How We Live Is How We Die Quotes

“When the appearances of this life dissolve, May I, with ease and great happiness, Let go of all attachments to this life As a son or daughter returning home.”
― Pema Chödrön, How We Live Is How We Die

“We can only stand in the shoes of others to the degree that we can stand in our own.”
― Pema Chödrön, How We Live Is How We Die

“it’s helpful to remember three words: embodied, present, and kind. Drop into your body, bring your attention to where you are right now, and be kind.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“One simple method for doing this I call the pause practice. You just stop whatever you’re doing and look out. You could do this almost any time. You’re walking around or washing dishes, and then you pause and look out. The pause interrupts the momentum of being completely caught up in thoughts.”
― Pema Chödrön, How We Live Is How We Die

“Habituating ourselves a little every day to the basic groundlessness of life will pay large dividends at the end of life. Somehow, despite its ongoing presence in our lives, we're still not used to continual change. The uncertainty that accompanies every day and every moment of our lives is still an unfamiliar presence. As we contemplate these teachings and pay attention to the constant, unpredictable flow of our experience, we just might start to feel more relaxed with how things are. If we can bring this relaxation to our deathbed, we will be ready for whatever may happen next.”
― Pema Chödrön, How We Live Is How We Die

“dharmata”
― Pema Chödrön, How We Live Is How We Die

“However, as Thich Nhat Hanh says, “It’s not impermanence that makes us suffer. What makes us suffer is wanting things to be permanent when they are not.” We can continue to resist reality, or we can learn to frame things in a new way, seeing our life as dynamic and vibrant, an amazing adventure. Then we will truly be in contact with the freshness of each moment, whether we think our lover is perfect or not. If we can embrace continual change in this way, we’ll start to notice the hum of anxiety quieting down and slowly, slowly fading away.”
― Pema Chödrön, How We Live Is How We Die

“Like a shooting star, a visual fault, a candle flame, an illusion, a dewdrop, a water bubble, a dream, lightning, a cloud: regard conditioned dharmas like that.”
― Pema Chödrön, How We Live Is How We Die

“This precious human birth, so free and well favored, bless me that I reach its full meaning. The time of death is uncertain. Bless me that I have no regrets. —Prayer to Machik Labdrön, Karma Chagmé”
― Pema Chödrön, How We Live Is How We Die

“Whatever is happening, stay there—right with what you’re feeling. Slow down and pay attention. Develop the capacity to stay in those uncomfortable, edgy places of uncertainty, vulnerability, and insecurity.”
― Pema Chödrön, How We Live Is How We Die

“In life we have a choice of either living in our usual unaware way—lost in our thoughts, run around by our emotions—or waking up and experiencing everything freshly, as if for the very first time. We also have the choice of relating bravely to the underlying groundlessness of our situation rather than trying to avoid it. It is said that this all-pervasive groundlessness has three aspects: uncertainty, vulnerability, and insecurity.”
― Pema Chödrön, How We Live Is How We Die

“The present situation is important. That’s the whole point, the important point.”
― Pema Chödrön, How We Live Is How We Die

“one of the main purposes of meditation: to slow down enough to notice there are always gaps in our dense, thought-filled experience—and to become familiar with these gaps as glimpses of the unfabricated, nonconceptual nature of mind.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“How we live is how we die. For me, this is the most fundamental message of the bardo teachings. How we deal with smaller changes now is a sign of how we’ll deal with bigger changes later. How we relate to things falling apart right now foreshadows how we’ll relate to things falling apart when we die.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“However, as Thich Nhat Hanh says, “It’s not impermanence that makes us suffer. What makes us suffer is wanting things to be permanent when they are not.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“The ego feels at home only when it’s meddling, trying to fix things. It’s always telling us that we can’t leave anything alone.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“Confusion is based on having a frozen view of ourselves and the world. It’s a product of our discomfort with the groundless nature of how things are—the cosmic mirror–ness of how things are. Most of us experience that wide-open space as groundlessness.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“The Buddha taught that wherever there’s confusion, there’s also wisdom: “co-emergent wisdom.” Whenever we get hooked, whenever our kleshas get triggered, whenever we temporarily lose our bearings and act out in destructive ways, we are in the grip of confusion. But that very confusion is inseparable from our deepest wisdom.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“To the degree that we can feel what we feel, to that degree we will be able to know firsthand what others feel.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“By contemplating our sameness with others, we may begin to question the illusion of separateness.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“So when we feel the tug of craving, the burn of anger, the checked-out quality of ignorance, instead of resenting these emotions, we can appreciate them for giving us insight into the experience of others. They can help us develop empathy with all humanity.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“We use our thoughts intentionally to give the kleshas a positive direction. We do this by using the pain of our emotions—that very intensity we usually avoid—to connect with others.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“The kleshas are an inevitable result of the illusion of separateness.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“It’s the first method we need because, when we perpetuate our storylines or act out, we don’t have the mental space to apply the other two practices: transforming the emotions and using them as a direct path of awakening.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“My brother used to tell me, “Whenever you are hungry, angry, lonely, or tired, H-A-L-T.” That’s an instruction on refraining. Instead of barreling ahead and reverting to old patterns of blaming or judging or otherwise avoiding what we’re feeling, we allow space. We halt. We slow down the reactivity.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“But if, on the other hand, we allow a mindful gap, we won’t react in the usual way and we can allow the experience simply to pass through us.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“Having a regular meditation practice makes us more aware of what’s happening in our mind, the mental undercurrent that tends to go unnoticed when we’re caught up in our daily activities and interactions. With meditation, we begin to catch some of the ember-like thoughts and subtle emotions that, left undetected, escalate before we notice them.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“us to change our habits. In general, lack of awareness is what gives our emotions their power. Bringing awareness to them is the magic key. When we’re aware of what’s happening, they lose their ability to make us miserable.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“Then I heard a talk by Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche in which he used the phrase “the propensity to be bothered,” and”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die

“How does it feel? Is it tight or loose, contracted or expansive? Does it have a temperature, a color, a special quality? If you investigate the unpleasant feeling of jealousy with mindfulness and gentleness, you will learn much about it. You will see your history with it. You will start to notice patterns. You will see that this feeling often arises in your life, and that you tend to make a mess when it does. This could be the beginning of your taking care of the propensity.”
― Pema Chodron, How We Live Is How We Die