I have found that the greatest degree of inner tranquility comes from the development of love and compassion. The more we care for the happiness of others, the greater is our own sense of well-being. Cultivating a close, warmhearted feeling for others automatically puts the mind at ease. It is the ultimate source of success in life. ~Dalai Lama
Every time you give your internal formations a bath of mindfulness, the blocks of pain in you become lighter and less dangerous. So give your anger, your despair, your sorrow a bath of mindfulness every day—that is your practice. If mindfulness is not there, it is very unpleasant to have these seeds come up. But if you know how to generate the energy of mindfulness, it is very healing to invite them up every day and embrace them. And after several days or weeks of bringing them up daily and helping them go back down again, you create good circulation in your psyche, and the symptoms of mental illness will begin to disappear. ~Thich Nath Hanh
Jendhamuni in Cambodia
Being an island unto myself.
As an island unto myself.
Buddha is my mindfulness.
Shining near, shining far.
Dharma is my breathing, guarding body and mind.
I am free.
Being an island unto myself.
As an island unto myself.
Sangha is my five skandhas, working in harmony.
Taking refuge in myself.
Coming back to myself.
I am free.
~Thich Nhat Hanh
We gently caress you, the Earth, our planet and our home.
Our vision has brought us closer to you, making us aware of the harm we have done to the life-network upon which we ourselves depend.
We are reminded that we have poisoned your waters, your lands, your air.
We have filled you with the bones of our dead from war and greed.
Your pain is our pain.
Touching you gently, we pray that we may become peace-bringers and life-bringers so that our home in its journey around the Sun not become a sterile and lonely place.
May this prayer and its power last forever.
Sensei Ulrich, Manitoba Buddhist Temple
For one who is in the habit of constantly honoring and respecting the elders,
four blessings increase—age, beauty, bliss, and strength. ~Dhammapada
Whoever settles a matter by violence is not just.
The wise calmly considers what is right and what is wrong.
Whoever guides others by a procedure
that is nonviolent and fair
is said to be a guardian of truth, wise and just.
A person is not a supporter of justice
simply because one talks much.
Even if a person has learned little,
whoever discerns justice with the body
and does not neglect justice is a supporter of justice.
~Dhammapada
“They insulted me; they hurt me;
they defeated me; they cheated me.”
In those who harbor such thoughts,
hate will never cease. ~Dhammapada
Loving-kindness meditation can be brought in to support the practice of insight meditation to help keep the mind open and sweet. It provides the essential balance to support Insight meditation practice.
It is a fact of life that many people are troubled by difficult emotional states in the pressured societies we live in, but do little in terms of developing skills to deal with them. Yet even when the mind goes sour it is within most people’s capacity to arouse positive feelings to sweeten it. Loving-kindness is a meditation practice taught by the Buddha to develop the mental habit of selfless or altruistic love. In the Dhammapada can be found the saying: “Hatred cannot coexist with loving-kindness, and dissipates if supplanted with thoughts based on loving-kindness.”
Loving-kindness is a meditation practice, which brings about positive attitudinal changes as it systematically develops the quality of ‘loving-acceptance’. It acts, as it were, as a form of self-psychotherapy, a way of healing the troubled mind to free it from its pain and confusion. Of all Buddhist meditations, loving-kindness has the immediate benefit of sweetening and changing old habituated negative patterns of mind.
If a man’s thoughts are muddy, if he is reckless and full of deceit, how can he wear the yellow robe? Whoever is master of his own nature, bright, clear and true, he may indeed wear the yellow robe. ~Buddha
Dhamma talk: Shravan Kumar រឿងសុវណ្ណសាម [one of Buddha’s previous lives]
By Vipassana Master Ketodhammo Som Bunthoeun
