"Anything which is troubling you, anything which is irritating you, that is your teacher" (Ajahn Chah)
"Dharma is in your mind, not in the forest. Don't believe others, just listen to your mind. You don't have to go anywhere else. Wisdom is in yourself, just like a sweet ripe mango is already in a young green one." (Ajahn Chah)
"Do everything with a mind that lets go. Do not expect praise or reward." (Ajahn Chah)
"Do not be in a hurry or try to push your practice. If you become peaceful, then accept it,; if you don’t become peaceful, then accept that also. This is the nature of the mind. We must find our own practice and persevere." (Ajahn Chah)
"Do not try to become anything. Do not make yourself into anything. Do not be a meditator. Do not become enlightened. When you sit, let it be. What you walk, let it be. Grasp at nothing. Resist nothing." (Ajahn Chah)
"Don’t be attached to visions or lights in meditation, don’t rise or fall with them. What’s so great about brightness? My flashlight has it. It can’t help us rid ourselves of our suffering." (Ajahn Chah)
"Don't think that only sitting with the eyes closed is practice. If you do think this way, then quickly change your thinking. Steady practice is keeping mindful in every posture, whether sitting, walking, standing or lying down. When coming out of sitting, don't think that you're coming out of meditation, but that you are only changing postures. If you reflect in this way, you will have peace. Wherever you are, you will have this attitude of practice with you constantly. You will have a steady awareness within yourself." (Ajahn Chah)
"Happiness and suffering do not depend on being poor or rich, they depend on having the right or wrong understanding in our mind." (Ajahn Chah)
"If you let go a little you will have a little happiness. If you let go a lot you will have a lot of happiness. If you let go completely you will be free." (Ajahn Chah)
"If you see certainty in that which is uncertain, you are bound to suffer." (Ajahn Chah)
"If you want to understand suffering you must look into the situation at hand. The teachings say that wherever a problem arises it must be settled right there. Where suffering lies is right where non-suffering will arise, it ceases at the place where it arises. If suffering arises you must contemplate right there, you don't have to run away. You should settle the issue right there. One who runs away from suffering out of fear is the most foolish person of all. He will simply increases his stupidity endlessly." (Ajahn Chah)
"If your mind is happy then you are happy anywhere you go.
When wisdom awakens within you, you will see Truth wherever you look.
Truth is all there is.
It's like when you learned how to read, you can then read anywhere you go." (Ajahn Chah)
"Just know what is happening in your mind - not happy or sad about it, not attached. If you suffer see it, know it, and be empty. It's like a letter - you have to open it before you can know what's in it." (Ajahn Chah)
"Learn to see that it is not things that bother us, that we go out to bother them. See the world as a mirror. It is all a reflection of the mind. When you know this, you can grow in every moment, and every experience reveals truth and brings understanding." (Ajahn Chah)
"Look at your own mind. The one who carries things thinks he's got things, but the one who looks on sees only the heaviness. Throw away things, lose them, and find lightness." (Ajahn Chah)
"Meditation is like a single log of wood. Insight and investigation are one end of the log; calm and concentration are the other end. If you lift up the whole log, both sides come up at once. Which is concentration and which is insight? Just this mind." (Ajahn Chah)
"Mental activity is like a deadly poisonous cobra. If we don't interfere with a cobra, how poisonous it may be, it simply goes its own away." (Ajahn Chah)
"Of course there are dozens of meditation techniques, but it all comes down to this - just let it all be. Step over here where it is cool, out of the battle. Why not give it a try?" (Ajahn Chah)
"Once you understand non-self, then the burden of life is gone. You'll be at peace with the world. When we see beyond self, we no longer cling to happiness and we can truly be happy. Learn to let go without struggle, simply let go, to be just as you are - no holding on, no attachment, free." (Ajahn Chah)
"One day some people came to the master and asked: How can you be happy in a world of such impermanence, where you cannot protect your loved ones from harm, illness or death? The master held up a glass and said: Someone gave me this glass; It holds my water admirably and it glistens in the sunlight. I touch it and it rings! One day the wind may blow it off the shelf, or my elbow may knock it from the table. I know this glass is already broken, so I enjoy it - incredibly." (Ajahn Chah)
"One man watches a river flow by. If he does not wish it to flow, to change ceaselessly in accord with its nature, he will suffer great pain. Another man understands that nature of the river is to change constantly, regardless of his likes and dislikes, and therefore he does not suffer. To know existence as this flow, empty of lasting pleasure, void of self, is to find that which is stable and free of suffering, to find true peace in the world." (Ajahn Chah)
"Peace is within oneself to be found in the same place as agitation and suffering. It is not found in a forest or on a hilltop, nor is it given by a teacher. Where you experience suffering, you can also find freedom from suffering. Trying to run away from suffering is actually to run toward it." (Ajahn Chah)
"Proper effort is not the effort to make something particular happen. It is the effort to be aware and awake each moment, the effort to overcome laziness and merit, the effort to make each activity of our day meditation." (Ajahn Chah)
"Read yourself, not books. Truth isn't outside, that's only memory, not wisdom. Memory without wisdom is like an empty thermos bottle - if you don't fill it, it's useless." (Ajahn Chah)
