Philosophy 04 (Jan 25 - Dec 26)

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Death Is an Alarm Bell

The death of someone close to you is like an alarm bell: Wake up! This is it! Do what you care about! Love is what matters!

- Susan Moon, “Don’t Fear the Reaper”

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Compassion Is Intention

It is not about what we feel or what we can actually accomplish, it is about the intentions that we commit to and embody in our lives.

Compassion is a practice of seeing beyond the automatic reactivity of the heart and a striving to achieve the goals of an impossible vow.

- Christina Feldman and Chris Cullen, “An Appropriate Response”

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This Fire Is Love

This fire that runs through all things burns through life — in our suffering, losses, passions and connectedness and mutuality, all of which is love itself.

- Susan Murphy, “Why Love What You Will Lose?”

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Practice in the Body

We already have everything we need to get our practice out of our head and into our body, simply by being in the body that we’re in, as it is, in this one moment.

- Dhara Kowal, “This Very Body”

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Happiness Without Conditions

Our fragile happiness depends on things happening a certain way.

But there is something else: a happiness not dependent on conditions.

- Henepola Gunaratana, “Getting Started”

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Quit Deceiving Yourself

Self-improvement starts with breaking self-deception and learning to face the truth.

- Khangser, “Your Life Is a Mirror”

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Succeeding Together

Once we see that we are not solo improv stand-up players but rather members of a vast improv collective, we can recognize that the only way that I can succeed is if we succeed.

- Jay Garfield, “How to Live Without a Self (and Be a Better Person)”

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Luminous Openness

Meditation is the only way you can truly see yourself and come to know your inner world.

Sometimes on the surface, what you see as your self might not be that pleasant but underneath, there is a true nature of luminous openness and love.

- Tsoknyi, “Finding Our Way to the Feeling World”

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Magical Illusions

No one lives and no one dies.

Life and death, beginnings and endings, gains and losses, are like dreams or magical illusions.

- Pema Chödrön, “What Goes Through the Bardos?”

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An Experiential Understanding

Unfortunately, wisdom can’t be learned from books or magazine articles, no matter how profound the writing.

Instead, it arises from an experiential understanding of life, which meditation can help to enhance.

- Andy Puddicombe, “10 Tips for Living More Mindfully”