think of abundance (arising, realization, buddhas) as positive, and we consider deficiency (perishing, delusion, and living beings) as negative. When we understand Buddha’s teaching in this commonsense way, it seems that we should escape from samsara, which is something bad, in order to reach nirvana, which is something good. We think nirvana is a goal we can achieve in the same way that a poor person can work hard and become rich. We may think that practice is a way to reach nirvana in the same way that working hard is a way to attain wealth. The common understanding of Buddha’s teaching is that since ignorance turns the lives of deluded beings into suffering, we should eliminate our ignorance so we can reach nirvana. If we simply accept that teaching and devote our lives to the practice of eliminating our ignorance and egocentric desires, we will find that it’s impossible to do. Not only is it impossible, but it actually creates another cycle of samsara. This happens because the desire to become free from delusion or egocentricity is one of the causes of our delusion and egocentricity. And the idea that there is nirvana or samsara existing separately from each other is a basic dualistic illusion; the desire to escape from this side of existence and enter another side is another expression of egocentric desire. When we are truly in nirvana we awaken to the fact that nirvana and samsara are not two separate things. This is what Mahayana Buddhism teaches, especially through the Prajna Paramita Sutras; it teaches that samsara and nirvana are one. If we don’t find nirvana within samsara, there is no place we can find nirvana. If we don’t find peacefulness within our busy daily lives, there is no place we can find peacefulness. This is why the Heart Sutra “negates” the Buddha’s teaching; it attempts to release us from dichotomies created in our thoughts. If we understand Buddha’s teaching with our commonsense, calculating way of thinking, we create another type of samsara. Eventually we feel more pain as our desire to reach nirvana creates more difficulty in our lives. This desire to end our suffering is another cause of suffering, and the Heart Sutra presents the Buddha’s teachings in a negative way in order to avoid arousing this desire.

These questions are closely related to one of the Buddha’s main interests: how to lead a virtuous life. Every spiritual tradition is concerned with virtue, but what does virtue mean? Is it the same as following a list of dos and don’ts? Does a virtuous person have to be a goody-goody? Is it necessary to be dogmatic, rigid, and smug? Or is there room to be playful, spontaneous, and relaxed? Is it possible to enjoy life while at the same time being virtuous? Like many spiritual traditions, the Dharma has lists of positive and negative actions. Buddhists are encouraged to commit to some basic precepts, such as not to kill, steal, or lie. Members of the monastic community, such as myself, have much longer lists of rules to follow. But the Buddha didn’t establish these rules merely for people to conform to outer codes of behavior. The Buddha’s main concern was always to help people become free of suffering. With the understanding that our suffering originates from confusion in our mind, his objective was to help us wake up out of that confused state. He therefore encouraged or discouraged certain forms of behavior based on whether they promoted or hindered that process of awakening. When we ask ourselves, “Does it matter?” we can first look at the outer, more obvious results of our actions. But then we can go deeper by examining how we are affecting our own mind: Am I making an old habit more habitual? Am I strengthening propensities I’d like to weaken? When I’m on the verge of lying to save face, or manipulating a situation to go my way, where will that lead? Am I going in the direction of becoming a more deceitful person or a more guilty, self-denigrating person? How about when I experiment with practicing patience or generosity? How are my actions affecting my process of awakening? Where will they lead? By questioning ourselves in these ways, we start to see “virtue” in a new light. Virtuous behavior is not about doing “good” because we feel we’re “bad” and need to shape up. Instead of guilt or dogma, how we choose to act can be guided by wisdom and kindness. Seen in this light, our question then boils down to “What awakens my heart, and what blocks that process from happening?” In the language of Buddhism, we use the word “karma.” This is a way of talking about the workings of cause and effect, action and reaction.

