100+ Sharon Salzberg Quotes | InspiringQuotes.us

source: - "A conversation with meditation teacher and co-founder of Insight Meditation Society: Sharon Salzberg". Interview with Nancy Alder, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

Topics: Important, Come Up, Relate

Each decision we make, each action we take, is born out of an intention.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Oct 13, 2012

Topics: Hard Work, Decisions We Make, Choices

It doesn't matter how long we may have been stuck in a sense of our limitations. If we go into a darkened room and turn on the light, it doesn't matter if the room has been dark for a day, a week, or ten thousand years - we turn on the light and it is illuminated. Once we control our capacity for love and happiness, the light has been turned on.

Topics: Happiness, Dark, Years, Turn-on

Mindfulness isn't difficult, we just need to remember to do it.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Sep 16, 2013

Topics: Inspiration, Meditation Practice, Mindfulness, Meditation Mindfulness, Mindful Living

Mindfulness allows us to watch our thoughts, see how one thought leads to the next, decide if we're heading down an unhealthy path, and, if so, let go and change directions.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2010). “Real Happiness - Enhanced Ebook Edition: The Power of Meditation: A 28-Day Program”, p.111, Workman Publishing

Topics: Letting Go, Mindfulness, Watches

To be truly happy in this world is a revolutionary act...It is a radical change of view that liberates us so that we know who we are most deeply and can acknowledge our enormous ability to love.

Topics: Views, World, Who We Are, Ability To Love

Loving ourselves opens us to truly knowing ourselves as part of the matrix of existence, inextricably connected to the boundlessness of life... when we see that we are far bigger than the person that is delineated by family or cultural expectations, we realize we are capable of so much more than we usually dare to imagine.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2012). “The Force of Kindness: Change Your Life with Love & Compassion”, p.19, Sounds True

Topics: Knowing, Expectations, Realizing

Meditation is the ultimate mobile device; you can use it anywhere, anytime, unobtrusively.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Oct 13, 2013

Topics: Inspiration, Meditation Practice, Meditation And Yoga, Meditation Life, Meditation Mindfulness

As I go through all kinds of feelings and experiences in my journey through life -- delight, surprise, chagrin, dismay -- I hold this question as a guiding light: 'What do I really need right now to be happy?' What I come to over and over again is that only qualities as vast and deep as love, connection and kindness will really make me happy in any sort of enduring way.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Nov 28, 2013

Topics: Happiness, Kindness, Journey, Love Connection, Dismay

We often get caught up in our own reactions and forget the vulnerability of the person in front of us.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Feb 19, 2013

Topics: Forget, Reactions, Caught

To remember non-attachment is to remember what freedom is all about. If we get attached, even to a beautiful state of being, we are caught, and ultimately we will suffer. We work to observe anything that comes our way, experience it while it is here, and be able to let go of it.

source: - "The Buddha’s Five Protections - Part 2" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. June 19, 2010.

Topics: Beautiful, Letting Go, Attachment

Find a gap between a trigger event and our usual conditioned response to it and by using that pause to collect ourselves and shift our response

Topics: Usual, Events, Gaps

The art of concentration is a continual letting go. We let go of what is inessential or distracting. We let go of a thought or a feeling, not because we are afraid of it or because we can’t bear to acknowledge it as a part of our experience; but, because it is UNNECESSARY.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (1999). “A Heart as Wide as the World”, p.20, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Letting Go, Art, Feelings

The cultivation of generosity is the beginning of spiritual awakening. Generosity has tremendous force because it arises from an inner quality of letting go. Being able to let go, to give up, to renounce, and to give generously all spring from the same source, and when we practice generosity ... we open up these qualities within ourselves.

Topics: Letting Go, Spiritual, Giving Up

True giving is a thoroughly joyous thing to do. We experience happiness when we form the intention to give, in the actual act of giving, and in the recollection of the fact that we have given. Generosity is a celebration. When we give something to someone we feel connected to them, and our commitment to the path of peace and awareness deepens.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (1999). “A Heart as Wide as the World”, p.187, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Commitment, Generosity, Giving

If you’re reading these words, perhaps it’s because something has kicked open the door for you, and you’re ready to embrace change. It isn’t enough to appreciate change from afar, or only in the abstract, or as something that can happen to other people but not to you. We need to create change for ourselves, in a workable way, as part of our everyday lives.

