Quotes About Enlightenment

A true experience of prajna corresponds to "enlightenment" or liberation—not change, but transformation—a profound vision of his identity with universal life, past, present, and future, that keeps man from doing harm to others and sets him free from fear of birth-and-death. In

Satchidananda.

There is no sense of loss in this transcendence of the quest to satisfy desires that previously seemed so important or of the pleasures that came from their satisfaction, for enlightenment involves detachment from one's desires.

Our century has been dominated intellectually by a coming to terms with science.

I have just three things to teach: simplicity, patience, compassion. These three are the greatest treasures. Simple in actions and thoughts, you return to the source of being. Patient with both friends and enemies, you accord with the way things are. Compassionate toward yourself, you reconcile all beings in the world.

Zen teacher Lewis Richmond tells the story of hearing Shunryu Suzuki sum up Buddhism in two words. Suzuki had just finished giving a talk to a group of Zen students when someone in the audience said, "You've been talking about Buddhism for nearly an hour, and I haven't been able to understand a thing you said. Could you say one thing about Buddhism I can understand?" After the laughter died down, Suzuki replied calmly, "Everything changes.

triangle offense, that aligned perfectly with the values of selflessness and mindful awareness I'd been studying in Zen Buddhism.

I did not tell Fat this, but technically he had become a Buddha. It did not seem to me like a good idea to let him know. After all, if you are a Buddha you should be able to figure it out for yourself.

When I was a child I thought as a child. But now I have put away childish things. Now I must seek in other realms.

Everyone dwelt in it without realizing it. The Black Iron Prison was their world.

Hallelujah," Rybys said. "What?" he

I've read the Cosmic Trigger and Robert Anton Wilson says

It strikes me as an interesting paradox that a Buddha-an enlightened one-would be unable to figure it out, even after four-and-a-half years, that he had become enlightened. Fat had become totally bogged down in his enormous exegesis, trying futilely to determine what had happened to him. He resembled more a hit-and-run accident victim than a Buddha.

God, what a dreadful thing - the truth.

Yaldaboath is a monster spawned by Sophia who fell from the Pleroma," Fat said. "He imagines he's the only god but he's wrong. There's something the matter with him; he can't see. He creates our world but because he's blind he botches the job. The real God sees down from far above and in his pity sets to work to save us. Fragments of light from the Pleroma are—

them. Saw a glimpse of it myself. What would

Listen, Ruth. I saw the fabric of reality split open. I saw—behind. Underneath. I saw what was really there. And I don't want to go back.

I am not free. I never was, but now I know it; and that makes it different.

And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.

this is a different kind of knowing.… It's like understanding, I suppose.…

She watched it calmly, content not to know at first but to know that a meaning was coming, and then it began to clear. She let it dance on until it was certain.

Peter didn't want to change the world: he wanted to fully comprehend it.

Her philosophy, Objectivism, advocates reason, individualism, and personal happiness. Conservatives are more likely to favor faith, tradition, and duty as core values. Politically, Objectivism is classically liberal or libertarian. It expresses a worldview associated with the Enlightenment. Ayn Rand fundamentally rejected the conservative-liberal distinction in culture.

Enlightenment is scary. Sometimes things look better in the dark.