People, for the most part, live in the objective-immediate mode (discussed earlier). This means that they are totally absorbed in and identified with positive worldly interests and projects, of which there is an unending variety. That is to say, although they differ from one another in their individual natures, the contents of their respective positivities, they are all alike in being positive. Thus, although the fundamental relation between positives is conflict (on account of their individual differences), they apprehend one another as all being in the same boat of positivity, and they think of men generally in terms of human solidarity, and say 'we'. But the person who lives in the subjective-reflexive mode is absorbed in and identified with, not the positive world, but himself. The world, of course, remains 'there' but he regards it as accidental (Husserl says that he 'puts it in parentheses, between brackets'), and this means that he dismisses whatever positive identification he may have as irrelevant. He is no longer 'a politician' or 'a fisherman', but 'a self'. But what we call a 'self', unless it receives positive identification from outside, remains a void, in other words a negative. A 'self', however, is positive in this respect—it seeks identification. So a person who identifies himself with himself finds that his positivity consists in negativity—not the confident 'I am this' or 'I am that' of the positive, but a puzzled, perplexed, or even anguished, 'What am I?'. (This is where we meet the full force of Kierkegaard's 'concern and unrest'.) Eternal repetition of this eternally unanswerable question is the beginning of wisdom (it is the beginning of philosophy); but the temptation to provide oneself with a definite answer is usually too strong, and one falls into a wrong view of one kind or another. (It takes a Buddha to show the way out of this impossible situation. For the sotāpanna, who has understood the Buddha's essential Teaching, the question still arises, but he sees that it is unanswerable and is not worried; for the arahat the question no longer arises at all, and this is final peace.) This person, then, who has his centre of gravity in himself instead of in the world (a situation that, though usually found as a congenital feature, can be acquired by practice), far from seeing himself with the clear solid objective definition with which other people can be seen, hardly sees himself as anything definite at all: for himself he is, at best, a 'What, if anything?'. It is precisely this lack of assured self-identity that is the secret strength of his position—for him the question-mark is the essential and his positive identity in the world is accidental, and whatever happens to him in a positive sense the question-mark still remains, which is all he really cares about. He is distressed, certainly, when his familiar world begins to break up, as it inevitably does, but unlike the positive he is able to fall back on himself and avoid total despair. It is also this feature that worries the positives; for they naturally assume that everybody else is a positive and they are accustomed to grasp others by their positive content, and when they happen to meet a negative they find nothing to take hold of.

Religion is inevitably something that demands faith, or belief from us. Given the variety of forms of religion, it is natural that definitions of faith are also various. One interpretation, based on our discussion thus far, is to say that faith involves the sincere taking of our entire past as a foundation while simultaneously looking forward to the creation of a bright future. While this is a somewhat narrow perspective of the notion of faith, it reflects at least two essential points. One is that no one can rearrange his or her past. Whatever may be in our past, we have to accept it. The second point is that the thinking consciousness is operating while being continually subjected to the powerful influences of the manas [mind of self-attachment]. Even the wholesome mental factors are working under the severe constraints of a deeply embedded selfish attachment that is utterly bereft of the ability to take an unbiased perspective on anything. The only recourse we have is to consciously accept our past without a struggle, and from the position of leverage provided by this awareness, elevate, deepen, and broaden our inclination toward the world of the Buddha. This is the first religious step of Yogācāra, it's foundational form of faith.

Buddha taught that we should not merely not be evil, but that we should be positively good.

Find a sitting position that allows you to be alert—spine erect but not rigid—and also relaxed. Close your eyes and rest your hands in an easy, effortless way. Allow your awareness to scan through your body and, wherever possible, soften and release obvious areas of physical tension.      Because we so easily get lost in thoughts, vipassana begins with attention to the breath. Using the breath as a

You can only be put in a lowered position if you are a victim and let them cause your feelings and emotions instead of you causing your feelings and emotions. The key is to say nothing. This will surprise your attacker and throw them for a loop because they are ready for a fight and you are remaining as still as a Buddha. Do not let you emotional body become engaged. You want to remain totally detached, calm, rational, and objective.