Topics: Buddhist, Reading, Doors, Embrace Change

If we fall, we don't need self-recrimination or blame or anger - we need a reawakening of our intention and a willingness to re-commit, to be whole-hearted once again.

Topics: Change, Fall, Self

Metta is the ability to embrace all parts of ourselves, as well as all parts of the world. Practicing metta illuminates our inner integrity because it relieves us of the need to deny different aspects of ourselves.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2002). “Lovingkindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness”, p.27, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Integrity, Different, Needs, Metta

Loving kindness is the spirit of friendship toward yourself and others.

Topics: Kindness, Spirit, Loving Kindness

One of the primary conditions for suffering is denial. Shutting our mind to pain, whether in ourselves or others, only ensures that it will continue. We must have the strength to face it without turning away. By opening to the pain we see around us with wisdom and compassion, we start to experience the intimate connection of our relationship with all beings.

Topics: Pain, Compassion, Mind

You might have extensive bouts of thinking exceedingly nasty thoughts, but because you are relating to those thoughts with mindfulness and compassion, that's considered good meditation.

source: - "A conversation with meditation teacher and co-founder of Insight Meditation Society: Sharon Salzberg". Interview with Nancy Alder, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

Topics: Thinking, Compassion, Meditation

We find greater lightness & ease in our lives as we increasingly care for ourselves & other beings.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Jul 17, 2011

Topics: Ease, Care, Greater, Lightness

Mindfulness helps us get better at seeing the difference between what’s happening and the stories we tell ourselves about what’s happening, stories that get in the way of direct experience. Often such stories treat a fleeting state of mind as if it were our entire and permanent self.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2010). “Real Happiness - Enhanced Ebook Edition: The Power of Meditation: A 28-Day Program”, p.13, Workman Publishing

Topics: Self, Meditation Practice, Differences

Every single moment is expressive of the truth of our lives when we know how to look.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from May 06, 2013

Topics: Single Mom, Looks, Moments, Expressive

Each of us has a genuine capacity for love, forgiveness, wisdom and compassion. Meditation awakens these qualities so that we can discover for ourselves the unique happiness that is our birthright.

Topics: Unique, Compassion, Meditation, Forgiveness Love

By engaging in a delusive quest for happiness, we bring only suffering upon ourselves. In our frantic search for something to quench our thirst, we overlook the water all around us and drive ourselves into exile from our own lives.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “Lovingkindness”, p.14, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Water, Suffering, Quests, Quench

Effort is the unconstrained willingness to persevere through difficulty.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Jul 07, 2011

Topics: Effort, Meditation, Persevere

The first step on the journey of faith is to recognize that everything is moving onward to something else, inside us and outside... We see that a self-image we've been holding doesn't need to define us forever, the next step is not the last step, what life was is not what it is now, and certainly not what it might yet be.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2003). “Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience”, p.17, Penguin

Topics: Faith, Moving, Journey

Even in the midst of devastation, something within us always points the way to freedom.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2003). “Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience”, p.82, Penguin

Topics: Recovery, Devastation, Way

In order to do anything about the suffering of the world we must have the strength to face it without turning away.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from May 07, 2013

Topics: Order, Suffering, World

Faith is not a commodity we either have or don't have-it is an inner quality that unfolds as we learn to trust our own deepest experience.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2003). “Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience”, p.9, Penguin

Topics: Spiritual, Quality, Commodity

You cannot fail at meditation.

Topics: Meditation, Failing

Mindfulness helps us to set boundaries by revealing what makes us unhappy & what brings us peace.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2013). “Real Happiness at Work: Meditations for Accomplishment, Achievement, and Peace”, p.32, Workman Publishing

Topics: Unhappy, Mindfulness, Helping

Let the breath lead the way.

source: - "Befriending the Body: Further Adventures of a Reluctant Meditator" by Barbara Markway, www.psychologytoday.com. March 14, 2012.

Topics: Meditation, Way, Breaths

Some things hurt, you know, and there's pain. But we magnify the suffering of it often, I think, by our reactions.

