Quotes About Interbeing

Every act, says Thich Nhat Hanh, should be a ritual of mindfulness awakening us to our true identity of interbeing. "True mind is our real self, is the Buddha: the pure one-ness which cannot be cut up by the illusory divisions of separate selves, created by concepts and language" (Naht Hanh, 1975, p. 42).

In the Light of interbeing, peace and happiness in your daily life means peace and happiness in the world.

Wisdom sees that the Many is One, and Compassion sees that the One is the Many. Or in the East: Prajna sees that Form is Emptiness, Karuna sees that Emptiness is Form.

This is, because that is. This is not, because that is not. This is born, because that is born. This dies, because that dies.

A physicist who is able to see the interpenetration and interbeing of elementary particles without going beyond his or her intellect has, from the viewpoint of Buddhist liberation, attained just a decorative facade. -Someone who studies Buddhism without practicing meditation has also accumulated knowledge only as decoration.

We cannot be by ourselves alone. We can only inter-be with everything else in the cosmos.

God the Father is in God the Son; and the Holy Spirit is in the Son and in the Father. That is interbeing.

The insight of interbeing helps us touch this wisdom of non-discrimination. It sets us free. We no longer want to belong just to one geographical area or cultural identity. We see the presence of the whole cosmos in us.

A true bodhisattva is one who sees no demarcations between organic and non-organic, self and non-self, living beings and non-living beings, bodhisattvas and non-bodhisattvas.

I am determined not to try to cover up loneliness, anxiety, or other suffering by losing myself in consumption. I will contemplate interbeing and consume in a way that preserves peace, joy, and well-being in my body and consciousness, and in the collective body and consciousness of my family, my society, and the Earth.

Nothing can be by itself alone, no one can be by himself or herself alone, everyone has to inter-be with every one else. That is why, when you look outside, around you, you can see yourself.

True self is non-self, the awareness that the self is made only of non-self elements. There's no separation between self and other, and everything is interconnected. Once you are aware of that you are no longer caught in the idea that you are a separate entity.

Dear friends, I have seen deeply that nothing can be by itself alone, that everything has to inter-be with everything else. I have seen that all beings are endowed with the nature of awakening.

When we see the nature of interbeing, barriers between ourselves and others are dissolved, and peace, love, and understanding are possible. Whenever there is understanding, compassion is born. Just

We let individualism prevail in the twentieth century, and frankly, we have made a mess of it. We must begin anew for the twenty-first century; we need a new, different direction. We can no longer continue destroying ourselves and the planet we live on. With determination we can abandon the cult of individualism and the self, and act and live in harmony, in the spirit of interbeing.

When we look into the heart of a flower, we see clouds, sunshine, minerals, time, the earth, and everything else in the cosmos in it. Without clouds, there could be no rain, and there would be no flower. Without time, the flower could not bloom. In fact, the flower is made entirely of non flower elements; it has no independent, individual existence. It 'inter-is' with everything else in the universe.

Our practice for the new century should be to transform the notion that we are separate selves and to liberate ourselves from the prison of the individual. The most meaningful practice we have today is to learn how to live as a sangha.

Even time breaks down within this calculus of interbeing. We stand in a spiral—rather than a strictly linear—continuity with our ancestors and the ancient cosmos. We still see the light of the stars that died long ago and that now form our living bodies; so, too, do our actions reach into the future of all life and death. It matters what we bring forth with the matter of our bodies. We create, as cosmos-formed creatures, within creation.

God is and has been for me, rather, the Mystery of InterBeing that surrounds me and animates me. But it is a Mystery that is also personally present to me. When I say "personally present," I mean that I have sensed that this Mystery touches me and affects me in ways that I can, and must, describe as personal.

The kind of experiences that have stimulated my awareness of being part of the energy field of InterBeing have also made me aware that this energy is not blind, and its field is not inanimate. The energy, as it were, is up to something. There is something personal about it, even though I can't call it a person.