Your favorite quotes.

General forum on the teachings of all schools of Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism. Topics specific to one school are best posted in the appropriate sub-forum.
Simon E.
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by Simon E. »

Reporter to Salvador Dali,
"Signor Dali how would you compare yourself to Picasso ? "
Dali,
" Picasso is Catalan.. and so is Dali. Picasso is genius... and so is Dali. Picasso is communist... and neither is Dali. "

:namaste:
“You don’t know it. You just know about it. That is not the same thing.”

Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche to me.
muni
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by muni »

"Learn to look without imagination, to listen without distortion: that is all. Stop attributing names and shapes to the essentially nameless and formless, realize that every mode of perception is subjective, that what is seen or heard, touched or smelled, felt or thought,expected or imagined, is in the mind and not in reality, and you will experience peace and freedom from fear." - Nisargadatta Maharaj
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Ogyen
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by Ogyen »

I teach the sort of doctrine where one does not quarrel with anyone in the cosmos, with its deities, demons, and universal spirits, with its contemplatives and priests, its hierarchies and common folk.

That is the end of taking up rods and bladed weapons, of arguments, quarrels, disputes, accusations, divisive tale-bearing and false speech. That is where these evil, unskillful things cease without remainder.

—Buddha Shakyamuni, Madhupindika Sutra
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The Heart Drive - nosce te ipsum

"To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never, to forget." –Arundhati Roy
muni
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by muni »

"The bad news is you’re falling through the air, nothing to hang on to, no parachute. The good news is there’s no ground." — Trungpa Rinpoche

Thoughts.
Huseng
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by Huseng »

Leaving the patron, Buddha,
And bowing to other gods,
Is like a fool who comes to the bank of the Ganges
And being thirsty digs a well.

-Nagarjuna
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Ikkyu
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by Ikkyu »

A poem from Hanshan, also known as Cold Mountain, a Ch'an monk who studied Taoism alongside Buddhism and wrote on the themes of transience and natural beauty:

Do I have a body? Or have I none?
Am I who I am? Or am I not?
Pondering these questions, I sit
Leaning against the cliff while the years go by
And the green grass grows up between my feet
And the red dust settles on my head
Then men of the world come and thinking me dead
Bring offerings of wine and fruit


-- Hanshan

I also enjoy this stanza from the "Principia Discordia":

Bullshit makes
the flowers grow
and that's beautiful
"Nothing can be known, not even this."
-- Arcesilaus (but I'm not sure)

(cutting through bullshit, and sometimes failing... that's ok, though)

http://thegrandtangent.com
muni
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by muni »

“For things to reveal themselves to us, we need to be ready to abandon our views about them.”

Thich Nhat Hanh.
White Lotus
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by White Lotus »

''enlightenment is nought to be attained'' bodhidharma.

''enlightenment is nothing at all'' mango.

''its not mind, its not buddha, its not nature.'' koan (see 'wu men kuan').
in any matters of importance. dont rely on me. i may not know what i am talking about. take what i say as mere speculation. i am not ordained. nor do i have a formal training. i do believe though that if i am wrong on any point. there are those on this site who i hope will quickly point out my mistakes.
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cesar
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by cesar »

just a few of many that inspire me continuously,

“Like a great river that runs down toward the ocean, the narrowness of discipline leads into the openness of panoramic awareness.”
-- Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche

Until we experience it,
Emptiness sounds so
Empty.
Once experienced,
All is empty by comparison.
-- Pema Chödron

"The ultimate reality is beyond intellectual investigation, for the intellect is regarded as apparent reality." - Shantideva


"Mantra and Tantra, meditation and concentration, they are all a cause of self-deception." - Saraha


"I don't believe in reincarnation, but I will bring a change of underwear anyway.." - Woody Allen

:)
muni
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by muni »

Although we are all human beings, each one has a different mind, different defilements and so forth. In order to suit every level of our minds the Buddha bestowed an enormous amount of teachings.

One kind of teaching is not enough. Just as we require many medicines in order to cure the different types of disease, similarly in order to help the limitless sentient beings, the Buddha also gave many many teachings.

His Holiness Sakya Trizin.
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VlcImba
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by VlcImba »

A man asked Buddha for a favor," i want happiness",he said. the buddha replied " Take off I , thats ego, now remove want, thats desire, there you go, happiness:)
Simplicity at its best :twothumbsup:
Form is emptiness,emptiness is form
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oushi
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by oushi »

Longchenpa wrote:The pathless path
is the path always under our feet
and since that path is always beneath us,
if we miss it, how stupid!
Say what you think about me here.
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seeker242
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Location: South Florida, USA

Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by seeker242 »

"Things are not what they appear to be: nor are they otherwise."

Hmm!
One should not kill any living being, nor cause it to be killed, nor should one incite any other to kill. Do never injure any being, whether strong or weak, in this entire universe!
muni
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by muni »

"If you do not acquire contentment in yourselves,
Heaped-up accumulations will only enrich others.

If you do not obtain the light of Inner Peace,
Mere external ease and pleasure will become a source of pain.

If you do not suppress the Demon of Ambition,
Desire for fame will lead to ruin and to lawsuits"


Milarepa
muni
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by muni »

“All the joy the world contains has come
Through wishing happiness for others.
All the misery the world contains
has come through wanting pleasure for oneself.
Is there need for lengthy explanation?
Childish beings look out for themselves;
Buddhas labor for the good of others;
See the difference that divides them!”

Shantideva. :namaste:
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lobster
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by lobster »

Although gold dust is precious, when it gets in your eyes, it obstructs your vision.
Hsi-Tang

If you live the sacred and despise the ordinary,
you are still bobbing in the ocean of delusion.
Zen Master Lin-Chi

Since everything is but an apparition, having nothing to do with good or bad, acceptance or rejection, one may well burst out in laughter.
Longchenpa
muni
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by muni »

Any thought such as miserliness and so on
Is held to be an afflictive obscuration.
Any thought of ‘subject’, ‘object’ and ‘action’
Is held to be a cognitive obscuration.

Maitreya.
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well wisher
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by well wisher »

“Let my doing nothing when I have nothing to do , become untroubled in its depth of peace, like the evening in the seashore when the water is silent.”
- Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941)
Doing nothing is better than being busy doing nothing.
- Lao Tzu
So I say to you –
This is how to contemplate our conditioned existence in this fleeting world:”
“Like a tiny drop of dew, or a bubble floating in a stream;
Like a flash of lightning in a summer cloud,
Or a flickering lamp, an illusion, a phantom, or a dream.
“So is all conditioned existence to be seen.”
- Shakyamuni Buddha in the Diamond Sutra
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well wisher
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by well wisher »

“I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies, and that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but swindling futurity on a large scale.” - Thomas Jefferson
“Rather than justice for all, we are evolving into a system of justice for those who can afford it. We have banks that are not only too big to fail, but too big to be held accountable.” - Joseph E. Stiglitz
“Money is numbers and numbers never end. If it takes money to be happy, your search for happiness will never end.” - Bob Marley
"There is a sufficiency in the world for man's need but not for man's greed." - Mahatma Gandhi
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Supramundane
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Re: Your favorite quotes.

Post by Supramundane »

"There is a path to an ancient city.
That city is Nirvana.
The path to it is the Eight-Fold Path.
At the end of the path is jhana"
--unknown
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