Topics: Hurt, Pain, Thinking

We are all too often told by someone that we are too old, too young, too different, too much the same, and those comments can be devastating.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2012). “The Force of Kindness: Change Your Life with Love & Compassion”, p.38, Sounds True

Topics: Meditation, Different, Too Much

There are many times when I have to remind myself that people who harm others are coming from a place of profound disconnection. It is not easy to recognize the pain such a person is in, especially because they may not be conscious of it themselves. They may present themselves to the world as just fine. If you believe human beings have a potential for deep connection, wisdom and love; the limitation in those peoples' lives becomes clearer.

source: - "A conversation with meditation teacher and co-founder of Insight Meditation Society: Sharon Salzberg". Interview with Nancy Alder, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

Topics: Pain, Believe, People, Deep Connections, Disconnection

The Buddha said that no true spiritual life is possible without a generous heart. . . . Generosity allies itself with an inner feeling of abundance - the feeling that we have enough to share.

Topics: Spiritual, Heart, Generosity, Inner Feelings, Generous Heart

I’m learning that to be at home everywhere, I have to be sure to include the place I actually live.

Topics: Home

Because the development of inner calm and energy happens completely within and isn't dependent on another person or a particular situation, we begin to feel a resourcefulness and independence that is quite beautiful - and a huge relief.

source: - "Real Happiness: The Power of Meditation - A 28-Day Program". Book by Sharon Salzberg, June, 2011.

Topics: Beautiful, Meditation, Independence, Resourcefulness

We do good because it frees the heart. It opens us to a wellspring of happiness.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “Lovingkindness”, p.166, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Heart, Wellspring

It is in the act of offering our hearts in faith that something in us transforms... proclaiming that we no longer stand on the sidelines but are leaping directly into the center of our lives, our truth, our full potential.

Topics: Faith, Heart, Offering

With the practice of meditation we can develop this ability to more fully love ourselves and to more consistently love others.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Jul 02, 2011

Topics: Practice, Meditation, Ability

Mindfulness, also called wise attention, helps us see what we’re adding to our experiences, not only during meditation sessions but also elsewhere.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2010). “Real Happiness - Enhanced Ebook Edition: The Power of Meditation: A 28-Day Program”, p.78, Workman Publishing

Topics: Wise, Meditation, Mindfulness

To reteach a thing its loveliness is the nature of metta. Through lovingkindness, everyone & everything can flower again from within.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “Lovingkindness”, p.22, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Flower, Metta, Loving Kindness, Lovingkindness, Loveliness

Meditation is a tool for helping us accept the profound fact that everything changes all the time.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2010). “Real Happiness - Enhanced Ebook Edition: The Power of Meditation: A 28-Day Program”, p.24, Workman Publishing

Topics: Time, Profound, Meditation

Patience doesn't mean making a pact with the devil of denial, ignoring our emotions and aspirations. It means being wholeheartedly engaged in the process that's unfolding, rather than ripping open a budding flower or demanding a caterpillar hurry up and get that chrysalis stage over with.

Topics: Flower, Mean, Devil, Pact, Wholeheartedly

Loving-kindness and compassion are the basis for wise, powerful, sometimes gentle, and sometimes fierce actions that can really make a difference - in our own lives and those of others.

Topics: Wise, Powerful, Kindness, Loving Kindness

Seeking is endless. It never comes to a state of rest; it never ceases.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “Lovingkindness”, p.66, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Mindfulness, States, Endless, Mindful Living

Compassion isn't morose; it's something replenishing and opening; that's why it makes us happy.

Topics: Compassion, Opening, Morose

What unites us as human beings is an urge for happiness which at heart is a yearning for union.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Dec 09, 2012

Topics: Heart, Unions, Yearning

As we practice meditation, we get used to stillness and eventually are able to make friends with the quietness of our sensations.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Jul 09, 2011

Topics: Practice, Meditation, Able

There are many different ways to practice meditation; it's good to experiment until you find one that seems to suit you.

Topics: Practice, Suits You, Meditation

Meditation trains the mind the way physical exercise strengthens the body.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2013). “Real Happiness at Work: Meditations for Accomplishment, Achievement, and Peace”, p.13, Workman Publishing

Topics: Exercise, Meditation, Mind

Mindfulness needs to not be judgmental to really be mindfulness, which means it needs a basis of loving kindness.

source: - "A conversation with meditation teacher and co-founder of Insight Meditation Society: Sharon Salzberg". Interview with Nancy Alder, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

Topics: Kindness, Mean, Mindfulness

Voting is the expression of our commitment to ourselves, one another, this country and this world.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Apr 06, 2016

Topics: Country, Commitment, Expression, Voting Day

Let the power of intention lead the way.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Jun 19, 2013

Topics: Way, Intention, Power Of Intention

We apply our effort to be mindful, to be aware in this very moment, right here and now, and we bring a very wholehearted effort to it. This brings concentration. It is this power of concentration that we use to cut through the world of surface appearances to get to a much deeper reality.

source: - "The Buddha’s Five Protections - Part 2" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. June 19, 2010.

