DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ 10/31/2012

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	Speak not harshly to anyone. Those thus addressed will retort. Painful, indeed, is vindictive speech. Blows in exchange may bruise you. If, like a cracked gong, you silence yourself, you have already attained Nibbana: no vindictiveness will be found in you. - Dhammapada 133-134

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 31, 2012

Accepting Uncertainty Uncertainty, when accepted, sheds a bright light on the power of intention. That is what you can count on: not the outcome, but the motivation you bring, the vision you hold, the compass setting you choose to follow. - Joanna Macy, "The Greatest Danger"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 30, 2012

Just by Listening Sounds, like everything else, arise and pass away. Just by listening, you can experience the insight of impermanence, an understanding the Buddha taught as crucial for the development of wisdom. - Sylvia Boorstein, "Sound Meditation"

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ 10/29/2012

Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	It is like the water of the ocean: even without wind there are waves everywhere. Suddenly knowing of the waves all around is the gross within the subtle; letting go of knowledge in the midst of knowing is like the subtle within the subtle. This is the sphere of the enlightened. - Pai-chang

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 29, 2012

Loving Attention When we are fully present and able to pay attention in a sustained way to our experience we can begin to see directly, uncolored by our ideas and concepts. Placing our trust more in loving attention and less in analyzing the story can allow space for a new way of holding the question. - Narayan Liebenson Grady, "Questioning the Question"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 28, 2012

Unfailing Altruism The practitioner’s mind is likened to a mountain that the winds can’t shake; he’s neither tormented by the difficulties he may come across nor elated by his successes. But that equanimity is neither apathy nor indifference. It’s accompanied by inner jubilation, and by an openness of mind expressed as unfailing altruism. - Matthieu Ricard, "One Blood, Two Lineages"

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ 10/27/2012

Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	A person getting enlightened is like the moon reflecting in the water. The moon does not get wet, the water is not disturbed. Though it is a great expanse of light, it reflects in a little bit of water; the whole moon and the whole sky reflect even in the dew on the grass; they reflect even in a single drop of water. Enlightenment not disturbing the person is like the moon not piercing the water. A person not obstructing enlightenment is like the dewdrop not obstructing the heavens. - Dogen, "Flowers Fall"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 27, 2012

Great Questioning, Great Awakening The most important part of the practice is for the question to remain alive and for your whole body and mind to become a question. In Zen they say that you have to ask with the pores of your skin and the marrow of your bones. A Zen saying points out: Great questioning, great awakening; little questioning, little awakening; no questioning, no awakening. - Martine Batchelor, "What is This?"

Tricycle Daily Dharma ~ 10/25/2012

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 25, 2012

Only the Truth The Buddha didn't talk about Buddhism. He was concerned, simply, with the truth—the truth of suffering, the truth of the end of suffering—and that, I'd submit, is a good thing for anybody to learn. - Peter Doobinin, "Tough Lovingkindness"

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ 10/24/2012

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	First of all, do not predefine understanding, and do not make a principle of non-understanding. - Ying-an

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 24, 2012

Don’t Take It Personally That which we call 'I' is just impermanent, ownerless karma rolling along. Don't take it personally. - Lama Surya Das, "Surya Says"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 23, 2012

The Path to Restoration My advice for people is to love the world they are in, in whatever way makes sense to them. It may be a devotional practice, it may be song or poetry, it may be by gardening, it may be as an activist, scientist, or community leader. The path to restoration extends from our heart to the heart of sentient beings, and that path will be different for every person. - Paul Hawken, "The Movement With No Name"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 21, 2012

Awakening Our Senses The problem with listening, of course, is that we don't. There's too much noise going on in our heads, so we never hear anything. The inner conversation simply never stops. It can be our voice or whatever voices we want to supply, but it's a constant racket. In the same way we don't see, and in the same way we don't feel, we don't touch, we don't taste. - Philip Glass, "Listening to Philip Glass"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 20, 2012

Rising to the Occasion We cannot eliminate all of the challenges or obstacles in life—our own or anyone else’s. We can only learn to rise to the occasion and face them. - Dzigar Kongtrul, "Old Relationships, New Possibilities"

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ Extra

Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	Trivial thoughts, insignificant thoughts, When followed they distract the mind. Not understanding those thoughts The roaming mind runs back and forth. But by understanding those thoughts One ardent and mindful restrains the mind. An awakened one has overcome them completely So they do not arise to distract the mind. - Udana

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ 10/19/2012

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	Meditation is running into reality. It does not insulate you from the pain of life. It allows you to delve so deeply into life and all its aspects that you pierce the pain barrier and go beyond suffering. - Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, "Mindfulness in Plain English"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 19, 2012

Developing A Kind Nature A person disposed to anger will more and more easily erupt in anger anew at any provocation. But in a moment of kindness a kindly disposition is deposited, and one becomes incrementally more disposed to kindness. The attitude with which we respond to an object of experience, with anger or with kindness, will therefore not only influence the causal field outside ourselves but also progressively reshape our very nature. - Andrew Olendzki, "Karma in Action"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 18, 2012

Seeing Our Oneness Because compassion is a state of mind that is itself open, abundant, and inclusive, it allows us to meet pain more directly. With direct seeing, we know that we are not alone in our suffering and that no one need feel alone when in pain. Seeing our oneness is the beginning of our compassion, and it allows us to reach beyond aversion and separation. - Sharon Salzberg, "A Quiver of the Heart"

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ 10/17/2012

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	A mantra is not like a prayer to a divine being. Rather, the mantra is the deity, is enlightenment, immediately manifest. - Lorne Ladner, "Wheel of Great Compassion"

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ 10/17/2012

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	Worldly afflictions are as extensive as an ocean, noisy and clamorous; but they all arise from the thoughts in your own mind. When not a single thought is conceived, you are liberated from them all. - Ta-t

