Browse 1768 quotes about Awakening.
“I take refuge until I am enlightened
In the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha.
By the positive potential I generate
Through studying these teachings,
May I attain buddhahood for the benefit of all.”
Source: Illuminating the Path to Enlightenment: A Commentary on Atisha Dipamkara Shrijnana's A Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment and Lama Je Tsong Khapa's Lines of Experience
“When you cultivate deeply such powerful sentiments as those articulated in Shantideva’s prayer...
For as long as space exists,
For as long as sentient beings remain,
Until then, may I too remain
And dispel the miseries of the world,
… time is totally irrelevant; you are thinking in terms of infinity.”
Source: Illuminating the Path to Enlightenment: A Commentary on Atisha Dipamkara Shrijnana's A Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment and Lama Je Tsong Khapa's Lines of Experience
“One has to die to the separate self in oder to find the universal Self or God […] as the mystics everywhere have repeatedly told us, it is only in accepting death that real life is found. (A Universe within, p. 79)”
Source: Grace & Grit: Spirituality & Healing in the Life & Death of Treya Killam Wilber
“There are two kinds of aspiration in the realization of bodhicitta: the aspiration concerned for the welfare of all sentient beings and the aspiration to attain buddhahood for their sake. The spontaneous intention to attain buddhahood for the benefit of all sentient beings occurs when these two aspirations are complete. This is the realization of bodhicitta, the mind of enlightenment. At this point, the student has become a practitioner of the highest capacity and all activities and practices motivated by bodhicitta are those of the Greater Vehicle, the Mahayana.”
Source: Illuminating the Path to Enlightenment: A Commentary on Atisha Dipamkara Shrijnana's A Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment and Lama Je Tsong Khapa's Lines of Experience
“The moment you have realized bodhicitta, you have become a Mahayana practitioner and are on the path to complete enlightenment but the moment your bodhicitta degenerates, you fall outside the fold of the bodhisattvas. Without bodhicitta, no matter how advanced you are in other practices—even if you have a direct realization of emptiness or have attained nirvana—nothing you do becomes the conduct of a bodhisattva or the cause of enlightenment.”
Source: Illuminating the Path to Enlightenment: A Commentary on Atisha Dipamkara Shrijnana's A Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment and Lama Je Tsong Khapa's Lines of Experience
“Bodhisattvas are referred to as enlightened “heroes” or “warriors.” They are highly altruistic beings who have the wisdom to realize that by dedicating themselves to the welfare of other sentient beings, the fulfillment of their own self-interest comes automatically as a by-product.”
Source: Illuminating the Path to Enlightenment: A Commentary on Atisha Dipamkara Shrijnana's A Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment and Lama Je Tsong Khapa's Lines of Experience
“The highest perfection of altruism, the ultimate altruism, is bodhicitta complemented by wisdom. Bodhicitta—the aspiration to bring about the welfare of all sentient beings and to attain buddhahood for their sake—is really the distilled essence, the squeezed juice, of all the Buddha’s teachings, because ultimately, the Buddha’s intention is to lead all sentient beings to perfect enlightenment, complete omniscience. Since it is bodhicitta that determines whether or not our practice becomes the path to enlightenment, bodhicitta is truly the heart essence of all the teachings of the Buddha.”
Source: Illuminating the Path to Enlightenment: A Commentary on Atisha Dipamkara Shrijnana's A Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment and Lama Je Tsong Khapa's Lines of Experience
“With the wish to free all beings
I shall always go for refuge
To Buddha, Dharma and Sangha.
Until I reach full enlightenment,
Inspired by wisdom and compassion,
Today, in the Buddha’s presence,
I generate the mind of full awakening
For the benefit of all sentient beings.
As long as space remains
As long as sentient beings remain
Until then may I too remain
And dispel the miseries of the world.”
Source: Illuminating the Path to Enlightenment: A Commentary on Atisha Dipamkara Shrijnana's A Lamp for the Path to Enlightenment and Lama Je Tsong Khapa's Lines of Experience
“Having these negative imprints on my mental continuum is unbearable. “It’s as if I’ve swallowed a lethal poison. I must practice the antidote right away and purify all this negative karma immediately, without a second’s delay.” In this way, generate strong feelings of urgency and regret.”
Source: Daily Purification: A Short Vajrasattva Practice
“The first two steps of the path: the recognition of the preciousness of human life, which is endowed with liberty and opportunity, and the awareness of the immediacy of death. (p. 79)”
Source: The Jewel Tree of Tibet: The Enlightenment Engine of Tibetan Buddhism
“We are being developed by what we have done, and what we do, not only physically and verbally, but mentally also. What we now do in mind and speech and body will determine how we will become. The different forms and idiosyncrasies of all beings and things – all worlds in fact – depend on this inexorable causality of evolutionary action, or karma. Karma is not mysterious. Karma doesn‘t mean „fate“, although in a way it occupies the place of fate. Karma means „evolution, evolutionary causality.“ (Pages 79-80)”
Source: The Jewel Tree of Tibet: The Enlightenment Engine of Tibetan Buddhism
“The literal meaning of guru yoga is ‘union with the teacher´s nature’. To blend your mind with the teacher’s mind is the most profound of all practices, and the shortest path of realization. It is the life force of the path and the one practice that includes all others. It was through relying on a spiritual teacher that all the bodhisattvas of the past generated the mind of enlightenment and reached perfection.”