Ninety-five percent of the Extraterrestrial races visiting the Earth are very Christed and positive in nature. There are, however, about five percent, some of which even come from other universes, that are run by the negative ego and are not loving, and would like nothing more than to conquer the Earth and ravage it of its resources.

LEARN FROM PAIN TO MAKE POSITIVE CHANGES. If you're hurting and feeling angry, resentful, or resistant: Identify the cause of your pain. Are you reliving something that happened long ago? Are you hurting because of a current situation that isn't working for you? It's easier to stuff pain down than to address it, but you can only learn about what you need if you're willing to acknowledge that you haven't gotten it and how that makes you feel. The next step is to ask yourself if you have some investment in hurting. Is there a part of you that wants to stay in a situation that you know is bad? You can only let go of pain if you understand why you're holding on to it.

Instead of falling to the ground like a heavy doll, as Kermin had seen the prisoners do at the Chetnik executions, his mother shrank into herself, a reverse blossoming, coming to rest in a sitting position, like a ruminative Buddha

Any single time of taking in the good will usually make just a little difference. But over time those little differences will add up, gradually weaving positive experiences into the fabric of your brain and your whole being.

Temple started to become excited. ‘I want to get this out before you get to the airport,’ she said, with a sort of urgency. She had been brought up an Episcopalian, she told me, but had rather early ‘given up orthodox belief’ – belief in any personal deity or intention – in favour of a more ‘scientific’ notion of God. ‘I believe there is some ultimate ordering force for good in the universe – not a personal thing, not Buddha or Jesus, maybe something like order out of disorder. I like to hope that even if there’s no personal afterlife, some energy impression is left in the universe. . . . Most people can pass on genes – I can pass on thoughts or what I write. ‘This is what I get very upset at. . . .’ Temple, who was driving, suddenly faltered and wept. ‘I’ve read that libraries are where immortality lies. . . . I don’t want my thoughts to die with me. . . . I want to have done something. . . . I’m not interested in power, or piles of money. I want to leave something behind. I want to make a positive contribution – know that my life has meaning. Right now, I’m talking about things at the very core of my existence.

This is why every day before you start your day you should put on your mental armor or mental protection. I suggest a golden white semipermeable bubble that allows in positive thoughts and feelings and keeps out negative thoughts and feelings. People put on physical clothing every day but they do not think of the importance to put on mental and emotional clothing.

Pray over your food before eating it and if possible get some kind of positive energy plate to place your food on for 5 minutes before eating it. I recommend the purple energy plates that many of you are familiar with. This will clear all the energetic toxins from your food. Eat as many vegetables as you can in your diet, as well as the proper ratio of other foods that works best for you. If you have any skill working with the pendulum, test the foods that are really the best for your body elemental and not just the one’s that are the best for your taste buds.

On a social level, choose friends that are spiritually uplifting. At earlier and even intermediary stations of the path, the people you spend time with may be one of the single most important factors in your spiritual path. If your friends do get negative at times in their thinking or feeling do not allow yourself to catch their psychological disease. Maintain a strong psychological immune system, and help them to become more positive rather than you sinking to their level.

Personal Power and a Positive attitude after praying, you should also completely men-tally, emotionally and physically “act as if it is already accomplished!

The mind is everything. What you think you become.” ‒ Buddha

In order to create a positive life, you have to have a positive vision and take creative actions.

In order to get positive results, fill your mind with positive thoughts and take action.

Lasting, good relationships typically need at least a 5:1 ratio of positive to negative interactions (Gottman 1995).

Your brain is like Velcro for negative experiences and Teflon for positive ones—even though most of your experiences are probably neutral or positive.

Turn positive facts into positive experiences. Good things keep happening all around us, but much of the time we don’t notice them; even when we do, we often hardly feel them. Someone is nice to you, you see an admirable quality in yourself, a flower is blooming, you finish a difficult project—and it all just rolls by. Instead, actively look for good news, particularly the little stuff of daily life: the faces of children, the smell of an orange, a memory from a happy vacation, a minor success at work, and so on. Whatever positive facts you find, bring a mindful awareness to them—open up to it—dig in! Savor the experience. It’s delicious! Make it last by staying with it for 5, 10, even 20 seconds. Let the experience fill your body and be as intense as possible. For example, if someone is good to you, let the feeling of being cared about bring warmth to your whole chest. Imagine or feel that the experience is entering deeply into your mind and body, like the sun’s warmth into a T-shirt.

