Quotes from Thich Nhat Hanh

You cannot remain yourself.

No act of killing can be justified.

if you know how to suffer, suffering is okay. And the moment you have that attitude, you don't suffer much anymore. And out of suffering, a lotus flower of happiness can open.

When conditions are sufficient, we manifest in a particular way. When conditions are no longer sufficient, we no longer manifest in that way. This doesn't mean that we don't exist. If we're afraid of death, it's because we don't understand that things do not really die.

To make hell into paradise, we only need to change the mind on which it is based. [...] With your deluded mind, you make hell for yourself. With your true mind, you make paradise.

Your action, what you do, depends on who you are. The quality of your action depends on the quality of your being. [...] So there is a link between doing and being. If you don't succeed in being, you can't succeed in doing.

Buddhist meditation is based on the principle of nonduality. This means that if we are mindfulness, if we are love, we are also ignorance, we are also suffering, and there is no reason to suppress anything at all.

Sexual intimacy shouldn't occur before there is communion, understanding, and sharing on the emotional and spiritual level.

Buddha said, "The past no longer is, the future is not yet here; there is only one moment in which life is available, and that is the present moment." To meditate with mindful breathing is to bring body and mind back to the present moment so that you do not miss your appointment with life.

it is always possible to practice "I have arrived, I am home." I have run all my life; I am not going to run anymore; now I am determined to stop and really live my life. When

With mindful walking, our steps are no longer a means to arrive at an end.

Whatever the tasks, do them slowly and with ease, in mindfulness. Don't do any task in order to get it over with. Resolve to do each job in a relaxed way, with all your attention.

In everyone there's a continuous desire and expectation; deep inside, you still expect something better to happen. That is why you check your email many times a day!

True love gives us beauty, freshness, solidity, freedom, and peace. True love includes a feeling of deep joy that we are alive. If we don't feel this way when we feel love, then it's not true love.

Whether we are happy or whether we suffer depends largely on our perceptions. It is important to look deeply into our perceptions and recognize their source.

The way to suffer well and be happy is to stay in touch with what is actually going on; in doing so, you will gain liberating insights into the true nature of suffering and of joy. NO

When your loved one is suffering, your impulse may be to want to do something to fix it, but you don't need to do much. You just need to be there for him or her. That is true love. True love is made of mindfulness.

You think the other person in your life is going to be there forever, but that is not true. That person is impermanent, just like you. So if you can do something to make that person happy, you should do it right away. Anything you can do or say to make him or her happy—say it or do it now. It's now or never.

Nothing exists by itself alone. We all belong to each other; we cannot cut reality into pieces.

We really have to understand the person we want to love. If our love is only a will to possess, it is not love. If we only think of ourselves, if we know only our own needs and ignore the needs of the other person, we cannot love. We must look deeply in order to see and understand the needs, aspirations, and suffering of the person we love. This is the ground of real love. You cannot resist loving another person when you really understand him or her.

Sometimes we say, "I didn't want to do it, but it's stronger than me, it pushed me. So that is a seed, a habit energy, that may have come from many generations in the past.We can smile at our shortcomings, at our habit energy. With awareness, we have a choice; we can act another way. We can end the cycle of suffering right now.

We are primarily responsible for our anger, but we believe very naively that if we can say something or do something to punish the other person, we will suffer less. This kind of belief should be uprooted. Because whatever you do or say in a state of anger will only cause more damage in the relationship. Instead, we should try not to do anything or say anything when we are angry.

Our world does not lack people willing to throw themselves into action. What we need are people who are capable of loving, of not taking sides so that they can embrace the whole of reality as a mother hen embraces all her chicks, with two fully spread wings.

Without suffering, you cannot grow. Without suffering, you cannot get the peace and joy you deserve.