Insight Meditation Quotes

“The wonderful paradox about the truth of suffering is that the more we open to it and understand it, the lighter and freer our mind becomes. Our mind becomes more spacious, more open, and happier as we move past our avoidance and denial to see what is true. We become less driven by compulsive desires and addictions, because we see clearly the nature of things as they are.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Every time we become aware of a thought, as opposed to being lost in a thought, we experience that opening of the mind.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Imagine holding on to a hot burning coal. You would not fear letting go of it. In fact, once you noticed that you were holding on, you would probably drop it quickly. But we often do not recognize how we hold on to suffering. It seems to hold on to us. This is our practice: becoming aware of how suffering arises in our mind and of how we become identified with it, and learning to let it go. We learn through simple and direct observation, seeing the process over and over again until we understand.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“In Buddhist psychology “conceit” has a special meaning: that activity of the mind that compares itself with others. When we think about ourselves as better than, equal to, or worse than someone else, we are giving expression to conceit. This comparing mind is called conceit because all forms of it—whether it is “I’m better than” or “I’m worse than,” or “I’m just the same as”—come from the hallucination that there is a self; they all refer back to a feeling of self, of “I am.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“True humility is the absence of anyone to be proud.” Humility is not a stance; it is simply the absence of self. In the same way, relationship is the absence of separation, and it can be felt with each breath, each sensation, each thought, each cloud in the sky, each person that we meet. “And being nothing, you are everything. That is all.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Our progress in meditation does not depend on the measure of pleasure or pain in our experience. Rather, the quality of our practice has to do with how open we are to whatever is there.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Generosity, love, compassion, or devotion do not depend on a high IQ.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Most people believe that we are the thoughts that come through our mind. I hope not, because if we are, we are in big trouble! Those thoughts coming through have clearly been conditioned by something: by different events in our childhood, our environment, our past lives, or even some occurrence that has happened two minutes before.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“An emotion is like a cloud passing through the sky. Sometimes it is fear or anger, sometimes it is happiness or love, sometimes it is compassion. But none of them ultimately constitute a self. They are just what they are, each manifesting its own quality. With this understanding, we can cultivate the emotions that seem helpful and simply let the others be, without aversion, without suppression, without identification.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“If we try to practice meditation without the foundation of goodwill to ourselves and others, it is like trying to row across a river without first untying the boat; our efforts, no matter how strenuous, will not bear fruit. We need to practice and refine our ability to live honestly and with integrity.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Unless a practice cools the fires of greed, aversion, and ignorance it is worthless.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“I have no parents I make the heavens and earth my parents I have no home I make awareness my home I have no life or death I make the tides of breathing my life and death I have no divine power I make honesty my divine power I have no friends I make my mind my friend I have no enemy I make carelessness my enemy I have no armor I make benevolence my armor I have no castle I make immovable-mind my castle I have no sword I make absence of self my sword.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Our mind becomes more spacious, more open, and happier as we move past our avoidance and denial to see what is true.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“We all know people who become strongly identified with, and attached to, their intelligence. It can become a big ego trap, harmful to oneself or others. Intelligence can also be a great blessing, providing invaluable clarity.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Mindfulness, the Root of Happiness”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“The emphasis in meditation is very much on undistracted awareness: not thinking about things, not analyzing, not getting lost in the story, but just seeing the nature of what is happening in the mind. Careful, accurate observation of the moment’s reality is the key to the whole process.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“We often mistakenly assume that because someone has genuine understanding in one particular area, this mastery necessarily extends to all other areas of life. That may or may not be true.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Having been through both of those other stages, our mind matures to a place where it is no longer moved: it does not grasp at pleasant things; it is not repelled by unpleasant things. Our mind attains deep, deep balance, like a calm, deep-flowing river. Out of this mature place of equanimity, the conditions arise that open our mind suddenly to the unconditioned, to what is beyond body and mind, to freedom.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Is enlightenment gradual or is it sudden? Whole schools of Buddhism have grown up around this issue. But it has always seemed to me that liberation is both sudden and gradual, that there is no polarity between the two.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“In meditation practice, we build the energy of awareness until it grows powerful enough to see entirely different levels of reality.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Understanding “no-self” does not come from destroying something we call “self” or “ego.” The great awakening or discovery of the Buddha revealed that there was no self, no permanent I, to begin with. So if there is nothing we have to get rid of, then understanding selflessness very simply comes from careful awareness of what actually is happening moment to moment.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“When we are with people and feeling bored, can we listen a little more carefully, stepping off the train of our own inner commenting? If we are sitting in meditation and feeling uninterested, can we come in closer to the object, not with force but with gentleness and care? What is this experience we call the breath? If someone were holding your head under water, would the breath be boring? Each breath is actually sustaining our life. Can we be with it fully, just once?”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Wisdom is the clear seeing of the impermanent, conditioned nature of all phenomena, knowing that whatever arises has the nature to cease. When we see this impermanence deeply, we no longer cling; and when we no longer cling, we come to the end of suffering.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“We establish some stability and focus in our mind and see which elements in it lead to greater peace, which to greater suffering. All of it—both the peace and the suffering—happens lawfully. Freedom lies in the wisdom to choose.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“And just as a path that goes to a mountain does not cause the mountain, the path of practice leads us to this highest freedom, but does not cause it.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“The perception of solidity also comes from observing things from a distance. When we look at an ordinary object like a chair or a table, it appears quite solid. Yet if we put that same object under a powerful microscope, whole new worlds emerge. When we look at trees from a distance, we just see an undifferentiated mass of color. But as we get closer, we can distinguish individual leaves, and even the small distinct parts of the leaves.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Why do we have this perception of solidity? Why is it so deeply conditioned as our view of reality? This hallucination of perception arises from the great rapidity of changing phenomena. When we go to the movies we cannot see the separate frames of film. They move too quickly to be noticed, and so we remain in the illusion of appearances, overlooking the reality of how the magic works. Of course, in a movie theater that is the whole idea; we go specifically for the illusion. However, when we overlook the reality of our life, it has more serious and far-reaching consequences.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“The meditative journey is not about always feeling good. Many times we may feel terrible. That’s fine. What we want is to open to the entire range of what this mind and body are about. Sometimes we feel wonderful and happy and inspired, and at other times we deeply feel different aspects of suffering.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“Not Seeing Dukkha Is Dukkha”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom

“In the second training, we develop energy, concentration, and mindfulness. These are the meditative and life tools that enable us to awaken. Without them we simply act out the patterns of our conditioning.”
― Joseph Goldstein, Insight Meditation: The Practice of Freedom