Source: The Heart Treasure of the Enlightened Ones: The Practice of View, Meditation, and Action: A Discourse Virtuous in the Beginning, Middle, and End
“Those who practice the Dharma of the Mahayana in accordance with the Buddha's intention are known as bodhisattvas. If you practice the teachings of the Mahayana, you can reach the level of the great bodhisattvas Avalokiteshvara and Manjushri, in the best case, or become like the Buddha's two main disciples Shariputra and Maudgalyayana, who were gifted with insight and miraculous powers.
Even if you are unable to practice to the full in this life, you will at least be reborn among the principal disciples of the future Buddha, Maitreya. The buddhas being those who have totally conquered the enemies of ignorance and the other emotions, they are often referred to by the synonym 'Victorious Ones,' while bodhisattvas, in many texts including the Tibetan original of the root verses of these teachings, are called 'children of the Victorious Ones'.
Who, then, are the children of the buddhas? In the case of Buddha Shakyamuni, the child of his body was his physical son, Prince Rahula. The children of his speech were all those who heard him teach and attained the level of arhart - the great beings such as Shariputra, Maudgalayana, the sixteen arhats and others, who became the holders of his teachings.
Above all, the children of the buddha's mind are the great bodhisattvas like Avalokiteshvara and Manjushri, who carry out their noble intention to bring all beings to enlightenment.
For, just as a great monarch with a thousand children would choose the one with the most perfect qualities to be his heir, so, too, a buddha regards as his authentic heirs the bodhisattvas who have perfected the union of wisdom and compassion.”
Source: The Heart of Compassion: The Thirty-seven Verses on the Practice of a Bodhisattva
“I often refer to the great mythologist and American author Joseph Campbell (1904-1987) in this book. He used the designation of „hero“ to describe individuals who embark on the monumental psychological task of expanding and evolving consciousness and famously charted this journey. This hero‘s journey begins in our inherent state of blindness, separation, and suffering and progresses on a circular (as opposed to linear) route made up of stages shared by myths and legends spanning all cultures and epochs. From Buddha to Christ, Arjuna to Alice in Wonderland, the hero‘s journey is one of passing through a set of trials and phases: seeking adventure, encountering mentors, slaying demons, finding treasure, and returning home to heal others.
Tibetan Buddhism‘s and Campbell‘s descriptions of the hero both offer a travel-tested road map of a meaningful life, a path of becoming fully human – we don‘t have to wander blindly, like college kids misguidedly hazed by a fraternity, or spiritual seekers abused in the thrall of a cult leader. The hero archetype is relevant to each of us, irrespective of our background, gender, temperament, or challenges, because we each have a hero gene within us capable of following the path, facing trials, and awakening for the benefit of others. Becoming a hero is what the Lam Rim describes as taking full advantage of our precious human embodiment. It‘s what Campbell saw as answering the call to adventure and following our bliss – not the hedonic bliss of chasing a high or acquiring more stuff, but the bliss of the individual soul, which, like a mountain stream, reaches and merges with the ocean of universal reality. (p. 15)”
Source: Gradual Awakening: The Tibetan Buddhist Path of Becoming Fully Human
“Just as a snake sheds its skin, so too do we relinquish actions, words, and views that compose our current life of misery and longing so we can be reborn as a Bodhisattva Hero, a child of the Buddhas. Are you ready to let go? (p. 97)”
Source: Gradual Awakening: The Tibetan Buddhist Path of Becoming Fully Human
“There are certain pivotal moments in life when clarity replaces its opposite in the blink of an eye.”
Source: Cali the Destroyer
“For as long as I could remember, I had been transparent to myself, unselfconscious, learning, doing, most of every day. Now I was in my own way; I myself was a dark object I could not ignore. I couldn't remember how to forget myself. I didn't want to think about myself, to reckon myself in, to deal with myself every livelong minute on top of everything else - but swerve as I might, I couldn't avoid it. I was a boulder blocking my own path. I was a dog barking between my own ears, a barking dog who wouldn't hush.
So this was adolescence. Is this how the people around me had died on their feet - inevitably, helplessly? Perhaps their own selves eclipsed the sun for so many years the world shriveled around them, and when at least their inescapable orbits had passed through these dark egoistic years it was too late, they had adjusted.