Topics: Cutting, Reality, Effort

Pure generosity emerges when we give without the need for our offering to be received in a certain way. That’s why the best kind of generosity comes from inner abundance, rather than from feeling deficient and hollow, starved for validation.

Topics: Offering, Validation, Generosity

Someone who has experienced trauma also has gifts to offer all of us - in their depth, their knowledge of our universal vulnerability, and their experience of the power of compassion.

source: - "There Is Always Trauma In The Room" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. September 18, 2009.

Topics: Compassion, Depth, Trauma

It's easy for us to feel separate from other people and from other forms of life, especially if we don't have a reliable connection to our own inner world. Without insight into our internal cycles of pleasure and pain, desires and fears, there is a strong sense of being removed, apart or disconnected. When we do have an understanding of our inner lives, it provides an intuitive opening, even without words, to the ties that exist between ourselves and others.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2012). “The Force of Kindness: Change Your Life with Love & Compassion”, p.32, Sounds True

Topics: Strong, Pain, Ties, Inner Life, Disconnected

There is no 'thing' to let go of, but a concept, an idea of an ego that burdens us. As soon as we posit a 'thing' to let go of, we're in trouble. We need to change our view of reality, not attack a nonexistent entity.

Topics: Letting Go, Reality, Views, Need A Change

In contrast, compassion manifests in us as the offering of kindness rather than withdrawal. 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 compassion, and it allows us to reach beyond aversion and separation.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “The Kindness Handbook: A Practical Companion”, p.24, Sounds True

Topics: Pain, Kindness, Compassion

Compassion allows us to use our own pain and the pain of others as a vehicle for connection. This is a delicate and profound path. We may be adverse to seeing our own suffering because it tends to ignite a blaze of self-blame and regret. And we may be adverse to seeing suffering in others because we find it unbearable or distasteful, or we find it threatening to our own happiness. All of these possible reactions to the suffering in the word make us want to turn away from life.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “The Kindness Handbook: A Practical Companion”, p.24, Sounds True

Topics: Pain, Regret, Compassion

Compassion allows us to bear witness to suffering, whether it is in ourselves or others, without fear; it allows us to name injustice without hesitation, to act strongly, with all the skill at our disposal.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Jun 19, 2016

Topics: Compassion, Skills, Names, Lovingkindness

Love as a power can go anywhere. It isn't sentimental. It doesn't have to be pretty, yet it doesn't deny pain.

Topics: Love, Pain, Sentimental

Sometimes people don't trust the force of kindness. They think love or compassion or kindness will make you weak and kind of stupid and people will take advantage of you; you won't stand up for other people.

Topics: Kindness, Stupid, Thinking

Training our mind through meditation does not mean forcibly subjugating it or beating it into shape.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (1999). “A Heart as Wide as the World”, p.76, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Mean, Meditation, Training

Vulnerability in the face of constant change is what we share, whatever our present condition.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from May 17, 2016

Topics: Faces, Share, Constant

Dedicating some time to meditation is a meaningful expression of caring for yourself that can help you move through the mire of feeling unworthy of recovery. As your mind grows quieter and more spacious, you can begin to see self-defeating thought patterns for what they are, and open up to other, more positive options.

Topics: Meaningful, Moving, Recovery

One of the things that I think makes it hard in this society for us to tell the truth is the kind of conventional relationship to adversity. Things aren't always easy and rather than being taught to have kindness to ourselves and others in the light of that we're taught something very different; that it's wrong and rejected - that's a lot of conditioning to step away from.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Feb 11, 2015

Topics: Kindness, Adversity, Thinking

Meditation is not the construction of something foreign, it is not an effort to attain and then hold on to a particular experience. We may have a secret desire that through meditation we will accumulate a stockpile of magical experiences, or at least a mystical trophy or two, and then we will be able to proudly display them for others to see.

source: - "How Doing Nothing Can Help You Truly Live" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 24, 2010.