"Regarding this Dhamma, it is not something that we can simply talk about or take another's word for it. We need to develop meditation so that the understanding arises clearly within oneself. It is not the case that merely by listening to another's explanation our defilements will disappear. When we gain some understanding we need to chew on it again so that we see it for ourselves with certainty: paccattam." (Ajahn Chah)
"Remember you don't meditate to get anything, but to get rid of things. We do it, not with desire, but with letting go. If you want anything, you wont find it." (Ajahn Chah)
"The Dhamma has to be found by looking into your own heart and seeing that which is true and that which is not, that which is balanced and that which is not balanced." (Ajahn Chah)
"The Dhamma has to sink deeply into the mind so that whatever we do, the mind has always goodness within it. All the ways of making merit are aiming at this. Goodness lies in the right view that is established in the mind. Then we don't have to celebrate it or let anybody know about it, simply let the mind have firm confidence in the goodness and keep going like this." (Ajahn Chah)
"The Dhamma is revealing itself in every moment, but only when the mind is quiet can we understand what it is saying, for the Dhamma teaches without words." (Ajahn Chah)
"The forest is peaceful, why aren’t you? You hold on to things causing your confusion. Let nature teach you. Hear the bird’s song then let go. If you know nature, you’ll know truth. If you know truth, you’ll know nature." (Ajahn Chah)
"The mind of one who practices doesn't run away anywhere, it stays right there. Good, evil, happiness and unhappiness, right and wrong arise, and he knows them all. The meditator simply knows them, they don't enter his mind. That is, he has no clinging. He is simply the experiencer." (Ajahn Chah)
"The serene and peaceful mind is the true epitome of human achievement." (Ajahn Chah)
"There are people who are born and die and never once are aware of their breath going in and out of their body. That's how far away they live from themselves." (Ajahn Chah)
"There are two kinds of suffering. There is the suffering you run away from, which follows you everywhere. And there is the suffering you face directly, and so become free." (Ajahn Chah)
"These days people don't search for the Truth. People study simply in order to find knowledge necessary to make a living, raise families and look after themselves, that's all. To them, being smart is more important than being wise!" (Ajahn Chah)
"Things are simply the way they are. They don't give us suffering. Like a thorn: Does a sharp thorn give us suffering? No. It's simply a thorn. It doesn't give suffering to anybody. If we step on it, we suffer immediately.
Why do we suffer? Because we stepped on it. So the suffering comes from us." (Ajahn Chah)
"To define Buddhism without a lot of words and phrases, we can simply say, 'Don't cling or hold on to anything. Harmonize with actuality, with things as they are.'" (Ajahn Chah)
"To observe and watch one's own mind is something really interesting. The untrained mind will run and follow its old habit patterns. Because it has not been trained and taught, it will get lost in all kinds of stories and issues. Therefore we have to train our mind. The meditation practice in Buddhism is all about training one's own mind." (Ajahn Chah)
"Try to be mindful, and let things take their natural course. Then your mind will become still in any surroundings, like a clear forest pool. All kinds of wonderful, rare animals will come to drink at the pool, and you will clearly see the nature of all things. You will see many strange and wonderful things come and go, but you will be still. This is the happiness of the Buddha." (Ajahn Chah)
"We don't meditate to see heaven, but to end suffering." (Ajahn Chah)
"We have limited time in our life, therefore we should try to teach ourselves, not to teach others. We should conquer ourselves, rather than conquer others. Whether coming or going, standing, sitting or lying down, our mind should be focused in this way. If we practice like this and develop mindfulness continuously, wisdom arises quickly and this is a fast way of practice." (Ajahn Chah)
"We practice to learn how to let go, not how to increase our holding on to things. Enlightenment appears when you stop wanting anything." (Ajahn Chah)
"When the heart truly understands, it lets go of everything." (Ajahn Chah)
"When we conquer ourselves, then everything will be conquered: oneself, others, and all the sense objects as well, coming in by way of the eyes, ears, nose, tongue and body - it will all get conquered like this." (Ajahn Chah)
"When we sit in meditation and hear a sound, we think, 'Oh, that sound's bothering me.' If we see it like this, we suffer. But if we investigate a little deeper, we see that the sound is simply sound. If we understand like this, then there's nothing more to it. We leave it be. The sound is just sound, why should you go and grab it? You see that actually it was you who went out and disturbed the sound." (Ajahn Chah)
"When we see beyond self, we no longer cling to happiness. And when we stop clinging, we can begin to be happy." (Ajahn Chah)
"Where does peace arise? Peace arises whenever we let something go." (Ajahn Chah)
"Wisdom is in yourself, just like a sweet ripe mango is already in a young green one." (Ajahn Chah)
"With even a little intuitive wisdom we will be able to see clearly the ways of the world. We will come to understand that everything in the world is our teacher." (Ajahn Chah)
"You are your own teacher. Looking for teachers can’t solve your own doubts. Investigate yourself to find the truth - inside, not outside. Knowing yourself is most important." (Ajahn Chah)
"You say that you are too busy to meditate. Do you have time to breathe? Meditation is your breath. Why do you have time to breathe but not to meditate? Breathing is something vital to peoples lives. If you see that Dhamma practice is vital to your life, then you will feel that breathing and practicing the Dhamma are equally important." (Ajahn Chah)
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