Must I then lose the world forever, that I had so loved? Was it all, the whole bright and various planet, where I had been so ardent about finding myself alive, only a passion peculiar to children, that I would outgrow even against my will?”
Source: An American Childhood
“The one who has made our spiritual heart alive and awakened our conscience is YOU,
From the day of creation of the souls those who were sleeping who have awakened them is YOU!”
Source: The Inward Journey
“In deep meditation, individual consciousness merged with the cosmic consciousness. In the absence of doer, the lotus blossoms.”
Source: Enlightenment Step by Step
“There is nothing we could add to that which has already been created....perfection.”
Source: The Essentials of Life
“Defining moment in new telepathist's life, moment when intuitive individual learns most of society isn't telepathic, doesn't see auras,doesn't know what life on ethereal astral plane is like.”
Source: The Man Who Followed Jack Kerouac
“As Campbell pointed out, in all spiritual traditions the hero must undergo initiation and testing. These rites of passage awaken and develop latent human capacities as they mark and safely ritualize the process of maturity, empowerment, and agency among members of a group. Initiation is a way adolescent naivete and dependency ends as we develop a sense of mastery, meaning, and purpose and are reborn as adults and active, contributing members of the tribe. Vision quests, shamanic journeys, sun dances, ordinations, Bar and Bat Mitzvahs, and confirmations offer access to a time-tested method steeped in a collective body of wisdom and community that mitigates risk and gives reproducible outcome. (p. 18)
Regardless of time, place, or culture, the motifs and stages of every initiation are the same. Whether symbolic or actual they include leaving home or separating from the community, facing a symbolic or literal hardship that serves as a psychological catalyst for an altered state of consciousness, and awakening as the nascent hero. The process continues with integrating and embodying wisdom, sometimes with the help of elders, priests, or shamans, and returning to the community as a mature member, active contributor, or leader. Initiation hastens development so the latent hero nature can be realized. (p. 18)”
Source: Gradual Awakening: The Tibetan Buddhist Path of Becoming Fully Human
“Man has infinite power within himself, and he can realise it - he can realise himself as the one infinite Self. It can be done; but you do not believe it. You pray to God and keep your powder dry all the time.
“The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda”, p.3573, Manonmani Publishers”
Source: The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda
“I invite you to embrace a new reality. It is not a matter of religion – it is a matter of fact, a matter of science, a matter of experiment, and a matter of awareness. I invite you to awaken to the infinite life you already have, no matter what your worldview. I invite you to take up responsibility for your own evolutionary destiny. I invite you to take advantage of your priceless human opportunity to make a definitive turn toward ultimate security, complete freedom, and unbounded happiness. (p. 23, The Nature of Reality)”
Source: Infinite Life: Awakening to Bliss Within
“There is no full stopping of anything, it‘s nonsense to say something can become nothing; your consciousness is a something, just like your body! You are body and mind, spirit and soul – the whole „you“ is what is immortal! Always has been and always will be, living and dying, changing and experiencing. The question is not really whether or not you go on, but rather how are you going to enjoy it? How are your friends going to enjoy you, once you‘re all going to be there together forever?(p. 4, The Nature of Reality)”
Source: Infinite Life: Awakening to Bliss Within
“From a strictly realistic perspective, should we bet on infinite life and endless consequences to our actions? Pascal would argue that our answer must be a resounding „Yes!“ We might as well assume that there will be a future continuity of our personal consciousness, however changed, however disembodied or re-embodied, however connected or disconnected we remain to the „self“ we experience in this life. If we make that bet on our own future lives, then we will prepare in whatever way we can to assure that we continue in a good way, in a better embodiment and environment. We will become truly responsible for our thoughts and our acts. Even though we may not remember the previous-life self who made those preparations, we certainly will want to enjoy the results. If our bet is misplaced, and our preparations have no effect because we actually do enter oblivion at death, we will simply not exist to regret having made them.
But if we wrongly bet on noncontinuity and therefore do not prepare for the future and have to face it unprepared, then we may suffer seriously in our next existence, and we will very much regret our decision. Even if we don‘t remember making it, don‘t know why we are suffering, don‘t know how to fault ourselves for being so unconscious in our previous life, we will still suffer and regret. Pascal‘s wager is therefore a very safe bet – it has a clear-cut positive outcome. Whether our personal life is really terminal at death or in fact infinite in continuity, if we bet, like Pascal, on the existence of our life after death, in whatever form, we will be in the best possible position, however things turn out. (pp. 7-8, The Nature of Reality)”
Source: Infinite Life: Awakening to Bliss Within
“When you become aware of your selflessness, you realize that any way you feel yourself to be at any time is just a relational, changing construction. When that happens, you have a huge inner release of compassion. Your inner creativity about your living self is energized, and your infinite life becomes your ongoing work of art. (p. 54)”
Source: Infinite Life: Awakening to Bliss Within
“All have senses, but not all have sensuality.”