Seeing himself in others, one who is in a state of higher consciousness feels compassion for all beings, and holds only positive thoughts about them.

I take refuge until I am enlightened In the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha. By the positive potential I generate Through studying these teachings, May I attain buddhahood for the benefit of all.

Hindus spoke in many voices about the Buddha, some positive, some negative, and some indifferent or ambivalent.

In the months and years following my participation in the completion of Oracle of Compassion: the Living Word of Kuan Yin, I did, in accordance with the deity’s former declaration—that she would continue sending important dreams, experience many dreams and visitations from Kuan Yin. It was after completing the transcription of some of the Kuan Yin quotes that I fell into a deep slumber. Just before awakening, I dreamt of Kuan Yin standing in my living room directly in front of the marble-tiled fireplace wherein Lena Lees and I would hold prayer circles. So real was this vision that I could hear the deity’s sweet voice explain that there is a specific meditation for connecting with the Celestial Wisdom! Witnessing Kuan Yin lie face down on the Oriental Carpet with arms outstretched over Her head, I watched as Her thumb and forefinger formed a triangle—the dhyana mudra specifically designated to Kannon called the dhyana mudra displayed by the fourth Dhyani Buddha Amitabha, also known as Amitayus Kuan Yin. It was then that Kuan Yin further explained the significance of this specific mudra; that it acts similar to a capstone on an obelisk—drawing wisdom to one who has demonstrated intention to be a teacher of wisdom. Aware that Kuan Yin was pointed in a northward direction, I surmised this particular alignment was also a significant aspect of the meditation—that this specific positioning was most ideal for receiving answers for prayers directed to the Her. Later in the dream, it was confirmed that each person attracts from the universe, realities that are aligned with their specific beliefs and values.

Be present above all else. Desire is suffering (Buddha). Anger is a hot coal that you hold in your hand while waiting to throw it at someone else (Buddhist saying). If you can’t see yourself working with someone for life, don’t work with them for a day. Reading (learning) is the ultimate meta-skill and can be traded for anything else. All the real benefits in life come from compound interest. Earn with your mind, not your time. 99% of all effort is wasted. Total honesty at all times. It’s almost always possible to be honest and positive. Praise specifically, criticize generally (Warren Buffett). Truth is that which has predictive power. Watch every thought. (Always ask, “Why am I having this thought?”) All greatness comes from suffering. Love is given, not received. Enlightenment is the space between your thoughts (Eckhart Tolle). Mathematics is the language of nature. Every moment has to be complete in and of itself. A

A man and only a man can become a Buddha. Every man has within himself the potentiality of becoming a Buddha, if he so wills it and endeavours. [...] Man's position, according to Buddhism, is supreme. Man is his own master, and there is no higher being or power that sits in judgment over his destiny.

To train yourself in sitting meditation [za-zen] is to train yourself to be a sitting Buddha. If you train yourself in za-zen, (you should know that) Zen is neither sitting nor lying. If you train yourself to be a sitting Buddha, (you should know that) the Buddha is not a fixed form. Since the Dharma has no (fixed) abode, it is not a matter of making choices. If you (make yourself) a sitting Buddha this is precisely killing the Buddha. If you adhere to the sitting position, you will not attain the principle (of Zen).

If you think why for me, you will only be buddhu (ignorant fool). If you think why for whole humanity, you will become Buddha. Just Buddha saw the sick person, old person, dead body, but he did not think, “why did these fellows fall on my eyes, Buddha did not look into that as his omen, or he did not think, “oh these fellows came in my eyes and I am feeling depressed,” he asked, “why this for humanity?