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 17, 2012

The Lucidity of Simple Awareness Exposed to the lucidity of simple awareness, practice dissolves into a practice of no practice (which is not the same thing as abandoning practice) where no one is doing or not doing anything, and natural freedom, no longer yearned for, naturally prevails. - Joel Agee, "Not Found, Not Lost"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 16, 2012

Where We Are Transformed Buddhist practice only works when it's on the edge. And that's what the renunciant lifestyle is about, what living in the wilderness is about, what meditation is all about—getting to the edge. Because that's where we are transformed. - Ajaan Amaro, "Just Another Thing in the Forest"

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ 10/15/2012

Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	When desires go, joy comes. The follower of Buddha finds this truth. - The Buddha

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 15, 2012

Journeying with the Buddha Christians and Muslims observe great and classic pilgrimages, and so do people set on their own course, but the Buddha, perhaps, taking the Middle Way and always reminding us that even our destination is unfixed and perhaps illusory, is every walker’s special friend. Those who journey with him know that they may not come to knowledge so much as a deepened sense of their own ignorance. - Pico Iyer, "The Long Road to Sitting Still"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 14, 2012

Taking Care of Things Realization needs to be actualized. And having realized the fact that there’s no separation, an imperative arises to reach out to take care of things. That’s compassion. We take care of things because everything is this very body and mind itself. - John Daido Loori, "Straight Ahead"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 13, 2012

Dethroning the Ego The ego must be dethroned, its arrogance must be dismantled, and we must begin, before it is too late, to listen to the ensuing silence. All of this is about becoming who we are in the deepest sense and about surrendering to what creation is asking of us and needing from us just now. - Reginald Ray, "Looking Inward, Seeing Outward"

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ Dhammapada 146

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	What is laughter, what is joy, when the world is ever burning? Shrouded by darkness, would you not seek the light? - Dhammapada 146

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 12, 2012

Cutting Through Issues If you have the mindfulness enabling you to read yourself and understand yourself, that cuts through a lot of issues right there. Craving will have a hard time forming. In whatever guises it arises, you’ll get to read it, to know it, to extinguish it, to let it go. - Upasika Kee Nanayon, "How Empty is Emptiness?"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 11, 2012

Real Freedom We all dread the helplessness of losing control, and yet real freedom lies in recognizing the futility of demanding that life be within our control. Instead, we must learn the willingness to feel—to say yes to—the experience of helplessness itself. This is one of the hidden gifts of serious illness or loss. It pushes us right to our edge, where we may have the good fortune to realize that our only real option is to surrender to our experience and let it just be. - Ezra Bayda, "The Three Things We Fear Most"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 10, 2012

Great Responsibility You see, the past is past, and the future is yet to come. That means the future is in your hands—the future entirely depends on the present. That realization gives you a great responsibility. - H.H. the Dalai Lama, "The Experience of Change"

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ 10/9/2012

	Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	The Buddha compared people to four kinds of clay vessels. One type of vessel has holes in the bottom. We can pour in as much water as we like and it runs right out. When this type of person hears the Dharma, it goes in one ear and out the other. The second type of vessel has cracks. Though we pour in the Dharma, it seeps out slowly until the vessel is empty again. The third vessel is full to the brim with stale water--views and opinions. One can't pour anything new in, everything is already known. The only useful vessel is the fourth, without holes or cracks and totally empty. - Ayya Khema, "Be An Island"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 9, 2012

Embracing Groundlessness It’s not impermanence per se, or even knowing we’re going to die, that is the cause of our suffering, the Buddha taught. Rather, it’s our resistance to the fundamental uncertainty of our situation. Our discomfort arises from all of our effort to put ground under our feet, to realize our dream of constant okayness. - Pema Chödrön, "The Fundamental Ambiguity of Being Human"

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ 10/8/2012

Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	All beings are by nature Buddha, as ice by nature is water. Apart from water there is no ice; apart from beings, no Buddha. - Hakuin Zenji, "Song of Zazen"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 8, 2012

Ending Your Problems Forever When you are preoccupied with external, material objects, you blame them and other people for your problems. Projecting that deluded view onto external phenomena makes you miserable. When you begin to realize your wrong-conception view, you begin to realize the nature of your own mind and to put an end to your problems forever. - Lama Yeshe, "Your Mind is Your Religion"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 7, 2012

Looking Inward Whatever we attempt is a reflection of our inner thirst, which we hope to quench in all these external ways. What we are looking for lies within us, and if we gave out time and energy to an interior search, we would come across it much faster, since that is the only place where it is to be found. - Ayya Khema, "Thirsting for Enlightenment"

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 6, 2012

Recognizing Our Inadvertent Training The wildness of mind that we experience when we sit quietly noticing our body and breathing for five minutes is the result of everything we’ve been doing before those five minutes. Frequently we discover that our minds do not rest in radiant contentment for the entire meditation session. Why not? Because we have been training for years in desiring, reaching, grasping, getting, and then wanting more, and then, of course, more—all reinforcing the underlying feeling that this moment is not enough. - Gaylon Ferguson, “Fruitless Labor”

DAILY BUDDHIST WISDOM ~ 10/5/2012

Daily Buddhist Wisdom
	Although a suspicious mind is bad, still it is wrong to cling to what you shouldn't believe in, or to fail to ask about a truth you should seek. - Dogen

Tricycle Daily Dharma October 5, 2012

The Genuine Path of Awakening It is important that we know what awakening is not, so that we no longer chase the by-products of awakening. We must give up the pursuit of positive emotional states through spiritual practice. The path of awakening is not about positive emotions. On the contrary, enlightenment may not be easy or positive at all. - Adyashanti, "Bliss is a By-Product"