Dharma Quotes

“Work on yourself and never react to the condition. This is the freedom you've got from dharma and karma. When you begin to see the truth in yourself, automatically you will be picked up by the Power That Knows The Way, and you'll be placed in a position or place where you are supposed to be at this time. This is why I tell you so often, there are no mistakes. It appears complicated to the finite mind, but you are in your right place, going through those experiences that are right for you at this time. Only if you are thankful and you bless the position you're in, do you become a higher being, do you lift yourself up, and finally you find liberation. But it begins and ends with you. Never pray to God for release of your problems. Never pray to God to change your life, and to give you something better. This is wrong prayer. If you have to pray to God, pray to God to give you the strength and the wisdom and the courage that you need to be able to handle the situation that you're in. This is correct prayer. Do not try to change anything. Be yourself. Work on yourself. Begin to see things in a new light. See your situation differently. There are no bad things, there are no good things. But thinking makes it so. Stop thinking of the extremes, good and bad, right and wrong. Rather look at yourself in the moment. Stay centered. See yourself as a Divine Being, an Infinite Being, totally free and liberated. Do not feel sorry for yourself because you are in a position and in a situation you don't like. This just holds you there more. And again as we mentioned before, even if you run away from a situation, you will attract some of the circumstances elsewhere. Running away is never the answer. Changing yourself is the answer. (p. 185)”
― Robert Adams, Silence of the Heart: Dialogues with Robert Adams

“Indian poverty is more dehumanizing than any machine; and, more than in any machine civilization, men in India are units, locked up in the straitest obedience by their idea of their dharma. The scientist returning to India sheds the individuality he acquired during his time abroad; he regains the security of his caste identity, and the world is once more simplified. There are minute rules, as comforting as bandages; individual perception and judgement, which once called forth his creativity, are relinquished as burdens, and the man is once more a unit in his herd, his science reduced to a skill. The blight of caste is not only untouchability and the consequent deification in India of filth; the blight, in India that tries to grow, is also the over-all obedience it imposes, its ready-made satisfactions, the diminishing of adventurousness, the pushing away of men of individuality and the possibility of excellence.”
― V.S. Naipaul, India: A Wounded Civilization

“Samsara is not out there, but rather in the way that we experience our environment. To target it precisely, samsara is in the quality of our minds. Our minds are not functioning in accord with reality, and therein lies the problem.”
― B. Alan Wallace

“The root of our problems is within our mind. It is our unskillful ways of thinking. We have to recognize the right ways of thinking, which bring happiness, and the wrong ways of thinking, which bring suffering. With one way of thinking, we have problems in our life; with another way of thinking, we don't. In other words, happiness and suffering come from our own mind. Our mind creates our life.”
― Thubten Zopa, Ultimate Healing: The Power of Compassion

“The real miracle is when someone is able to stop the cause of suffering and create the cause of happiness by learning that their own mind is the source of their suffering and happiness. The real miracle is to transform our mind, because this will take care of us for many lifetimes. Our positive attitude will stop us from creating the cause of problems, thus ensuring our happiness not only in this life but in hundreds, or even thousands, of future lives up to enlightenment. This is the greatest success. (p. 30)”
― Thubten Zopa, Ultimate Healing: The Power of Compassion

“If you've realized that all this is a cosmic drama, you can play a victorious role in it because you have the power of awareness with you.”
― Shunya

“ಧರ್ಮಾಧರ್ಮದ ಸಂಘರ್ಷಣೆ, ರಕ್ಷಣೆಗಳಲ್ಲಿ ಕೊನೆಗೂ ಸೊರಗುವುದು ಸಮಾಜದ ಸೌಂದರ್ಯವೆನ್ನುವುದು ಯಾರಿಗೂ ಸುಲಭಕ್ಕೆ ಅರ್ಥವಾಗುವುದಿಲ್ಲ.”
― Vasudhendra, ತೇಜೋ-ತುಂಗಭದ್ರಾ [tejo-tungabhadra]

“Thus we are counseled at length to be careful about the company we keep, recognizing the simple fact that an unexamined lifestyle, in which we are immersed in the materialistic values and behavior of worldly friends, will get us nowhere. Only frustration and inanity will be the result. Shāntideva advises us to fight shy of those whose values are contrary to the Dharma—people he habitually refers to as “those who are like children” (in other words, in terms designed to stimulate feelings of concern rather than resentment). Thus Shāntideva prescribes solitude, a flight from the world—not of course in a puritanical, world-denying sense, but in a spirit of inner freedom. Tranquillity of mind, he says significantly, is “found by people who are happy to be free from worldly ties,” and who for that reason, “never turns . . . a backward glance” (8.4, 8.26). And he is lyrical in his celebration of retreat in the wilderness.”
― Śāntideva, The Way of the Bodhisattva

“Resting in the natural state does not mean that you cannot think about things or work. The idea is to rest in the natural state and think at the same time. If you can do that, you can think things through and work but there are no painful or sharp feelings.”
― Khenchen Thrangu, Vivid Awareness: The Mind Instructions of Khenpo Gangshar

