Rick Hanson Quotes

Nurturing your own development isn’t selfish. It’s actually a great gift to other people.

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.

All joy in this world comes from wanting others to be happy, and all suffering in this world comes from wanting only oneself to be happy. —Shantideva

Only we humans worry about the future, regret the past, and blame ourselves for the present.

It’s easy to be kind when others treat you well. The challenge is to preserve your loving-kindness when they treat you badly—to preserve goodwill in the face of ill will.

If you take care of the minutes, the years will take care of themselves.

By taking just a few extra seconds to stay with a positive experience—even the comfort in a single breath—you’ll help turn a passing mental state into lasting neural structure.

Neurons that fire together wire together. Mental states become neural traits. Day after day, your mind is building your brain. This is what scientists call experience-dependent neuroplasticity,

Your brain is like Velcro for negative experiences but Teflon for positive ones.

[I]f you can be with the pleasant without chasing after it, with the unpleasant without resisting it, and with the neutral without ignoring it - [...] that is an incredible [...] freedom.