We might posit an eternal consciousness principle, or higher self, but if we examine our consciousness closely we see that it is made up of temporary mental processes and events. We see that our "higher self" is speculative at best and imaginary to begin with. We have invented the idea to secure ourselves, to cement our relationship, once again. Because of this we feel uneasy and anxious, even at the best of times. It is only when we completely abandon clinging that we feel any relief from our queasiness.

As he was sitting there, he asked the Blessed One: "Is it true Master Gautama, that the cosmos is eternal?” “No”, the Buddha replied. “Then it must be true Master Gautama, that the cosmos is non-eternal?” “No, it is not like that”, said Buddha. “How it can be Master Gautama, that the world is neither eternal nor non-eternal” Buddha answered, “Any of these views doesn’t apply, Vacchogata. ‘Eternal’ doesn’t apply, ‘non-eternal’ doesn’t apply, ‘both eternal and non-eternal’ doesn’t apply and ‘neither eternal nor non-eternal’ doesn’t apply.” Vacchogata has never heard this answer to any of these questions before, he didn’t understand why Buddha has answered with elation, but seeing the peculiar nature of the answer, he decided to ask some more questions. "Is it true Master Gautama, that the cosmos are spatially infinite?” “No”, the Buddha replied. “Then it must be true Master Gautama, that the cosmos are spatially finite?” ----“No, it is not like that”, said Buddha. “Is it true Master Gautama, that the soul is identical with body?” “No”, the Buddha replied. “Then it must be true Master Gautama, that the soul is different from the body?” “No, it is not like that”, said Buddha. Seeing the Buddha entirely dissociating from any of the views, Vacchogata asked Buddha. “Why is that, that the Master doesn’t answer any of the questions? Does Master Gautama have any position at all?" The Buddha replied: “Whatever you have asked is incomprehensible, unthinkable, impenetrable, it cannot or should not be thought, and it is unthinkable and beyond thought. These views are unavoidably accepted for explaining facts, but they cannot stand the scrutiny of logic. Since they transcend the limits of thinking of humans and thus you should not ponder over them. When you become enlightened, you will understand yourself

If we don’t do anything constructive and expect that others will, then obviously nothing is possible. The first step is to cultivate within our minds those positive qualities taught by the Buddha.

Why It’s Good to Take in the Good Given the negativity bias of the brain, it takes an active effort to internalize positive experiences and heal negative ones. When you tilt toward what’s positive, you’re actually righting a neurological imbalance. And you’re giving yourself today the caring and encouragement you should have received as a child, but perhaps didn’t get in full measure. Focusing on what is wholesome and then taking it in naturally increases the positive emotions flowing through your mind each day. Emotions have global effects since they organize the brain as a whole. Consequently, positive feelings have far-reaching benefits, including a stronger immune system (Frederickson 2000) and a cardiovascular system that is less reactive to stress (Frederickson and Levenson 1998). They lift your mood; increase optimism, resilience, and resourcefulness; and help counteract the effects of painful experiences, including trauma (Frederickson 2001; Frederickson et al. 2000). It’s a positive cycle: good feelings today increase the likelihood of good feelings tomorrow.

