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“There is something unborn, unbecome, not made and not compounded. If there were not, there would be no means of escape from what is born, become, made, and compounded.”
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I – I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.
If you meditate earnestly, through spiritual disciplines you can make an island for yourself that no flood can overwhelm.
31 The earnest spiritual aspirant, fearing sloth, advances like a fire, burning all fetters. 32 Such seekers will never fall back: they are nearing nirvana.
The mind, he suggests, has a depth far greater than the deepest sea, and all the way down it churns with emotional tempests of which we are barely conscious, but which virtually dictate thought and behavior.
Remember, this body is like a fragile clay pot. Make your mind a fortress and conquer Mara with the weapon of wisdom. Guard your conquest always.
Remember that this body will soon lie in the earth without life, without value, useless as a burned log.
Remembering that this body is like froth, of the nature of a mirage, break the flower-tipped arrows of Mara. Never again will death touch you.
In a world whose survival is in doubt from day to day, those who have conquered the passions that wreck relationships and precipitate wars serve their fellow creatures ceaselessly in a way that no one else can, and in a way that will not end with death. That fact transcends any philosophical difference between the arhant and the bodhisattva.
Like the flight of birds in the sky, the path of the selfless is hard to follow. They have no possessions, but live on alms in a world of freedom. 93 Like the flight of birds in the sky, their path is hard to follow. With their senses under control, temperate in eating, they know the meaning of freedom.
Better than a speech of a thousand vain words is one thoughtful word which brings peace to the mind. 101 Better than a poem of a thousand vain verses is one thoughtful line which brings peace to the mind. 102 Better than a hundred poems of vain stanzas is one word of the dharma that brings peace to the mind.
103 One who conquers himself is greater than another who conquers a thousand times a thousand men on the battlefield. 104–105 Be victorious over yourself and not over others. When you attain victory over yourself, not even the gods can turn it into defeat.
114 One day’s glimpse of the deathless state is better than a hundred years of life without it.
The Buddha expresses enlightenment not as a meeting with God or an immersion in bliss, but as the disassembling of the conditioned personality and the exhilaration that comes with perfect freedom. Through his own effort he has undone the force that has conditioned his entire making, from the smallest unicellular organism at the dawn of evolution to the wonder of the individual that was Prince Siddhartha. Bursting through to the Unconditioned, he has destroyed craving; never again can he be compelled by karma to return to life as a separate creature.
I have gone through many rounds of birth and death, looking in vain for the builder of this body. Heavy indeed is birth and death again and again! 154 But now I have seen you, housebuilder; you shall not build this house again. Its beams are broken; its dome is shattered: self-will is extinguished; nirvana is attained.
“Hatred never ceases through hatred, only through love,”
Ehi passika: go and see for yourself, through the practice of meditation.”
277 All created things are transitory; those who realize this are freed from suffering. This is the path that leads to pure wisdom. 278 All created beings are involved in sorrow; those who realize this are freed from suffering. This is the path that leads to pure wisdom. 279 All states are without self; those who realize this are freed from suffering. This is the path that leads to pure wisdom.
It is hard to leave the world and hard to live in it, painful to live with the worldly and painful to be a wanderer. Reach the goal; you will wander and suffer no more.
Sitting alone, sleeping alone, going about alone, vanquish the ego by yourself alone. Abiding joy will be yours when all selfish desires end.
Some, if they manage to come out of one forest of cravings, are driven into another. Though free, they run into bondage again.
That one I call a brahmin who is never angry, never causes harm to others even when harmed by them.
Like Jesus?
The cited quote is about the plane of consciousness that one could get enlightened by letting go of what is …