Quotes from Pema Chodron

Whatever happens in your life, joyful or painful, do not be swept away by reactivity. Be patient with yourself and don't lose your sense of perspective.

The Buddha taught that we're not actually in control, which is a pretty scary idea. But when you let things be as they are, you will be a much happier, more balanced, compassionate person.

Only to the extent that we expose ourselves over and over to annihilation can that which is indestructible in us be found.

Somehow, in the process of trying to deny that things are always changing, we lose our sense of the sacredness of life. We tend to forget that we are part of the natural scheme of things.

Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know.

Sticking with that uncertainty, getting the knack of relaxing in the midst of chaos, learning not to panic-this is the spiritual path.

There's nothing more important on our spiritual path than developing gentleness to oneself.

Simply be present with your own shifting energies and with the unpredictabilit y of life as it unfolds.

The most important aspect of being on a spiritual path may be to just keep moving.

We don't sit in meditation to become good meditators. We sit in meditation so that we'll be more awake in our lives.

What if rather than being disheartened by the ambiguity, the uncertainty of life, we accepted it and relaxed into it?

Life is like that. We don't know anything. We call something bad; we call it good. But really we just don't know.

Hell is just resistance to life.

I have all the support I need to simply relax and be with the transitional, in-process quality of my life. I have all I need to engage in the process of awakening.

By not knowing, not hoping to know and not acting like we know what's happening, we begin to access our inner strength.

You build inner strength through embracing the totality of your experience, both the delightful parts and the difficult parts.

There isn't anything except your own life that can be used as ground for your spiritual practice. Spiritual practice is your life, twenty-four hours a day.

The biggest obstacle to taking a bigger perspective on life is that our emotions capture and blind us.

The only way to ease our pain is to experience it fully. Learn to stay with uneasiness, learn to stay with the tightening, so that the habitual chain reaction doesn't continue to rule your life.

Better to join in with humanity than to set ourselves apart.

The idea is to develop sympathy for your own confusion.

Allow situations in your life to become your teacher.

Difficult people are the greatest teachers.

Mindfulness is loving all the details of our lives, and awareness is the natural thing that happens: life begins to open up, and you realize that you're always standing at the center of the world.