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The Way of the Bodhisattva

This book is a comprehensive guide to the principles and practices of bodhisattvahood, a concept in Mahayana Buddhism that emphasizes compassion and the pursuit of enlightenment for the benefit of all sentient beings. more

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Śāntideva

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“We have the assurance of the enlightened beings that reality is goodness, that reality is freedom from suffering, that reality is bliss. So we should never fear to open ourselves to reality, to cast aside our preconceptions and biases, and to open more and more to whatever turns out to be real. You can have faith in enlightenment, faith in evolutionary potential, faith in infinity, faith in your infinite self. (p. 222)”

FaithBuddhismEnlightenmentAwakeningSpiritual TransformationThe Path Of The BodhisattvaFree Your Mind
Book:The Jewel Tree of Tibet: The Enlightenment Engine of Tibetan Buddhism
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“Since healing essentially comes from our mind, not from our body, it is important to understand the nature of the mind. The intrinsic nature of the mind is pure in the sense that it is not one with the faults of the mind, with the disturbing thoughts and obscurations. All the faults of our mind — our selfishness, ignorance, anger, attachment, guilt, and other disturbing thoughts — are temporary, not permanent and everlasting. And since the cause of our suffering, our disturbing thoughts and obscurations, is temporary, our suffering is also temporary. The mind is also empty of true existence, of existence from its own side. This quality of mind, known as Buddha Nature, gives us the potential to free ourselves completely from all suffering, including disease, and the causes of suffering and to achieve any happiness we wish, including the peerless happiness of enlightenment. Since the mind has all this potential, we do not need to feel depressed or hopeless. It is not as if we have to experience problems forever. We have incredible freedom to develop our mind in any way that we wish. It is simply a question of finding the right way to use the potential of our mind.”

HealingBuddhismEnlightenmentAwakeningSpiritual TransformationThe Path Of The BodhisattvaBuddha NatureThe Nature Of The Mind
Book:Ultimate Healing: The Power of Compassion
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“„When mind and body are synchronized in your life and practice, there is very little chance for neurosis of any kind to arise. The basis of neurosis, or even physical discomfort and pain, is mind and body not joining together. Sometimes the mind is miles away and the body is here. Or the body is miles away and the mind is there. The main point of practice is learning to be a proper human being, which is known as being a warrior. When mind and body are joined together, then you are joining heaven and earth, and you can be a genuine warrior. This quality of harmony will bring fearlessness. (p. 76, The Path of Fearlessness)”

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Book:Smile at Fear: Awakening the True Heart of Bravery
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“The strange thing about the messianic ideal of liberating yourself so that you can free all others is that just trying to adopt it makes you feel happier. Even though you know on some level that there is only so much you can get done in any given period of time, the fact that you do not let go of the determination to do everything gives you immense good cheer. (p. 20)”

BuddhismEnlightenmentAwakeningThe Path Of The BodhisattvaMessianic Consciousness
Book:Inner Revolution: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Real Happiness
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“Tibet became a laboratory for the enlightenment movement to create its model society, to evolve into an actual manifestation of a buddha‘s pure universe, a „buddhaverse“. A social buddhaverse is a place where everything is geared toward enlightenment, where every lifetime is made meaningful by dedication to optimal evolutionary development. Because that nation embraced the enlightenment movement for more than a millennium, Tibet is the prime example of a sustained attempt by an entire people to create a society, culture, and civilization that cherish the individual‘s pursuit of enlightenment over the needs of society. Instead of believing that a strong central government can force a group of people into making a better place to live, the Tibetans, influenced by ancient India, saw that helping the individual is what transforms society. Imagine a culture in which everything is geared toward helping all individuals become the best human beings they can be; in which individuals are driven to devoting their lives to becoming enlightened by the natural flood of compassion for others that arises out of their wisdom. Once an individual attains enlightenment, society at large automatically becomes enriched. This was the heart of the Buddha‘s social revolution. (p. 32-33)”

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Book:Inner Revolution: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Real Happiness
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“We can help people a great deal by thinking about them positively and developing metta towards them. And sometimes we can help people just by keeping out of their way – or rather by not getting in their way. Sometimes people need space, and we help them most by giving it to them, or at least not taking it from them.”

BuddhismThe Path Of The Bodhisattva
Book:The Bodhisattva Ideal : Wisdom and Compassion in Buddhism
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“Still, the word hierarchy is very unpopular these days, and the dictionary definition – ‘a body of ecclesiastical rulers’ – does nothing to make the term more appealing. But in its original sense, hierarchy meant something like an embodiment, in a number of different people, of different degrees of manifestation of reality. So one can speak, for instance, of a hierarchy of living forms – some lower, expressing or manifesting less reality, others higher, expressing or manifesting more reality. There is a continuous hierarchy of living forms from amoebas right up to human beings – the higher the level, the greater the degree of reality. And there is another hierarchy of living forms: the hierarchy from the unenlightened human being right up to the Enlightened Buddha. This corresponds to what in other contexts I have described as the Higher Evolution. Just as the unenlightened human being embodies or manifests more reality, more truth, than the amoeba, in the same way the Enlightened human being embodies or manifests more reality in his or her life and work, and even speech, than does the unenlightened person. The Enlightened person is like a clear window through which the light of reality shines, through which that light can be seen almost as it is. Or one can say that he or she is like a crystal or diamond concentrating and reflecting that light. Between the unenlightened human being and the Enlightened one, the Buddha, there are a number of intermediate degrees, embodied in different people at different stages of spiritual development. Most people are still short of Enlightenment, to a greater or lesser extent, but at the same time they are not wholly unenlightened. They stand somewhere between the unenlightened state and the state of full Enlightenment, and thus make up the spiritual hierarchy, the higher reaches of which can be referred to as the Bodhisattva hierarchy. By now we know enough about Bodhisattvas to have an appreciation of the intensity of their aspiration and commitment to the spiritual life. But even among Bodhisattvas there are degrees of spiritual attainment. The principle of spiritual hierarchy is very important.”

BuddhismThe Path Of The BodhisattvaSpiritual Hierarchy
Book:The Bodhisattva Ideal : Wisdom and Compassion in Buddhism
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“It is of the utmost importance for us to be in contact with people who are at least a little more spiritually advanced than we are ourselves, through whom the light of reality shines a little more clearly than it shines through us. Such people are known traditionally in Buddhism as our spiritual friends, our kalyana mitras, and they are more important to us than even a Buddha would be. If we happened to have the opportunity to meet a Buddha, we probably wouldn’t be able to make much of the encounter, or even realize the nature of the person in front of us. We are likely to benefit much more from contact with those who are just a little more spiritually developed than we are.”

BuddhismThe Path Of The BodhisattvaSpiritual Friends
Book:The Bodhisattva Ideal : Wisdom and Compassion in Buddhism
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