“And then, some morning in the second week, the mind wakes, comes to life again. Not in a city sense—no—but beach-wise. It begins to drift, to play, to turn over in gentle careless rolls like those lazy waves on the beach. One never knows what chance treasures these easy unconscious rollers may toss up, on the smooth white sand of the conscious mind; what perfectly rounded stone, what rare shell from the ocean floor. Perhaps a channeled whelk, a moon shell, or even an argonaut.”
Source: GIFT FROM THE SEA
“I might say too that you are the person who ought to help me, since you do bear some responsibility for having awakened in me such an immense, such a truly monstrous degree of love.”
Source: The Nice and the Good
“When she met Rudra, it was as if she had just awakened to the world and discovered its wonder. She knew a lot about dreams and a little about wickedness.”
Source: Tied to Deceit
“Imagine you're floating in dark space. Then you see a shop floating in darkness. You buy a chocolate there and eat. That's the kind of wonder you should feel while doing the usual day-to-day stuff. Because everything is actually floating in darkness.”
“Masters of flight don't learn to fly because of all that helped them, they learnt to fly, despite all that tried to stop them.”
“I’ve heard that sometimes a version of you must die before another more enlightened version can be born. I think that’s true after watching the corpse of myself walk around.”
Source: Wide Awake and Dreaming: A Memoir
“If you want to hear the distant voice of the ocean put your ear to the lips of a seashell.
If you want to hear the voice of God place your ear upon the chest of any living being.
If you want to be awakened from slumbering through life, place your ear up to the core of a corpse because the voice of honesty can clearly be heard there and the fingers of such a ribcage love to pinch dreamers into action.
But if you want to hear the voice that directs your personal pilgrimage, you must find a way to keep your ear glued to your body’s fragile shell.”
Source: Giants At Play: Finding Wisdom, Courage, And Acceptance To Encounter Your Destiny
“Kindness: a waltz with forgiveness and hope.”
Source: Pay Me What I'm Worth: Say it. Mean it. Get it.
“Seeing all life
in perfect symmetry.
Perceiving each day
with righteous clarity.
Living each moment
in purposed reality.
Believing each day
is the start of eternity.”
Source: Love, Adventure and Other Noble Quests
“You are sitting on a computer in the projector cabin of a unique cinema hall in which the screen is not made up of white cloth. Instead, there is a big transparent room full of white liquid. You click on a movie file on your computer, the projector starts throwing light on the room of white liquid, real characters start emerging from the white liquid. You get attached to the characters. You start feeling their pain and pleasures. That room of white liquid is Space-Time or Maya. You are a soul sitting on the computer. The movie file is Karma-Desires. If you don’t like the movie, you can change it and play a better movie.”
“You never had a life to lose, a self to keep, or a death to fear. Only the illusion of separation collapsing back into the clarity that was always watching.”
“When you woke up in the morning, discover the harmony and peace in the center of your heart.”
Source: Peace Bliss Beauty and Truth: Living with Positivity
“RELIGION is like a rocket. Use it to raise your consciousness only. Drop it when you are in your ORBIT.”
Source: Other Dimension, Secret Codes of the Universe
“Character is what the world needs - character that will empower the mind with such an unimaginable strength that one would meet death face to face and say “some other time, pal!”
Source: Principia Humanitas
“The world needs gigantic strong wills in front of which even the mountains will be crumbled.”
Source: Principia Humanitas
“I – the eternal idea of oneness, have said this before – and now in the century 21st, say once again - Awake, my friend! Arise, my friend! Start walking my friend! And do not stop until you bring the change you wish to see in your society!”
Source: Principia Humanitas
“Some will not see them.
But some will see the horses with their hearts of sleeping volcanoes
and will be rocked awake
past their bodies
to see who they have become.”
Source: She Had Some Horses
“Your job is to RESPOND and follow those inner juicy promptings that show up daily to seduce you awake. That’s what it means to live sensually ignited life.”
“I'll never forget seeing that familiar smile or look of amazement creep across a student's face when she has just connected with a high level of energy or has had some type of experience she never before realized was possible.”
Source: Soul Wisdom: A Guide to Miraculous Living
“Like all creations, I have come to understand that the messages I received have their own path to follow, and their own timing in which they needed to be set free.”
Source: Soul Wisdom: A Guide to Miraculous Living
“The more we awaken to the beauty of this dance being patterned throughout our lives and the uniqueness of our own personal dance step with the divine, the more miraculously our lives flow.”
Source: Soul Wisdom: A Guide to Miraculous Living
“Although hundreds or thousands of explanations are given,
There is only one thing to be understood -
Know the one thing that liberates everything -
Awareness itself, your true nature.”
Source: Wisdom Nectar: Dudjom Rinpoche's Heart Advice