“What is clinging to a self rooted in? Actually, it is not rooted in anything. If we see that, then naturally ego-clinging will not happen. The reason it has no root is that when we look for the object that we are clinging to as “me,” as a self, we cannot find it.”
― Khenchen Thrangu, Vivid Awareness: The Mind Instructions of Khenpo Gangshar

“Religion(Dharma) is a path and Spirituality is its destination.”
― Shiva Negi

“Jealousy is but a manifestation of artha’s corruptive influence on man which in due course became the insurmountable hurdle for him on the path of moksha. It is in man’s power to curtail it to manage his passage to moksha. One needs only to understand the physics of jealousy to appreciate the chemistry of its affects on human nature.”
― B.S. Murthy, Jewel-less Crown: Saga of Life

“If you have no contentment, you are poor even though you may be wealthy.
for the mind of a miser is never satisfied.
Those who are content are truly the richest.
Even if they have little, their minds are filled with happiness.

—Stainless Light, the testament of Drimé Özer”
― Longchen Rabjam, The Life of Longchenpa: The Omniscient Dharma King of the Vast Expanse

“If you want answers, you don't want life.
If you want method, you don't want life.
If you want security, you don't want life.
If you want goals, you don't want life.
If you don't want life, what is it that you want?”
― Padma Gendum

“The difference between theism and non-theism is not whether one does or does not believe in god. It is an issue that applies to everyone, including Buddhists and Non-Buddhists. Theism is a deep seated conviction that there is some hand to hold. If we we just do the right things someone will appreciate us and take care of us. It means thinking there will always be a babysitter available when we need one. We are all inclined to abdicate our responsibilities and delegate our authority to something outside ourselves. Non-Theism is relaxing with the ambiguity and uncertainty of the present moment without reaching for anything to protect ourselves. We sometimes think that Dharma is something outside ourselves, something to believe in, something to measure up to, however, Dharma isn't a belief. It isn't dogma. It is total appreciate of impermanence and change. The teachings disintegrate when we try to grasp them. We have to experience them without hope. Many brave and compassionate people have experienced them and taught them. The message is fearless. Dharma was never meant to be a belief that we blindly follow. Dharma gives us nothing to hold on to at all. Non-Theism is finally realizing that there is no babysitter that you can count on, you just get a good one and then he or she is gone. Non-Theism is realizing that it's not just babysitters that come and go, the whole of life is like that. This is the truth. And the truth is inconvenient. For those who want something to hold onto, life is even more inconvenient.”
― Pema Chödrön, When Things Fall Apart, The Places That Scare You, Start Where You Are, 10% Happier 4 Books Collection Set

“Those raised in dharma naturally tend to look for a common element among apparently different things, to discover the reality below the appearances and to appreciate relationships among seemingly unrelated phenomena.”
― Rajiv Malhotra, Being Different: An Indian Challenge to Western Universalism

“One of life's most nurturing notions is to realise that this is a finite and unpredictable experience.”
― Kayo K.

“What had Hitler achieved with his gospel of racial superiority and the hellish hatred it generated? How many millions of people lost their lives to that hatred? So that the Aryan race will retain its purity? What was the final outcome? Hitler had to die like a rat in its hole. He had to fire a bullet into his own temple in order to escape the ignominy that his friend, Mussolini, met with in the end.”
― Tomichan Matheikal, Black Hole

“Indians have made some contribution to science in this century; but - with a few notable exceptions - their work has been done abroad. And this is more than a matter of equipment and facilities. It is a cause of concern to the Indian scientific community - which feels itself vulnerable in India - that many of those men who are so daring and original abroad should, when they are lured back to India, collapse into ordinariness and yet remain content, become people who seem unaware of their former worth, and seem to have been brilliant by accident. They have been claimed by the lesser civilization, the lesser idea of dharma and self-fulfillment. In a civilization reduced to its forms, they no longer have to strive intellectually to gain spiritual merit in their own eyes; that same merit is now to be had by religious right behaviour, correctness.

India grieved for the scientist Har Gobind Khorana, who, as an American citizen, won a Nobel Prize in medicine for the United States a few years ago. India invited him back and fêted him; but what was most important about him was ignored. 'We could do everything for Khorana,' one of India's best journalists said, 'except do him the honour of discussing his work.' The work, the labour, the assessment of labour: it was expected that somehow that would occur elsewhere, outside India.”
― V.S. Naipaul, India: A Wounded Civilization

“पूरे वर्ष, सभी क्षेत्रों में, सभी मौसमों में; हम हिंदुओं को लगभग किसी भी चीज और हर चीज की, किसी को भी और सभी की पूजा करने के लिए कारण मिलते हैं; लोगों से देवताओं तक; जानवरों से पौधों तक; ग्रहों से सितारों तक। इसलिए जीवन के छोटे-छोटे आश्चर्यों के साथ हमारा उत्साह हमेशा ऊंचा रहता है, हम लोगों से मिलना और उनका अभिवादन करना पसंद करते हैं, क्योंकि सनातन धर्म में हम मानव होने के हर पहलू का जश्न मनाते हैं। हम मानते हैं कि (भगवान) हर कण में हैं और ऊँ (ओ3म्) ब्रह्मांड के हर एक परमाणु (atOM) में है।