Topics: Two, Effort, Meditation, Secret Desire

Mindfulness can play a big role in transforming our experience with pain & other difficulties; it allows us to recognize the authenticity of the distress & yet not be overwhelmed by it.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2010). “Real Happiness - Enhanced Ebook Edition: The Power of Meditation: A 28-Day Program”, p.83, Workman Publishing

Topics: Pain, Play, Meditation

The mind thinks thoughts that we don't plan. It's not as if we say, 'At 9:10 I'm going to be filled with self-hatred.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Sep 07, 2016

Topics: Thinking, Self, Hatred, Self Hatred

We use mindfulness to observe the way we cling to pleasant experiences & push away unpleasant ones.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Feb 14, 2013

Topics: Mindfulness, Use, Way

You don't have to believe anything, adopt a dogma in order to learn how to meditate.

source: - "Meditation Practice: A Paradigm Shift" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. February 9, 2011.

Topics: Believe, Order, Dogma

To cherish others is to cherish ourselves. To cherish ourselves is to cherish others. And in that same way, we relate to the truth. If we support it, if we embrace it, if we uphold it, we will be embraced by it, we will be supported and upheld by it.

source: - "One Who Protects The Truth Will Be Protected By It" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 10, 2010.

Topics: Support, Way, Cherish

Detachment is not about refusing to feel or not caring or turning away from those you love. Detachment is profoundly honest, grounded firmly in the truth of what is.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Dec 04, 2013

Topics: Love, Truth, Honesty, Not Caring, Truth Love

It's a rare and precious thing to be close to suffering because our society - in many ways - tells us that suffering is wrong. If it's our own suffering, we try to hide it or isolate ourselves. If others are suffering, we're taught to put them away somewhere so we don't have to see it.

Topics: Suffering, Trying, Our Society

The quality of mindfulness does not just know something is happening - e.g. there is an emotion, a sensation - but knows without clinging or condemning.

source: - "A conversation with meditation teacher and co-founder of Insight Meditation Society: Sharon Salzberg". Interview with Nancy Alder, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

Topics: Quality, Doe, Mindfulness, Condemning

An ordinary favor we do for someone or any compassionate reaching out may seem to be going nowhere at first, but may be planting a seed we can't see right now. Sometimes we need to just do the best we can and then trust in an unfolding we can't design or ordain.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Sep 22, 2013

Topics: Motivational, Compassion, Design

Throughout our lives we long to love ourselves more deeply and to feel connected with others. Instead, we often contract, fear intimacy, and suffer a bewildering sense of separation. We crave love, and yet we are lonely. Our delusion of being separate from one another, of being apart from all that is around us, gives rise to all of this pain.

source: - "Lovingkindness". Book by Sharon Salzberg, July 14, 2014.

Topics: Lonely, Emo, Pain, Emo Love

For all of us, love can be the natural state of our own being; naturally at peace, naturally connected, because this becomes the reflection of who we simply are.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “Lovingkindness”, p.73, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Reflection, Natural, States, Lovingkindness

Love and concern for all are not things some of us are born with and others are not. Rather, they are results of what we do with our minds: We can choose to transform our minds so that they embody love, or we can allow them to develop habits and false concepts of separation.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Mar 11, 2015

Topics: Relationship, Spiritual, Communication

Things don't just happen in this world of arising and passing away. We don't live in some kind of crazy, accidental universe. Things happen according to certain laws, laws of nature. Laws such as the law of karma, which teaches us that as a certain seed gets planted, so will that fruit be.

source: - "Buddhism: Between Desire and Emptiness" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 3, 2010.

Topics: Karma, Crazy, Law, Law Of Karma

It is because of that balanced relationship to the moment that mindfulness serves as the platform for insight... if we feel an emotion, for example, and struggle against it right away, there is not going to be a lot of learning going on. In the same way, if we are swamped by that emotion, overcome by it, there won't be enough space for there to be learning or insight.

source: - "A conversation with meditation teacher and co-founder of Insight Meditation Society: Sharon Salzberg". Interview with Nancy Alder, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

Topics: Struggle, Space, Way, Balanced Relationship

We long for permanence but everything in the known universe is transient. That's a fact but one we fight.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2010). “Real Happiness - Enhanced Ebook Edition: The Power of Meditation: A 28-Day Program”, p.82, Workman Publishing

