Quotes About Impermanence

What is more melancholy and more profound than to see a thousand objects for the first and the last time? To travel is to be born and to die at every instant...

We did not come to remain whole. We came to lose our leaves like the trees, Trees that start again.

Break open A cherry tree And there are no flowers; But the spring breeze Brings forth myriad blossoms.

Nothing endures. Not a tree. Not love. Not even death by violence.

All things such as grass and trees are soft and supple in life. At their death they are withered and dry.

Who then to frail mortality shall trust But limns the water, or but writes in dust.

You forget about all those things—you're just dominated by the vanishing-ness of things. It's just Gone, Gone, Gone. That, once again, leads to a figure-ground reversal. You are about to become Gone. Good, go with that.

I learned that impermanence is not merely something that you experience in your sensory circuits. It also informs your motor circuits. It's a kind of effortless energy that you can "ride on" in daily life. It imparts a bounce to your step, a flow to your voice, and a vibrancy to your creative thought. I also learned about the expansion-contraction paradigm for how consciousness works.

What we call 'I' is just a swinging door, which moves when we inhale and when we exhale.

Without accepting the fact that everything changes, we cannot find perfect composure. But unfortunately, although it is true, it is difficult for us to accept it. Because we cannot accept the truth of transience, we suffer.

Now it is raining, but we don't know what will happen in the next moment. By the time we go out it may be a beautiful day, or a stormy day. Since we don't know, let's appreciate the sound of the rain now.

We must have beginner's mind, free from possessing anything, a mind that knows everything is in flowing change. Nothing exists but momentarily in its present form and color. One thing flows into another and cannot be grasped. Before the rain stops we hear a bird. Even under the heavy snow we see snowdrops and some new growth. In the East I saw rhubarb already. In Japan in the spring we eat cucumbers.

When we realize the everlasting truth of "everything changes" and find our composure in it, we find ourselves in Nirvana.

To live in the realm of Buddha nature means to die as a small being, moment after moment.

Everything changes. There is nothing to stick to. That is the Buddha's most important teaching.

NIRVANA, THE WATERFALL "Our life and death are the same thing. When we realize this fact, we have no fear of death anymore, nor actual difficulty in our life.

After some years we will die. If we just think that it is the end of our life, this will be the wrong understanding. But, on the other hand, if we think that we do not die, this is also wrong. We die, and we do not die. This is the right understanding.

Knowing that your life is short, to enjoy it day after day, moment after moment, is the life of "form is form and emptiness is emptiness.

We should find perfect existence through imperfect existence. The basic teaching of Buddhism is the teaching of transiency, change. That everything changes is the basic truth of each existence. When we realize the everlasting truth of "everything changes" and find our composure in it, we find ourselves in Nirvana.

TRANSIENCY    ââ'¬Å"We should find perfect existence through imperfect existence.

You and I are just swinging doors.

Nothing lasts forever.

If there's one thing I learned, it's that nobody is here forever. You have to live for the moment, each and every day . . . the here, the now." "And

that 'now' you're talking about hardly exists. We feel it, but it's impossible to measure. The past is always eating up the present." I stroked his hair and paused. "I think I've always loved paintings for that reason. Somebody makes a canvas in time, but after it's made, a painting stays in the present.