Pema Chödrön Quotes

But when you let things be as they are, you will be a much happier, more balanced, compassionate person.

Resistance to unwanted circumstances has the power to keep those circumstances alive and well for a very long time. -Pema Chödrön

Rather than always trying to get security, you begin to develop an attitude of wanting to step into uncharted territory.

You keep thinking, erroneously, "Well, other people have it together, and if I could just scramble enough, I could avoid all these bad feelings." And the Buddha said no, it's a myth to think that you can get all the pieces to line up so that everything goes your way.

Rather than beating yourself up, use your own stuckness as a stepping stone to understanding what people are up against all over the world.

Finally somebody told the truth. Suffering is part of life,& we don’t have to feel it’s happening because we personally made the wrong move.

We’re afraid that this anger or sorrow or loneliness is going to last forever.... Instead, acting it out is what makes it last.

With our minds we make a big deal out of ourselves, out of our pain, and out of our problems.

The first noble truth of the Buddha is that when we feel suffering, it doesn’t mean that something is wrong. What a relief.

In a nutshell, when life is pleasant, think of others. When life is a burden, think of others.

We give it up and just look directly with compassion and humor at who we are. Then loneliness is no threat and heartache, no punishment.

All ego really is, is our opinions, which we take to be solid, real, and the absolute truth about how things are.

[W]e have a lot of opinions, and we tend to take them as truth. But actually they aren’t truth. They are just our opinions. -Pema Chödrön

Finally, never give up on yourself. Then you will never give up on others. -Pema Chödrön

We can gradually drop our ideals of who we think we ought to be... and just look directly with compassion and humor at who we are.

We can gradually drop our ideals of who we think we ought to be... or who we think other people think we want to be or ought to be.

You’ve been angry, jealous, and lonely. You know what it’s like and you know how sometimes you do strange things.

In the most ordinary terms, egolessness is a flexible identity. It manifests as inquisitiveness, as adaptability, as humor, as playfulness.

[Egolessness is:] not being at all sure about who we are—or who anyone else is either.