Quotes About Compassion

Not Seeing Dukkha Is Dukkha

The meditative journey is not about always feeling good. Many times we may feel terrible. That's fine. What we want is to open to the entire range of what this mind and body are about. Sometimes we feel wonderful and happy and inspired, and at other times we deeply feel different aspects of suffering.

and the liberating insight into how suffering in our lives is born from ignorance and ends through wisdom.

Do no harm, act for the good, purify the mind." The flowering of all the great traditions of Buddhism derives from the teachings in this one simple verse.

The entire spiritual journey rests on the morality of nonharming. This is the expression of the love and care we feel both for others and for ourselves.

If we're more accepting, more peaceful, less judgmental, less selfish, then the whole world is that much more loving and peaceful, that much less judgmental and selfish.

The world is like that boat, tossed by the storms of greed and hatred and fear.

At first, as we undertake the cultivation of compassion, we may feel genuine empathy with others in pain or difficulty. This happens when we take the time to stop and feel what is really going on—even for just a few moments before rushing on with our lives.

For a long time in my meditation practice I felt embarrassed and ashamed when I saw unwholesome states in my own mind, states like pride or jealousy, ill will or selfishness; and instead of examining them and working free of them, I would judge myself and dig the hole I was in even deeper.

WE MOVE FROM THE FIRST OF THE TEACHINGS OF ALL THE Buddhas, doing no harm, to the second: acting for the good. This principle of One Dharma, common to all traditions, highlights the positive actions we undertake both for our own welfare and for the benefit and well-being of others.

SIX SKILLFUL ACTIONS Generosity heads almost every list of actions for the good. For many people it is the easiest one to appreciate and develop because it brings such immediate delight to our lives. Generosity enacts the quality of nongreed; it is a willingness to give, to share, to let go. It may be the giving of time, energy, resources, love, and even, in rare cases, one's own life for the benefit and welfare of others.

If we're more accepting, more peaceful, less judgmental, less selfish, then the whole world is that much more loving and peaceful, that much less judgmental and selfish. Our

To pray for their safety was to pray for the death of other young men he did not even know.

Yossarian was moved by such intense pity for his poverty that he wanted to smash his pale, sad, sickly face with his fist and knock him out of existence because he brought to mind all the pale, sad, sickly children in Italy that same night who needed haircuts and needed shoes and socks.

Yossarian was moved by such intense pity for his poverty that he wanted to smash his pale. sad, sickly face with his fist and knock him out of existence

Yossarian quickened his pace to get away, almost ran. The night was filled with horrors, and he thought he knew how Christ must have felt as he walked through the world, like a psychiatrist through a ward full of nuts, like a victim through a prison full of thieves. What a welcome sight a leper must have been!

Yossarian's attitude towards his roommates turned merciful and protective at the mere recollection of Captain Black. It was not their fault that they were young and cheerful, he reminded himself as he carried the swinging beam of his flashlight back through the darkness. He wished that he could be young and cheerful, too. And it wasn't their fault that they were courageous, confident and carefree.

no craving for wealth or immortality could be so great, he felt, as to subsist on the sorrow of children.

He was genuinely sorry for Yossarian; when Yossarian realized that, he was genuinely sorry for Rogoff.

Actually, he was a very warm, compassionate man who never stopped feeling sorry for himself. "Why me?" was his constant lament, and the question was a good one.

We need a language that brings us together about the deepest things we care about rather than pushing us apart.

A hateful or resentful thought is a mental poison. Do not think ill of another for to do so is to think ill of yourself. You are the only thinker in your universe, and your thoughts are creative. 3.

Always make it a special point to rejoice in the wealth of another person.

Resentment, hatred, ill will, and hostility are behind a host of maladies. Forgive yourself and everybody else by pouring out love, life, joy, and good will to all those who have hurt you. Continue until such time as you meet them in your mind and you are at peace with them.