Quotes from Matthieu Ricard

I have also come to understand that although some people are naturally happier than others, their happiness is still vulnerable and incomplete, and that achieving durable happiness as a way of being is a skill. It requires sustained effort in training the mind and developing a set of human qualities, such as inner peace, mindfulness, and altruistic love.

One is not born wise; one becomes it.

Few of us would regret the years it takes to complete an education or master a crucial skill. So why complain about the perseverance needed to become a well-balanaced and truly compassionate human being?

I think what everyone should be doing, before it's too late, is committing themselves to what they really want to do with their lives.

We deal with our mind from morning till evening, and it can be our best friend or our worst enemy.

According to the philosopher Andre Comte-Sponville: The wise man has nothing left to expect or to hope for. Because he is entirely happy, he needs nothing. Because he needs nothing, he is entirely happy.

As long as a sense of self-importance rules your being, you will never know lasting peace.

We are very much like birds that have lived too long in a cage to which we return even when we get the chance to fly away. We have grown so accustomed to our faults that we can barely imagine what life would be like without them. The prospect of change makes us dizzy.

Being altruistic not only helps us to benefit others, but it is also the most satisfying way to live.

Another form of laziness is thinking: 'That's not for me; it's beyond my abilities. I'd rather not get involved with it.' In other words, you give up the race before you reach the starting line.

Tibetan poet Shabkar said: "One with compassion is kind even when angry; one without compassion will kill even as he smiles.

Demanding immediate results is an aspect of unsteadiness of mind or laziness.

He understands that all beings have the power to free themselves from ignorance and unhappiness, but that they don't know it. How

The ultimate reason for meditating is to transform ourselves in order to be better able to transform the world.

Those who seek happiness in pleasure, wealth, glory, power, and heroics are as naive as the child who tries to catch a rainbow and wear it as a coat. DILGO KHYENTSE RINPOCHE

The truth is that even if resentment is triggered by an external object, it is not located anywhere else but in our mind.

The most striking quality that humans and animals have in common is the capacity to experience suffering.

May every moment of my life and of the lives of others be one of wisdom, flourishing, and inner peace!

Voluntary simplicity is at once joyous and altruistic. Joyous because it is not permanently plagued by the hunger for "more"; altruistic because it does not encourage the disproportionate concentration of resources in the hands of a few, resources which—were they to be spread evenly—would significantly improve the lives of those deprived of basic needs.

Happiness does not come automatically. It is not a gift that good fortune bestows upon us and a reversal of fortune takes back. It depends on us alone. One does not become happy overnight, but with patient labor, day after day. Happiness is constructed, and that requires effort and time. In order to become happy, we have to learn how to change ourselves. LUCA AND FRANCESCO CAVALLI-SFORZA

Some people might think that the smartest way to guarantee their own well-being is to isolate themselves from others and to work hard at their own happiness, without consideration for what other people are experiencing. They probably assume that if everybody did that, we'd all be happy. But the result would be exactly the opposite: instead of being happy, they would be torn between hope and fear, make their own lives miserable, and ruin the lives of the people around them too.

On a timeline that shows the 15 billion years of the universe as one year, the first human appears only at 10:30p on December 31 (about 3 million years ago). Stonehenge is built and Egyptian civilization arises at 11:50:54p (about 3,000 years ago). The Buddha appears on the timeline at 11:59:55p (2,500 years ago), and Christ shows up at 11:59:55p (2,000 years ago). The European Renaissance occurs at 11:59:59p (450 years ago), on the last day of the year.

Meditation is not just blissing out under a mango tree. It completely changes your brain and therefore changes what you are.

It is in learning music that many youthful hearts learn to love.