“I struggled to find just the right words so He would understand the nature and motive of my request. It suddenly dawned on me that I was an idiot. "What a goose," Pascaline Coff whispered to me when I told this story to her fellow Benedictine sisters. God already knew my heart.”
Source: God's Patient Pursuit of My Soul
“I can't learn or will myself into God's holiness, but my own willpower and planning can make all of the difference in whether I am present for God and his transformation.”
Source: Flee, Be Silent, Pray: An Anxious Evangelical Finds Peace with God through Contemplative Prayer
“The secret place is God's secret. God hides His work in men so that He can reveal His wonders through them.”
“Today, we have many ways of defining success in life. Some define it as being a sports hero, others as being wealthy, others as being popular and well liked, and still others as being happy. How does God define success? He defines it as being spiritually mature!”
Source: Biblical Discipleship: Essential Components for Attaining Spiritual Maturity
“Rest as the awareness that is aware without using thought.”
Source: Shift Into Freedom: The Science and Practice of Openhearted Awareness
“When it comes to making the right moves at the right time, your dance partner is life itself or what can be referred to as your destiny. The more you pay attention and practice intuitive decision making skills, the better you will become at sensing the unique rhythm of your life.”
Source: Great Decisions, Perfect Timing: Cultivating Intuitive Intelligence
“The big realization when we go beyond the ego is simply seeing that we've always been ok.”
Source: Shift Into Freedom: The Science and Practice of Openhearted Awareness
“You are already the awakeness that you seek!”
Source: Shift Into Freedom: The Science and Practice of Openhearted Awareness
“Well look, it seems as though you do have some experience now at least of threefold bliss, luminosity, and emptiness that is such an important feature of the first yoga. On top of that, you are in an excellent position, having had introduction from myself and having all the things on your side that you have going for you. But look out! Your mind is probably not strong enough yet that you can go wandering into town, as a lot of yogi-types would, drinking liquor and womanizing, and trying to incorporate that into your practice. Instead, and until you have advanced far enough that you can actually take these things onto the path, you should be practicising!
— Gampopa to Phagmo Drupa
(Duff T. Gampopa Teaches Essence Mahamudra: Interviews with His Heart Disciples, Dusum Khyenpa and Others. Padma Karpo Translation Committee, 2012. Pp. xxviii-xxix)”
Source: Gampopa Teaches Essence Mahamudra: Interviews with His Heart Disciples, Dusum Khyenpa and Others
“The extraction of discrete parts of Chöd teachings from their broader philosophical contexts is symptomatic of how Chöd has been incorporated into and transmitted through other Tibetan Buddhist lineages. For example [...] Chöd practices gradually merged with pre-existing models of deity yoga, such the Vajrayoginī practices within Nyingma, Kagyü, and Geluk traditions. Fundamental Chöd practices such as those described in The Common Eightfold Supplementary Section do not tend to involve the kind of deity visualization common to *anuttaratantra practices, but many Mahāmudrā Chöd practices have been reconciled with other lineages through the employment of such visualizations. The incorporation of Chöd by the Geluk and Kagyü schools has thus had equivocal results: on the one hand, fragments of Chöd teachings are preserved, but on the other, the distinctiveness of Chöd is diminished in the service of different fundamental standpoints such as that of Mahāmudrā.”
Source: Making the Old New Again and Again: Legitimation and Innovation in the Tibetan Buddhist Chöd Tradition