Topics: Fighting, Long, Meditation, Permanence, Transient

Meditation is a microcosm, a model, a mirror. The skills we practice when we sit are transferable to the rest of our lives.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2010). “Real Happiness - Enhanced Ebook Edition: The Power of Meditation: A 28-Day Program”, p.73, Workman Publishing

Topics: Inspiration, Mirrors, Practice

We can learn the art of fierce compassion - redefining strength, deconstructing isolation and renewing a sense of community, practicing letting go of rigid us-vs.-them thinking - while cultivating power and clarity in response to difficult situations.

source: - "Fierce Compassion" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. August 14, 2012.

Topics: Letting Go, Art, Thinking

People turn to meditation because they want to make good decisions, break bad habits & bounce back better from disappointments.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Aug 05, 2011

Topics: Disappointment, People, Meditation

When we are devoted to the development of kindness, it becomes our ready response, so that reacting from compassion, from caring, is not a question of giving ourselves a lecture: 'I don't really feel like it, but I'd better be helpful, or what would people think?'

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2010). “The Force of Kindness: Change Your Life with Love and Compassion”, p.4, Sounds True

Topics: Kindness, Caring, Thinking

We like things to manifest right away, and they may not. Many times, we're just planting a seed and we don't know exactly how it is going to come to fruition. It's hard for us to realize that what we see in front of us might not be the end of the story.

Topics: Fruition, Stories, May

By prizing heartfulness above faultlessness, we may reap more from our effort because we're more likely to be changed by it.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Oct 11, 2012

Topics: Effort, May, Changed

To offer our hearts in faith means recognizing that our hearts are worth something, that we ourselves, in our deepest and truest nature, are of value.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2003). “Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience”, p.92, Penguin

Topics: Heart, Mean, Recognizing

There's a famous quotation from the time the Buddha learned of the deaths of two of his greatest disciples: "It's as if the sun and the moon have left the sky." From that quotation, I would guess that while the Buddha loved all beings everywhere, with no exclusion, he also had relationships that were special to him, and he felt their loss.

Topics: Buddhist, Loss, Moon

The movement of the heart as we practice generosity in the outer world mirrors the movement of the heart when we let go of conditioned views about ourselves on our inner journey. Letting go creates a joyful sense of space in our minds

source: - Sharon Salzberg (1999). “A Heart as Wide as the World”, p.187, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Letting Go, Heart, Journey, Outer Worlds, Inner Journey

As we practice meditation we are bringing forth ease, presence, compassion, wisdom & trust.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Apr 03, 2013

Topics: Compassion, Practice, Meditation

Faith is not a commodity that you either have or don't have enough of, or the right kind of. It's an ongoing process. The opposite of faith is despair.

Topics: Opposites, Despair, Ongoing

You should never use the word Karma when talking about someone else, it's only a concept you should apply to yourself as a matter of investigation.

Topics: Karma, Talking, Use, Talking About Someone

To sense which gifts to accept which to leave behind is our path to discovering freedom.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Jul 20, 2013

Topics: Path, Accepting, Discovering

What you learn about pain in formal meditation can help you relate to it in your daily life.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Dec 07, 2016

Topics: Pain, Meditation, Helping

over time, offering loving kindness to all beings everywhere, including ourselves, unites us to one another so that we know that we can not go forward forgetting those left behind." Page 62

Topics: Kindness, Offering, Pages

The key to cultivating confidence in ourselves is understanding our right to make the truth our own.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from May 04, 2013

Topics: Keys, Understanding, Cultivating

With attachment all that seems to exist is just me & that object I desire.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “Lovingkindness”, p.63, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Attachment, Meditation, Desire

Everyone's mind wanders, without doubt, and we always have to start over. Everyone resists or dislikes the thought of or is too tired to meditate at times, and we have to be able to begin again.

source: - "Opening the Heart with Lovingkindness" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. March 3, 2011.