Our joy, our peace, our happiness depend very much on our practice of recognizing and transforming our habit energies. There are positive habit energies that we have to cultivate, there are negative habit energies that we have to recognize, embrace, and transform. The energy with which we do these things is mindfulness. Mindfulness helps us be aware of what is going on. Then, when the habit energy shows itself, we know right away. "Hello, my little habit energy, I know you are there. I will take good care of you." By recognizing this energy as it is, you are in control of the situation. You don't have to fight your habit energy. In fact the Buddha does not recommend that you fight it, because that habit energy is you and you should not fight against yourself. You have to generate the energy of mindful­ness, which is also you, and that positive energy will do the work of recognizing and embracing. Every time you embrace your habit energy, you can help it transform a little bit. The habit energy is a kind of seed within your consciousness, and when it becomes a source of energy, you have to recognize it. You have to bring your mindfulness into the present moment, and you just embrace that negative energy: "Hello, my negative habit energy. I know you are there. I am here for you." After maybe one or two or three minutes, that energy will go back into the form of a seed. But it may re-manifest later on. You have to be very alert. Every time a negative energy is embraced by the energy of mindfulness, it will no longer push you to do or to say things you do not want to do or say, and it loses a little bit of its strength as it returns as a seed to the lower level of consciousness. The same thing is true for all mental formations: your fear, your anguish, your anxiety, and your despair. They exist in us in the form of seeds, and every time one of the seeds is watered, it becomes a zone of energy on the upper level of our consciousness. If you don't know how to take care of it, it will cause damage, and push us to do or to say things that will damage us and damage the people we love. Therefore, generating the energy of mindfulness to recognize, embrace, and take care of negative energy is the practice. And the practice should be done in a very tender, nonviolent way. There should be no fighting, because when you fight, you create damage within yourself. The Buddhist practice is based on the insight of non-duality: you are love, you are mindfulness, but you are also that habit energy within you. To medi­tate does not mean to transform yourself into a battlefield with right fighting wrong, positive fighting negative. That's not Buddhist. Based on the insight of nonduality, the practice should be nonviolent. Mind­fulness embracing anger is like a mother embracing her child, big sister embracing younger sister. The embrace always brings a positive effect. You can bring relief, and you can cause the negative energy to lose some of its strength, just by embracing it.

Since such realization is undeceiving, it is called "seeing what is true." As it is the opposite of worldly seeing, it may also be called "not seeing anything." Since it is the opposite of reification, it is expressed as "seeing emptiness." It is also referred to as "being released from empty and nonempty," because neither something empty nor something nonempty is observed. Since emptiness is nothing but a name, it is also described as "not seeing emptiness." Because it is the source of all positive qualities, it is designated as "seeing the emptiness endowed with the supreme of all aspects." It is called "seeing identitylessness," for it is the opposite of clinging to personal and phenomenal identities. Since it is the opposite of both clinging to a self and clinging to the lack of a self, it is said to be "seeing the genuine self." As any notion of a mind has vanished, it is labeled as "mind having vanished." It is also referred to as "realizing or seeing one's own mind," because the primordial basic nature of one's own mind is realized in just the primordial way it is. When "not seeing anything" is explained as "seeing what is true," this is to he understood just like our immediate certainty that we see space when we do not see anything. As the Buddha said: Beings constantly use the words, "I see space." You should examine the point of how you see space. Those who see in this way see all phenomena. I am not able to explain seeing through another example.

Well! Being born into this world there are, I suppose, many aims which we may strive to attain. The Imperial Throne of the Mikado inspires us with the greatest awe; even the uttermost leaf of the Imperial Family Tree is worthy of honour and very different from the rest of mankind. As to the position of a certain august personage (i.e. the Mikado's regent) there can be no question, and those whose rank entitles them to a Palace Guard are very magnificent also - their sons and grandsons, even if they fall into poverty, are still gentlefolk. But when those who are of lower degree chance to rise in the world and assume an aspect of arrogance, though they may think themselves grand, it is very regrettable. Now there is no life so undesirable as that of a priest. Truly indeed did Sei Shô-nagon write, 'People think of them as if they were only chips of wood.' Their savage violence and loud shouting does not show them to advantage, and I feel sure that, as the sage Zôga said, their desire for notoriety is not in accordance with the sacred precepts of Buddha. To retire from the world in real earnest, on the contrary, is indeed praiseworthy, and some I hope there may be who are willing to do so. A man should preferably have pleasing features and a good style; one never tires of meeting those who can engage in some little pleasant conversation and who have an attractive manner, but who are not too talkative. It is a great pity, however, if a man's true character does not come up to his prepossessing appearance. One's features are fixed by nature; but, if we wish to, may we not change our hearts from good to better? For, if a man though handsome and good-natured has no real ability, his position will suffer, and in association with men of a less engaging aspect his deficiency will cause him to be thrown into the background, which is indeed a pity. The thing to aim at, therefore, is the path of true literature, the study of prose, poetry, and music; to be an accepted authority for others on ancient customs and ceremonies is also praiseworthy. One who is quick and clever at writing and sketching, who has a pleasant voice, who can beat time to music, and who does not refuse a little wine, even thoughhe cannot drink much, is a good man.