Poore varsh, sabhee kshetron mein, sabhee mausamon mein; ham hinduon ko lagabhag kisee bhee cheej aur har cheej kee, kisee ko bhee aur sabhee kee pooja karane ke lie kaaran milate hain; logon se devataon tak; jaanavaron se paudhon tak; grahon se sitaaron tak. isalie jeevan ke chhote-chhote aashcharyon ke saath hamaara utsaah hamesha ooncha rahata hai, ham logon se milana aur unaka abhivaadan karana pasand karate hain, kyonki sanaatan dharm mein ham maanav hone ke har pahaloo ka jashn manaate hain. ham maanate hain ki bhagavaan (bhagavaan) har kan mein hain aur om brahmaand ke har ek paramaanu mein hai.”
― Vikrmn: CA Vikram Verma, You By You

“Taming the mind is the process of refining away mental afflictions until we aren't ruled by our circumstances and the negative thoughts and emotions they elicit.”
― Khentrul Lodrö T'hayé Rinpoche

“अधिकार खो कर बैठ रहना, यह महा दुष्कर्म है;
न्यायार्थ अपने बन्धु को भी दण्ड देना धर्म है।”
― Maithili Sharan Gupt, जयद्रथ वध

“And he is not at an age right for renunciation; he has not even entered the stage of the householder, as befits a well educated man; he has not therefore paid back his dues to the gods and to his ancestral spirits and to his fellowmen. Bound by these dues where can he go now? He has no experience at all of women and consequently of samsara. He has not therefore attained any of the purusharthas of life, namely dharma, artha and kama. He has not even rendered personal service to his parents to ensure their comfort. He has not helped his loving relations, nor endowed his dear friends with wealth, nor honoured the wise. He has not shared his wealth with his dependants nor fulfilled the desires of those begging for favours.

"He has not founded his lineage by begetting sons and grandsons. Nor has he performed any great sacrificial rituals. He has not given generous gifts nor fulfilled his obligations of hospitality. He has not done his duty by this world. He has not adorned the earth with dams, wells and water distributing centres, with palaces, ponds and groves. Above all he has not still spread his fame far and wide which alone would live on till the end of the world.”
― Bāṇabhaṭṭa, Kadambari

“Ordinary people tend to be caught by the object of the mind, and practitioners of the Path tend to be caught by the mind itself. When both the mind and the object are removed, once both the mind and the objects of the mind are overcome, then there is the true Dharma.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh, Zen Battles: Modern Commentary on the Teachings of Master Linji

“Dharma talks aren't the truth. The true Dharma exists in the mind of the students as seeds and the Dharma talks are just like a little cloud that releases rain and causes the seeds in the mind of the practitioners to sprout and manifest.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh, Zen Battles: Modern Commentary on the Teachings of Master Linji

“As we learn, whether by reading, listening, or discussing, we need to be open so we can see ways to put what we learn into practice. If learning is not followed by reflecting and practicing, it is not true learning.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh, The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching: Transforming Suffering into Peace, Joy, and Liberation

“The job of a Zen master is to transmit the dharma.

The word dharma is a cognate of the Pali word for carrying. The dharma that is passed from teacher to student involves the essential teachings of the Buddha and the spirit of living those truths. Transmission is applied both to the ritual identification and acknowledgment of a particular student as the legitimate successor, or dharma heir, of a Zen master, and to the ordinary, daily interactions between the teacher and all students.

Transmit is an oddly technical verb, and the analogies it occasions are oddly useful. If you imagine the dharma as an electrical current arcing across a distance from one conductive wire to another, you get the basic idea. However, if you have even a rudimentary grasp of physics, you know that the power of an electrical charge decreases as it travels this way This is precisely what is not supposed to happen to the dharma as it passes from master to disciple. A dharma heir is meant to be someone whose enlightenment or understanding equals or, preferably, surpasses that of the master.”
― Michael Downing, Shoes Outside the Door: Desire, Devotion, and Excess at San Francisco Zen Center

“You can only live once as you in this lifetime. If you live fully, once is enough”
― Leo Lourdes, A World of Yoga: 700 Asanas for Mindfulness and Well-Being

“There is no realm in samsara where we have not taken birth, no samsaric pleasure we have not enjoyed, and no form of life we have not known over our countless stream of previous lives. Yet even now as humans most of us are like blind animals, unable to discern the patterns of life unfolding within us, leaving spiritual aims behind and chasing only the biological and emotional needs of the senses. Totally unaware of the spiritual methods that produce everlasting joy, we admire the ignoble and have distaste for the noble.”
― Dalai Lama XIV, Refining Gold: Stages in Buddhist Contemplative Practice

“Being true to oneself is the highest religion.”
― Shiva Negi