One Dharma Quotes

“But after years of practice I’ve come to feel grateful when I observe these unskillful patterns arise, because now I would rather see them than not see them. It becomes another chance to unhook from these patterns, to see their essential transparency, and to let go of the burden they bring.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“If you want to understand your mind, sit down and observe it.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Tulku Urgyen Rinpoche, a great Dzogchen master of the last century, taught, “There is one thing we always need, and that is the watchman named mindfulness, the guard who is on the lookout for when we get carried away in mindlessness.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Although on some level we may see and understand the futility of seeking fulfillment in things that by their nature don’t last, we often still find ourselves living our lives waiting for the next hit of experience, whether it is the next vacation, the next relationship, the next meal, or even the next breath. We lean forward and so stay forever entangled in anticipation. Reflecting on and directly observing impermanence reminds us again and again that all experience is simply part of an endlessly passing show.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“The intent here is not to suppress whatever feelings we may have, but to communicate in a way that fosters connection rather than divisiveness.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“So we begin with a very simple object of attention, like the breath, and train ourselves to return to it even as we get distracted over and over again. This first insight into the habit of distraction leads us to understand the value and importance of steadying our attention, because the worlds we create in ourselves and around us all have their origins in our own minds. How many different mind-worlds do we inhabit in our thoughts, even between one breath and the next? And how many actions do we take because of these unnoticed thoughts? By first taking a particular object of concentration and then training the mind to stay focused on it, we can develop calmness and tranquillity. The object may be the breath, a sound or mantra, a visual image, or certain reflections, all of which serve to concentrate the mind. At first, this requires the effort of continually returning each time the mind wanders off. With practice, though, the mind becomes trained, and then rests quite easily in the chosen object. In addition to the feelings of restfulness and peace, the state of concentration also becomes the basis for deepening insight and wisdom. We find ourselves opening to the world’s suffering as well as to its great beauty. Through the power of increased awareness, simple experience often becomes magically alive: the silhouette of a branch against the night sky or trees swaying in the invisible wind. The way that we sense the world becomes purified, our perception of the world transformed. Marcel Proust wrote, “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeing new landscapes but in having new eyes.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Meditation begins with calming the mind and collecting the attention. The importance of this is revealed at the very beginning of our practice—it is often the first insight we gain when we begin to practice meditation. We see for ourselves how difficult the mind is to control. The mind is so slippery. We feel a breath or two, and then the mind wanders. We become seduced or distracted by thoughts, plans, and memories—sometimes not even pleasant ones. We often relive old arguments or hurts. We hop on a train of association not knowing that we’ve hopped on and having no idea where the train is going. Somewhere down the line we wake up from the dream of our thoughts, often in a completely different mental environment. Perhaps we have become entangled in some drama, some strong emotion, contracted in a strong sense of self, of ego. And all the time it is just the play of our minds.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Merit” is the usual translation of the Pali word punna, which more literally means “virtue” or that which purifies and cleanses the life stream, bringing good results.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Actions for the good accumulate what is called “merit”—one of the most commonly misunderstood concepts in Buddhism.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Another aspect of wrong view that we will discuss in much greater detail in later chapters is the deeply conditioned sense of “I,” of self. On the relative level, of course, we move and speak and act as individuals, as selves. Yet on a deeper level, and with close attention, we can see through this appearance and experience the place of nonseparation from others and from the world. This is the realization of selflessness.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Covetousness keeps the mind agitated and unhappy, far from the peace of contentment.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“The heart qualities of faith, confidence, and trust are actual powers we can cultivate. In Buddhist texts they are likened to a magical gem that settles impurities in water. Faith in the possibility of awakening, confidence in the moment’s experience and in the nature of awareness itself, trust in the direction of our lives—all of these settle doubt, confusion, and agitation. They create an inner environment of clarity, stillness, and beauty.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“In the moment that we awaken from being lost in a thought or feeling or reaction, in that very moment we can recognize the empty, clear, skylike nature of awareness itself. In that moment of wakefulness, we get a glimpse of freedom. And instead of judging ourselves for all the times we do get lost, which happen again and again, we can delight in each moment of awakening.