Well! Being born into this world there are, I suppose, many aims which we may strive to attain. The Imperial Throne of the Mikado inspires us with the greatest awe; even the uttermost leaf of the Imperial Family Tree is worthy of honour and very different from the rest of mankind. As to the position of a certain august personage (i.e. the Mikado's regent) there can be no question, and those whose rank entitles them to a Palace Guard are very magnificent also - their sons and grandsons, even if they fall into poverty, are still gentlefolk. But when those who are of lower degree chance to rise in the world and assume an aspect of arrogance, though they may think themselves grand, it is very regrettable. Now there is no life so undesirable as that of a priest. Truly indeed did Sei Shô-nagon write, 'People think of them as if they were only chips of wood.' Their savage violence and loud shouting does not show them to advantage, and I feel sure that, as the sage Zôga said, their desire for notoriety is not in accordance with the sacred precepts of Buddha. To retire from the world in real earnest, on the contrary, is indeed praiseworthy, and some I hope there may be who are willing to do so. A man should preferably have pleasing features and a good style; one never tires of meeting those who can engage in some little pleasant conversation and who have an attractive manner, but who are not too talkative. It is a great pity, however, if a man's true character does not come up to his prepossessing appearance. One's features are fixed by nature; but, if we wish to, may we not change our hearts from good to better? For, if a man though handsome and good-natured has no real ability, his position will suffer, and in association with men of a less engaging aspect his deficiency will cause him to be thrown into the background, which is indeed a pity. The thing to aim at, therefore, is the path of true literature, the study of prose, poetry, and music; to be an accepted authority for others on ancient customs and ceremonies is also praiseworthy. One who is quick and clever at writing and sketching, who has a pleasant voice, who can beat time to music, and who does not refuse a little wine, even though he cannot drink much, is a good man.

Step One: accepting that this human life will bring suffering    Step Two: seeing how we create extra suffering in our lives    Step Three: embracing impermanence to show us that our suffering can end    Step Four: being willing to step onto the path of recovery and discover freedom    Step Five: transforming our speech, actions, and livelihood    Step Six: placing positive values at the center of our lives    Step Seven: making every effort to stay on the path of recovery    Step Eight: helping others by sharing the benefits we have gained

In brief, what Centrists refute is any notion of real or absolute existence or an intrinsic nature that is attributed to any phenomenon, whether it is material form, ordinary consciousness, omniscient wisdom, Buddhahood, the Dharma Body, or Buddha nature. Centrists make no difference in this respect between refuting the positions of Buddhists and non-Buddhists. They do not even hesitate to apply such a critique to anything that is-correctly or incorrectly-understood as "Centrism." Thus, if the teachings on the three natures are explained so as to even slightly suggest real existence, be it on the seeming or the ultimate level, be it by the Proponents of Cognizance, so-called Mere Mentalists, or Shen- tong-Madhyamikas, Centrists will speak up against this. However, when the presentation of the three natures is understood as the Karmapa explained it above, it is not something that has to be discarded by Centrists but comes down to the same essential point of ultimate non referential 1 ry that is explained in the Centrist teachings.

