Mindfulness: A Practical Guide to Awakening

by Joseph Goldstein

whatever we frequently think of and ponder, that will become the inclination of our minds.

One thing you need to remember and understand is that you cannot leave the mind alone. It needs to be watched constantly. If you do not look after your garden it will overgrow with weeds. If you do not watch your mind, defilements will grow and multiply. The mind does not belong to you, but you are responsible for it.

“One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.

The more loving and patient we are with difficulties and disturbances, the less lost we are in reactivity.

Guilt is simply an ego trip of the mind.

“The sense of a separate self is only a shadow cast by grammar.”

“Things are seen through the lenses of our desires, prejudices, and resentments and are transformed accordingly.

“Thus you should think of this fleeting world: A star at dawn, a bubble in a stream; a flash of lightning in a summer cloud, a flickering lamp, a phantom and a dream.”