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“The last of these wholesome actions is meditation, the development of tranquillity and insight.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“I had a powerful personal experience of this truth. A few weeks before the end of my Peace Corps time in Thailand, I was sitting quietly in a friend’s garden listening to him read from a Tibetan text called, in that early translation, The Tibetan Book of the Great Liberation. My mind had become quite concentrated and at one point, when the text was speaking of the “unborn nature of the mind,” there was a sudden and spontaneous experience of the mind opening … to zero. This momentary opening to the “unmanifest,” a reality beyond the ordinary mind and body, had the force of a lightning bolt shattering the solidified illusion of self. Immediately following this, a phrase kept repeating in my mind, “There’s no me, there’s no me.” This experience radically changed my understanding of things. Of course, since then, feelings or thoughts of “me,” of a sense of self, have arisen many times, but, still, the deep knowing remains that even the sense of self is selfless—that it’s just another thought.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“No one can practice for us. The Buddhas just point the way.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“The last of the ten unwholesome actions is wrong view, basic misperceptions that become the cause of difficulty and suffering in our lives.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“In our own culture, we might call it “catalogue consciousness,” obsessively rifling through the pages to see what else we might want. It’s “wanting to want,” and it’s a disease our culture keeps nourishing.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Backbiting and gossip are the third type of unskillful speech. Words of this nature cause disharmony and the loss of friends.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“The second kind of unwholesome speech is the use of harsh, angry, or aggressive language.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“The second unwholesome action to avoid is stealing—taking that which doesn’t belong to us.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“There are ten actions—three of body, four of speech, and three of mind—that plant the seeds of our own future suffering.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“The entire spiritual journey rests on the morality of nonharming. This is the expression of the love and care we feel both for others and for ourselves.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Do no harm, act for the good, purify the mind.” The flowering of all the great traditions of Buddhism derives from the teachings in this one simple verse.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“No longer do we look outside of ourselves for solutions. We have seen where the path lies. All we require are the skillful means that will help us walk it.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“But in their deeper meaning, these refuges always point back to our own actions and mind states. Although there may be many false starts and dead ends as we begin our journey, if our interest is sincere, we soon make a life-changing discovery: what we are seeking is within us.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation) there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, the Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no one could have dreamed would have come his way. I have learned a deep respect for one of Goethe’s couplets: Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Impermanence is also seen in the fact that the end of meeting is separation. Our meetings with each other are like mingling in a dream. Yet we often become so intensely entangled in our relationships that separation of one kind or another becomes the source of overwhelming sorrow. The Buddha gave a striking example of this when he said that in the course of countless lifetimes each one of us has shed more tears over the death of loved ones than all of the water in the great oceans. Although feelings of loss and sorrow are natural for most of us, still, the more we contemplate and accept the truth that all meetings will end in separation, the less likely we will be to drown in those waters.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“Liberating insight arises both from a deep and clear observation of impermanence on momentary levels and from a wise consideration of what we already know. As a way of practicing this observation, the next time you take a walk, pay attention to the movements of your body and to things you see and hear and think. Notice what happens to all these experiences as you continue on your way. What happens to them? Where are they? When we look, we see everything continually disappearing and new things arising—not only each day or each hour, but in every moment. The truth of this is so ordinary that we have mostly stopped paying attention to it. By not paying attention, we miss the every-day, every-moment opportunity to see directly, and deeply, the changing nature of our lives. We miss the opportunity to practice the “letting-go mind.” “If you let go a little, you will have a little peace. If you let go a lot, you will have a lot of peace. If you let go completely, you will have complete peace. Your struggles with the world will have come to an end.” In addition to noticing the moment-to-moment nature of change, careful reflections on three obvious and universal aspects of impermanence can also jolt us out of the complacency of our deeply rooted habits and patterns.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism

“and the liberating insight into how suffering in our lives is born from ignorance and ends through wisdom.”
― Joseph Goldstein, One Dharma: The Emerging Western Buddhism