Al Owski > Recent Status Updates

“The fourth aspect of Right Speech is to refrain from speech that's violent, condemning, abusive, humiliating. accusing, or judgmental.”

“The third kind of incorrect speech is what we call in Vietnamese "forked tongue" or "double tongue." It means you say something to one person, but when speaking about the same matter to another person you say something different as a way of gaining some advantage.”

“The second part of Right Speech is to refrain from inventing and exaggerating. You want to speak about some little thing, but you exaggerate and make it very big. For ex ample, someone has made a mistake, but you exaggerate as though it's something many times worse.”

“The truth is a solid base for a long-lasting relationship. If you don't build your relationship on the truth, sooner or later it will crumble. We have to find the best way to tell the truth so that the other person can receive it easily. Sometimes even the most skillful words can cause pain. That is okay. Pain can heal. If your words are spoken with compassion and understanding, the pain will heal more quickly.”

“Lying is dangerous, because one day the other person may find out the truth. That could be a catastrophe. So if we don't want to lie, and we don't want to trigger a hurt we have to be mindful of our words and find a skillful means to tell the truth.”

“The first element of Right Speech is to tell the truth. We don't lie. We try not to say untruthful things. If we think the truth is too shocking, we find a skillful and loving way to tell the truth. But we have to respect the truth.”

“And from the ends of the earth, across thousands of miles of land and sea, kindly, well-meaning speakers tried to voice their fellow-feeling, and indeed did so, but at the same time proved the utter incapacity of every man truly to share in suffering which he cannot see.”

“But again and again there comes a time in history when the man who dares to say that two and two make four is punished with death.”

“The evil that is in the world always comes of ignorance, and good intentions may do as much harm as malevolence, if they lack understanding. On the whole men are more good than bad; ... But they are more or less ignorant, and it is this that we call vice or virtue; the most incorrigible vice being that of an ignorance which fancies it knows everything and therefore claims for itself the right to kill.”

“Who taught you all this, doctor?' The reply came promptly. 'Suffering.' ”

“Paneloux is a man of learning, a scholar. He hasn't come in contact with death; that's why he can speak with such assurance of the truth — with a capital T. But every country priest who visits his parishioners, and has heard a man gasping for breath on his death-bed, thinks as I do. He'd try to relieve human suffering before trying to point out its excellence.'

“Because you have first practiced compassionate listening, you know that what you say can carry with it insight and understanding. With more understanding, you can really help the other person suffer less, and your communication is more effective. You speak gently because you are willing to help. The way we communicate already makes the other person feel much better.”

“When you speak, you try to tell others the truth about your suffering and their suffering, this is loving speech. You speak in a way that helps others recognize the suffering inside themselves and in you. We have to be skillful. The one who speaks has to be very mindful, using words in a way that can help the listener not be caught in wrong perceptions.”

“With mindful breathing and listening to ourselves, our capacity for listening and looking expands deeply, and we may find the opportunity for much greater communication and connection with our parents and our loved ones.”

“If you wait until family members pass away, it will be too late to ask them to share more about themselves. It's nice when a child of any age sits with a parent and asks about their experiences, sufferings, and sources of happiness. Just sit and listen.”

“Listening and looking with mindfulness and concentration, we may discover that there's a block of suffering in that person. We see that she has suffered so much and doesn't know how to handle the suffering inside. So she continues to suffer and make other people suffer, too. Once you have seen that, suddenly your anger is no longer there. Compassion arises.”

“Waiting has serious consequences. People may isolate themselves, they may suddenly end a friendship or relationship, and they may even commit suicide. Something had been bothering that person for a long time, but he or she pretended that everything was okay. Maybe fear or pride gets in the way.”

“If you want to make someone happy, you should ask yourself the question "Do I understand him enough?" "Do I understand her enough?" Many people are reluctant to talk because they fear that what they say will be misunderstood. There are people who suffer so much; they're not capable of telling us about the suffering inside. And we have the impression that nothing is wrong-until it's too late.”

“As long as compassion is present, you can listen with equanimity.”

“After we have deeply listened and allowed the other person to express everything in his heart, we'll have a chance later on to give him a little of the information he needs to correct his perception—but not now. Now we just listen, even if the person says things that are wrong. It's the practice of mindfulness of compassion that keeps us listening deeply.”

“Then, when we are ready to listen deeply, we can listen without interrupting. If we try to interrupt or correct the other person, we will transform the session into a debate and it will ruin everything.”

“If we can keep our compassion alive, the seeds of anger and judgment in our hearts will not be watered and spring up. We have to train ourselves first so we're able to listen to the other person.”

“The other person may say things that are full of wrong perceptions, bitterness, accusation, and blaming. If we don't practice mindfulness, their words will set off irritation, judgment, and anger in us, and we will lose our capacity to listen compassionately.”

“If you can listen for thirty minutes with compassion, you can help the other person suffer much less. If you don't practice mindfulness of compassion, you can't listen long. Mindfulness of compassion means you listen with only one intention—to help the other person suffer less.”

“When we listen to someone with the intention of helping that person suffer less, this is deep listening. When we listen with compassion, we don't get caught in judgment. A judgment may form, but we don't hold on to it. Deep listening has the power to help us create a moment of joy, a moment of happiness, and to help us handle a painful emotion.”

“We all want to be understood. When we interact with another person, particularly if we haven't practiced mindfulness of our own suffering and listened well to our own selves, we're anxious for others to understand us right away. We want to begin by expressing ourselves. But talking first like that doesn't usually work. Deep listening needs to come first.”

“There are two keys to effective and true communication. The first is deep listening. The second is loving speech. Deep listening and loving speech are the best instruments I know for establishing and restoring communication with others and relieving suffering.”

“It's helpful to remember at the beginning of every communication with another person that there is a Buddha inside each of us. "The Buddha" is just a name for the most understanding and compassionate person it's possi. ble to be. You may call it something else if you wish, like wisdom or God. We can breathe, smile, and walk in such a way that this person in us has a chance to manifest.”

“As you connect with yourself, you begin connecting more deeply with other people. Without the first step, the second step isn't possible. Don't neglect to reserve some time alone each day for communicating with yourself.”

“Coming home to ourselves to understand our suffering and its roots is the first step. Once we understand our suffering and how it came about, we're in a position to communicate with others in such a way that they also suffer less. Our relationships depend on the capacity of each of us to understand our own difficulties and aspirations and those of others.”