On the basis of its ethical quality, the Buddha distinguishes kamma into two major categories: the unwholesome (akusala) and the wholesome (kusala). Unwholesome kamma is action that is spiritually detrimental to the agent, morally reprehensible, and potentially productive of an unfortunate rebirth and painful results. The criterion for judging an action to be unwholesome is its underlying motives, the “roots” from which it springs. There are three unwholesome roots: greed, hatred, and delusion. From these there arises a wide variety of secondary defilements—states such as anger, hostility, envy, selfishness, arrogance, pride, presumption, and laziness—and from the root defilements and secondary defilements arise defiled actions. Wholesome kamma, on the other hand, is action that is spiritually beneficial and morally commendable; it is action that ripens in happiness and good fortune. Its underlying motives are the three wholesome roots: nongreed, nonhatred, and nondelusion, which may be expressed more positively as generosity, loving-kindness, and wisdom. Whereas actions springing from the unwholesome roots are necessarily bound to the world of repeated birth and death, actions springing from the wholesome roots may be of two kinds, mundane and world-transcending. The mundane (lokiya) wholesome actions have the potential to produce a fortunate rebirth and pleasant results within the round of rebirths. The world-transcending or supramundane (lokuttara) wholesome actions—namely, the kamma generated by developing the Noble Eightfold Path and the other aids to enlightenment—lead to enlightenment and to liberation from the round of rebirths. This is the kamma that dismantles the entire process of karmic causation.

Mindfulness is both a skill and an attitude toward living that originated thousands of years ago as part of Buddhist philosophy. According to the Buddha, mental suffering (or inner stress) occurs because we cling to positive experiences, not wanting them to end, and we strive to avoid pain, sadness, and other negative experiences. This effort to control our mental and bodily experiences is misguided and out of touch with the reality of living. We can never escape loss and suffering, because these are natural parts of life. Our experiences are always changing. Living things wither and die, to be replaced by new living things. The forces of nature are beyond human control.

Walk straight through the curves in life.

In grief, there is an element of inconsolability. In our needs, there is an element of unsatisfiability. In the face of life’s most profound questions, there is an unknowability. This fits with the work of Kurt Gödel, the Czech mathematician, who confirmed the “incompleteness theorem,” which states that in any mathematical system there are indeed propositions that can neither be proved nor disproved. These natural incompletions reflect the first noble truth of Buddhism about the enduring and ineradicable unsatisfactoriness of all experience. This is not only Buddha’s truth, it is the one that some of our children and punk rockers also proclaim. Yet there is a positive side. Inconsolability means we cannot forget but always cherish those we loved. Unsatisfiability means we have a motivation to transcend our immediate desires. Unknowability means we grow in our sense of wonder and imagination. Indeed, answers close us, but questions open us. In accepting the given of the first noble truth without protest, blame, or recourse to an escape to which we can attach, we win all the way around.

Buddho A mantra, associated with the Mahayana or Vajrayana Buddhism and a significant part of the history of Theravada. Repeating the name of Buddha or other Pali phrases is known to help the individual cultivate loving kindness. ‘Buddho’ comes to mean His title, not His rank. You call upon the holy teacher to offer you peace, harmony between yourself and the universe, harmony between the sensual and the spiritual world, by repeating the mantra. Until you continue, sit comfortably on the ground and take a few deep breaths. Then breathe in, say a long' bud-,' breathe out, hold'-dho.' At the conclusion of your practice, the mantra will give you clarity and brightness. • Lumen de Lumine Lumen De Lumine is luminous song. It helps you to feel open towards the world. The person will be engulfed in light. When darkness overpowers your life, Lumen De Lumine removes your aura and fills you with glow and light. You'll be more relaxed and uplifted. This is the ideal balance of power and harmony. The mantra will give you the faith that you're free from negative energies. Just like the light, you'll feel strong, untouchable, and invincible. Anyone can touch Lumen De Lumine. You don't have to close yourself with this chant in mind. Think of your loved one bringing positive energy and feelings to them. • Sat, Chit, Ananda Often known as Satchitananda, a Sanskrit composite word composed of the three verbs' sat,'' cit' and' ananda.' Sat means ' life, being present, being alive, living, being real, being good, being right, being normal, intelligent, being truthful.' Chit means' see, feel, perceive, understand, accept, think about something, shape a thought, be conscious, remember, consider' Ananda means ‘joy, love, satisfaction, enjoyment, happiness, pure elation’.