The first noble truth of the Buddha is that life contains suffering. The second noble truth is that the cause of suffering is craving.

Zen in its essence is the art of seeing into the nature of one's own being, and it points the way from bondage to freedom.

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

When you recognize that pain and suffering are impermanent, you become free.

Like a dream, like an illusion, like a city of gandharvas, that's how birth, and that's how living, that's how dying are taught to be.

The secret of happiness is to want what you already have.

My father is the intrinsic awareness, Samantabhadra. My mother is the ultimate sphere of reality, Samantabhadri. I belong to the caste of non-duality of these two.

The eye with which I see Buddha is the same eye with which Buddha sees me.

If I had any position, I would thereby have a flaw. But since I have no position, I alone am without flaw.

The color of the mountains is Buddha's body; the sound of running water is his great speech.

The biggest prison is the one we build in our own mind.

The Noble Eightfold Path is not a path of mere intellectual understanding but a path of practice, of inner transformation.

The more a thing tends to be permanent, the more it tends to be lifeless.

The key to the Buddha's teaching is not grasping, not trying to hold onto things that are essentially impermanent and unstable.

In the moment of pure noting, there is no self - only the knowing and the known.

The path of practice requires both faith and wisdom, both devotion and understanding.

What we call "I" is just a swinging door which moves when we inhale and when we exhale.

Awareness is always with us. We don't need to create it or achieve it - we just need to recognize what's already there.

The essence of the teaching is emptiness and compassion. Without emptiness, compassion can become attachment. Without compassion, emptiness can become cold and distant.

The nature of all things is like a magical illusion, a mirage, a dream, a reflection of the moon in water.

Impermanence, suffering, and non-self are not philosophical concepts but realities to be directly perceived through mindfulness practice.

To live fully is to let go and die with each step.

To think in terms of either pessimism or optimism oversimplifies the truth. The problem is to see reality as it is.

Life is like a cup of tea. It's all in how you make it.

The three characteristics - impermanence, suffering, and non-self - are not philosophical concepts but aspects of experience to be directly observed.

The true person is not anyone in particular. But like the deep blue color of the limitless sky, it is everyone, everywhere in the world.

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

Our basic nature is pure awareness that simply cognizes experience. Everything else is temporary and adventitious.

Real freedom is not about controlling our experience, but about being free within our experience.

Health is the greatest gift, contentment the greatest wealth, faithfulness the best relationship.

The period of greatest gain in knowledge and experience is the most difficult period in one's life.

Because you are alive, everything is possible.

All experiences are preceded by mind, having mind as their master, created by mind.

If you want to know the past, look at the present. If you want to know the future, look at the present.

The Buddha's teaching challenges us to master the art of living, to live in a way that leads to the extinction of suffering.

The Buddha taught that wealth does not bring happiness and security. The pursuit of wealth is a matter of living in balance.

The Buddha's teachings are not a religion, but a science of mind.

The fundamental delusion of humanity is to suppose that I am here and you are out there.

Enlightenment is like the moon reflected on the water. The moon does not get wet, nor is the water broken.

The Buddha and all sentient beings are nothing but expressions of the one mind. There is nothing else.

When we understand that peace is not dependent on external conditions, we can find it in the midst of any circumstance.

Both formerly and now, it is only suffering that I describe, and the cessation of suffering.

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

To study the Way is to study the self. To study the self is to forget the self. To forget the self is to be enlightened by all things.

The nature of mind is like a mirror. It is not affected by whatever appears in it, yet it never fails to reflect everything perfectly.

The Buddha never taught a sectarian religion; he taught Dhamma - the way to liberation - which is universal.

Real happiness lies within. It cannot be found in external objects or achievements.

This very body is the Buddha. And this very earth the lotus paradise.

When concentration is developed, wisdom arises. When wisdom arises, one becomes disenchanted with the five aggregates.

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

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

The ocean does not reject any water; therefore it is great. The mountain does not select its stones; therefore it is great.

The contradiction so puzzling to the ordinary way of thinking comes from the fact that we have to use language to communicate our inner experience, which in its very nature transcends linguistics.

Three things cannot be long hidden: the sun, the moon, and the truth.

The ultimate source of happiness is not money and power, but warm-heartedness.

The only things that are truly mine are my actions and their results.

Where ignorance is our master, there is no possibility of real peace.

The mind is the source of all happiness and the source of all suffering.

Awareness is like the sun. When it shines on things, they are transformed.

The more we understand impermanence, the more we appreciate each moment of our lives.