When you realize the emptiness of all phenomena, compassion will arise in your heart for all sentient beings who do not understand this truth.

Instead of having a deep understanding of the teaching, we need a strong confidence in our teaching, which says that originally we have Buddha nature.

The trick is to keep exploring and not bail out, even when we find out that something is not what we thought.

Mindfulness is the key to transformation. It enables us to see our experience as it really is, free from distortion and bias.

Give the ones you love wings to fly, roots to come back, and reasons to stay.

Happiness is not the pursuit of an endless succession of experiences but an attitude toward life.

Meditation is not about escaping from difficulty but about meeting it with awareness.

Do not follow the ideas of others, but learn to listen to the voice within yourself.

When I run from suffering, it follows me. When I face suffering with equanimity, it runs from me.

All worldly pursuits have but one unavoidable and inevitable end, which is sorrow; acquisitions end in dispersion; buildings in destruction; meetings in separation; births in death.

True freedom is a freedom from the tyranny of our own thoughts and afflictive emotions.

You are the sky. Everything else is just the weather.

The difference between buddhas and sentient beings is that buddhas recognize their nature while sentient beings fail to recognize it.

Sensations are not your enemy. They are your teacher. Through observing them, you understand the truth of existence.

Sankharas are the seeds of consciousness that manifest as sensations. By observing sensations equanimously, we stop creating new sankharas.

When you generate negativity, you are the first victim of your negativity.

Neither from itself nor from another, nor from both, nor without a cause, does anything whatever, anywhere arise.

The practitioner and practice are like fire and wood. The more you practice, the more you burn.

Every intelligent individual wants to know what makes him tick, and yet is at once fascinated and frustrated by the fact that oneself is the most difficult of all things to know.

When one sees with wisdom that all phenomena are empty of inherent existence, one is liberated from suffering.

The real purpose of Zen is to see things as they are, to observe things as they are, and to let everything go as it goes.

Meditation is like catching a fish. If you try to catch it quickly, you'll miss it. If you have patience and know how to wait, the fish will come.

Wherever you are, you are one with the clouds and one with the sun and the stars you see. You are one with everything. That is more true than I can say, and more true than you can hear.

Breathing in, there is only the present moment. Breathing out, it is a wonderful moment.

Open your arms to change, but don't let go of your values.

Radiate boundless love towards the entire world — above, below, and across — unhindered, without ill will, without enmity.

Fear keeps us focused on the past or worried about the future. If we can acknowledge our fear, we can realize that right now we are okay.

The key to happiness is inner peace. The greatest obstacles to inner peace are disturbing emotions such as anger, attachment, fear and suspicion.

The idea of Zen is to catch life as it flows. There is nothing extraordinary or mysterious about Zen. I raise my hand; I take a book from the other side of the desk; I hear the boys playing ball outside my window; I see the clouds blown away beyond the neighboring wood: all these I do in Zen.

The practice of vipassana is the study of the self. When you study physical and mental phenomena, you are studying the truth about yourself.

The more we care for the happiness of others, the greater our own sense of well-being becomes.

Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them, humanity cannot survive.

Peace requires us to surrender our illusions of control.