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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Haemin Sunim
Read between
October 9 - October 14, 2023
Imagine that a strong negative emotion is like mud swirling inside a fish tank. To get the mud to sink to the bottom of the tank so you can have a clear view of the fish, the last thing you want to do is submerge your hands in the muddy water and try to push the mud to the bottom. The more you try to push it down, the more you churn it up.
As you get better at it, you will realize that the negative emotion is not a fixed reality.
When you attack someone, it is often because you are afraid.
If I had to summarize the entirety of most people’s lives in a few words, it would be endless resistance to what is. As we resist, we are in constant motion trying to adjust, and yet we still remain unhappy about what is.
When you cannot control even your own mind, what makes you think you can control others?
Remember that you are neither your feelings nor the story your mind tells about you to make sense of them. You are the vast silence that knows of their emergence and their disappearance.
But just because it appears effortless does not mean that no effort was made.
She plays her role but never forgets it is a performance.
Life is like theater. You are assigned a role. If you don’t like the role, keep in mind that you have the power to re-create the role you want.
I ended up speaking passionately about the incredible rarity of what is called “karmic affinity” in Buddhism. I told the students that, according to Buddhist teachings, our gathering there that day was not the product of mere chance, but the result of our having met over countless lifetimes.
No matter how effective the medicine may be, if you demand that someone take it, it can taste like poison.
A person does not live the way he says he would. He lives the way he has been living.
Everyone is kind to someone they meet for the first time. The question is how long their kindness lasts.
If we think, “I’ll just do it this way for now and fix it later,” it usually does not happen, because later we may not have the motivation to fix it, or we just get used to the way it is. It is like moving into a house and deciding to fix it up over time. Even after many years, we never get around to fixing it up. We end up just living with the way things are for a long time.
When you are making a decision, try to assess how many people it will benefit. If it satisfies only your ego and unnecessarily hurts many, then it is the wrong decision.
Some people are generous and kind to those outside their circle while neglecting the needs of those within it. It is a mistake to take family and close colleagues for granted. When those closest to you feel ignored and betrayed, everything you have built can collapse in an instant.
Isn’t it better to be happy together than to be right alone?
Being right isn’t nearly as important as being happy together.
When you hear something that makes your blood boil, don’t shoot off a text or an e-mail right away. A wise person sleeps on it.
When you ask a question and there is no response, then that is the answer.
If you want to truly succeed, don’t use anyone else’s yardstick.
After mastering eighteen levels of kung fu, you can hurt someone with the flick of a finger. But if you go on to master all thirty-six levels, you choose to retreat when the weak foolishly come to fight.
From this experience I realized that the art of maintaining a good relationship can be compared to sitting by a fireplace. If we sit too close for too long, we become hot and possibly burned. If we sit too far away, we cannot feel the warmth.
The end of a sushi roll, with the filling sticking out, is often tastier than a piece sliced neatly from the middle. Someone slick and well-put-together can come across as cold and alienating, while an average guy without pretense is more genuine and attractive.
The noise from a motorcycle assaults the driver more than anyone. The driver has only himself to blame when he is old and can’t hear anything.
Why can’t you trust that friend? Because you know all too well that you, too, are capable of lying in a similar circumstance.
For even as love crowns you, so shall he crucify you.
Love will come when it wants to. Love will leave when you ask more of it.
The heart is slower than the mind. The mind knows you must part ways, but your heart does not. This is because your feelings are settled deeper in your heart. When one day, after many days of disappointment, your partner deals the final blow, the light finally dims in your heart.
Apparently most people are unable to tell the difference between a $15 bottle of wine and a $50 bottle. The extra $35 is the price of our vanity.
A cruel irony: The reward for someone who works hard is more work.
There is no such thing as being completely prepared. Life is an adventure, through which we learn and mature. Of course, we must consider all our options carefully. But if we wait for 100 percent certainty, then it is often too late.
If Jesus, Buddha, and Confucius were all alive and gathered in the same place, would they argue over who is right? Or would they respect and admire one another’s teachings? Religious conflict can often be blamed not on the founders of religions but on their fanatical followers.
Medicine can be prescribed, but it must be you who takes it.
