"Do I want the present moment to be my friend or my enemy?" ....Become friendly toward it, welcome it no matter in what disguise it comes, and soon you will see the results. Life becomes friendly toward you; people become helpful, circumstances cooperative....But that one decision you have to make again and again and again - until it becomes natural to live in such a way.
~Eckhart Tolle
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When you are content to be simply yourself and don't compare or compete, everyone will respect you.
~Lao Tzu
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Think before you desire a thing. There is every possibility that it will be fulfilled, and then you will suffer.
~OSHO
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An alive and loving person simply loves. Love is a natural function. So the second thing to remember is, don't ask for perfection; otherwise you will not find any love flowing in you. On the contrary, you will become unloving. People who demand perfection are very unloving people, neurotic. Even if they can find a lover they demand perfection, and the love is destroyed because of that demand. Once a man loves a woman or a woman loves a man, demands immediately enter. The woman starts demanding that the man should be perfect, just because he loves her. As if he has committed a sin! Now he has to be perfect, now he has to drop all his limitations,suddenly, just because of this woman? Now he cannot be human? Either he has to become superhuman or he has to become phony, false, a cheat. Naturally, to become superhuman is very difficult, so people become cheats. They start pretending and acting and playing games. In the name of love people are just playing games. So the second thing to remember is never to demand perfection. You have no right to demand anything from anybody. If somebody loves you, be thankful, but don't demand anything,because the other has no obligation to love you. If somebody loves, it is a miracle. Be thrilled by the miracle.
~OSHO
@GatelessGate
One morning, sitting in his bed, Chuang Tzu looked very sad. His disciples had never seen him so sad. And never after waking up had he remained in his bed, sitting. What had happened? Was he sick?
They gathered around and asked him, “Master, what is the matter?”
He said, “The matter is really difficult, I cannot solve it; perhaps you may be of some help. I will tell you what is the matter.
“In the night I dreamed that I had become a butterfly, and I was moving from one flower to another flower.”
The disciples said, “This is nothing to be sad about. In dreams we all do strange things; and this is not a bad thing, to be a butterfly – colourful, beautiful, moving from one juicy flower to another juicy flower.
“Why are you so worried?”
He said, “You have not heard the whole thing. The problem is, now I am awake and I am wondering whether Chuang Tzu dreamed that he is a butterfly, or now the butterfly has gone to sleep and is dreaming she is Chuang Tzu. Both are possible. If Chuang Tzu can dream that he is a butterfly, why can’t a butterfly dream that she is a Chuang Tzu?”
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Care about what other people think and you will always be their prisoner.
~Lao Tzu
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Remember, that which appeals to the ego cannot help your spiritual growth.
~OSHO
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Real meditation means: don't avoid the inner madhouse; enter into it, face it, encounter it, be watchful, because it is through watchfulness that you will overcome it.
~OSHO
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Never belong to a crowd; Never belong to a nation; Never belong to a religion; Never belong to a race. Belong to the whole existence. Why limit yourself to small things? When the whole is available.
~OSHO
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If you begin to understand what you are without trying to change it, then what you are undergoes a transformation.
~Jiddu Krishnamurti
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If you find the here and now intolerable and it makes you unhappy, you have three options: Remove yourself from the situation, change it, or accept it totally.
~Eckhart Tolle
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All know the way; few actually walk it.
~Bodhidharma
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You have within you more love than you could ever understand.
~Rumi
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When there is anger there is always pain underneath.
~Eckhart Tolle
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A horse suddenly came galloping quickly down the road. It seemed as though the man had somewhere important to go.
Another man, who was standing alongside the road, shouted, "Where are you going?" and the man on the horse replied,
"I don't know! Ask the horse!"
~Zen Story
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To love someone deeply gives you strength. Being loved by someone deeply gives you courage.
~Lao Tzu
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Sunlight fell upon the wall; the wall received a borrowed splendor. Why set your heart on a piece of earth, O simple one? Seek out the source which shines forever.
~Rumi
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In the stillness of the mind, I saw myself as I am: unbound.
~Nisargadatta Maharaj
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It is truth that liberates, not your effort to be free.
~Jiddu Krishnamurti
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These pains you feel are messengers. Listen to them.
~Rumi
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A young man was very much interested in the esoteric, in the mysterious. He found a saint who was known to have many secrets, but it was very difficult to get any secret from him. The young man said, “I will see. I will devote my whole life to his service, and I will get the secrets, the mysteries.”
So he remained with the old saint. The old saint told him, “You are unnecessarily wasting your time. I don’t have anything, I am just a poor old soul. Because I don’t speak, people think I am keeping some secret. But I don’t have anything to say, so I remain silent.”
But the man said, “I cannot be persuaded so easily. You will have to give me the secret which opens the door of all the mysteries.”
Tired of the young man, because twenty-four hours a day he was there… the poor old saint had to arrange for his food, had to ask somebody to take care for his clothes; the winter was coming and he would need more clothes. It had become a burden. Finally the old man got fed up. He told the young fellow, “Today I am going to tell you the secret. It is not very difficult. It is very simple.”
In Tibet there is a common mantra which religious people repeat: Om mani padme hum. He said, “Everything is hidden in this.”
But the young man said, “Don’t befool me! Everybody knows this mantra, it is not a secret. It is the most widely known mantra to the Tibetans.”
He said, “It is true, it is widely known. But the key is not known to them for opening it. Do you know the key for opening it?”
The young man said, “Key? I have never heard that there is a key to open a mantra.”
“That is the secret! The key is, while you are repeating the mantra – just for five minutes – just don’t let any monkey pop into your head.”
He said, “You seem to be an old idiot! In my whole life I have never thought of a monkey. Why should I think of one?”
He rushed down the stairs of the temple where the old saint lived. But strangely, even though he was not reciting the mantra, monkeys started coming, giggling. He would close his eyes and they would be there. He would run to this side and they would be there. They were not outside, they were inside his head. And slowly slowly the crowd was becoming bigger. As far as he could see, only monkeys and monkeys, and doing all kinds of circus!
He said, “My god, this is the key? I am finished! I have not even started the mantra.”
Finally he said, “Let me take a good bath and get rid of all these monkeys.” But the more he pushed them away, the more they jumped towards him. He took the bath, he burned incense, he sat in a religious lotus posture, but whatever he was doing, monkeys were watching from every side. He said, “It is strange – monkeys have never visited this house…” The whole night he tried, but he could not repeat this simple mantra Om mani padme hum without monkeys jumping in.
By the morning he was so tired. He said, “This old saint, I will kill him! What kind of key…?” In the morning he rushed to the old saint and said, “Please take away your key. I am almost mad!”
The old man said, “That’s why I was not telling anybody, because the key is very difficult. Now do you understand why I was silent?”
He said, “I don’t want to listen to a single word from you. You just take this key back and let me go home. And I don’t want these monkeys to follow me!”
The saint said, “If you give back the key, never repeat the mantra again. The monkeys will come! I cannot help it, they are not in my power.”
The man dropped the mantra, he dropped the key. He descended the same steps and there was no monkey at all. He closed his eyes and there was no monkey. He looked all around and there was no monkey. He said, “It is strange…” He tried just once on the way, to see what happens when he says Om mani padme hum and closes his eyes. And they were all coming, from all directions!
~ancient Tibetan story
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