Topics: Tired, Starting Over, Doubt

When we practice metta, we open continuously to the truth of our actual experience, changing our relationship to life.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “Lovingkindness”, p.26, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Practice, Our Relationship, Metta

I have seen that there are a number of people who benefit from doing loving kindness meditation, either prior to or along with mindfulness meditation. It varies from person to person of course, but for many, their practice of mindfulness will bring along old habits of self-judgment and ruthless criticism, so it is not actually mindfulness.

source: - "A conversation with meditation teacher and co-founder of Insight Meditation Society: Sharon Salzberg". Interview with Nancy Alder, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

Topics: Kindness, Practice, Old Habits

Meeting people in a genuine way and feeling like there is a vital and meaningful connection going on makes me come alive.

Topics: Meaningful, People, Feelings, Meaningful Connections

In our usual mind state, we are continually activating the process that in Buddhist terminology is known as 'bhava,' which literally means 'becoming.' In this space of becoming, we are subtly leaning forward into the future, trying to have security based on feeling that we can hold on, we can try to keep things from changing.

source: - "How Doing Nothing Can Help You Truly Live" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 24, 2010.

Topics: Buddhist, Mean, Space, Terminology

I think what we (as a society) need from artists of all kinds is courage, a willingness to explore, and a really big sense of possibility.

Topics: Artist, Thinking, Needs

Develop a mind so filled with love that it resembles space.

source: - "Practicing Loving Kindness In The Capital" by Matteo Pistono, www.huffingtonpost.com. July 12, 2011.

Topics: Space, Mind, Filled

As we look around, it's very clear that in this world people do outrageous things to one another all of the time. It's not that these qualities or actions make us bad people, but they bring tremendous suffering if we don't know how to work with them.

source: - "The Buddha’s Five Protections - Part 1" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 29, 2010.

Topics: People, Suffering, Quality

Our practice rather than being about killing the ego is about simply discovering our true nature.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Dec 06, 2014

Topics: Practice, Ego, Killing

I call myself a meditation teacher rather than a spiritual teacher.

source: - "A Way Out of Suffering: An Interview With Sharon Salzberg". "Omega Institute" Interview, www.huffingtonpost.com. August 26, 2012.

Topics: Spiritual, Teacher, Spiritual Teachers

Fearful of wasting a second, we hoard time as if it were money.

Topics: Fearful, Ifs

The most common response I hear when I tell people I teach meditation is, "I'm so stressed out. I could use some of that!" A response I also sometimes hear, which amuses me a lot is, "My partner should really meet you!"

source: - "A conversation with meditation teacher and co-founder of Insight Meditation Society: Sharon Salzberg". Interview with Nancy Alder, www.marandapleasantmedia.com. August 4, 2013.

Topics: People, Meditation, Stressed

Resilience is based on compassion for ourselves as well as compassion for others

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Jun 24, 2016

Topics: Compassion, Resilience, Wells, Compassion For Others

In a single moment we can understand we are not just facing a knee pain, or our discouragement and our wishing the sitting would end, but that right in the moment of seeing that knee pain, we're able to explore the teachings of the Buddha. What does it mean to have a painful experience? What does it mean to hate it, and to fear it?

source: - "The Buddha’s Five Protections - Part 1" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 29, 2010.

Topics: Pain, Hate, Teaching, Painful Experiences

Voting is like alchemy - taking an abstract value and breathing life into it.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Sep 28, 2012

Topics: Breathing, Voting, Abstract, Breathing Life

The meditation traditions I started and have continued practicing have all emphasized inclusivity: anyone can do this who is interested.

source: - "Meditation Practice: A Paradigm Shift" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. February 9, 2011.

Topics: Meditation, Tradition, Can Do

I prefer to think of faith, as Coleridge says of poetry, not as the taking up of belief but as "the willing suspension of disbelief". . . a willingness to be open, to explore, to investigate.

Topics: Faith, Thinking, Belief, Suspension Of Disbelief

Compassion grows in us when we know how the energy of love is available all around us.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from May 14, 2013

Topics: Love Is, Compassion, Energy

We can have skills training in mindfulness so that we are using our attention to perceive something in the present moment. This perception is not so latent by fears or projections into the future, or old habits, and then I can actually stir loving-kindness or compassion in skills training too, which can be sort of provocative, I found.

source: - "How to Get Real Happiness: An Interview with Sharon Salzberg". Interview with Elisha Goldstein, www.huffingtonpost.com. November 17, 2011.

Topics: Kindness, Compassion, Skills Training, Latent

Metta sees truly that our integrity is inviolate, no matter what our life situation may be. We do not need to fear anything. We are whole: our deepest happiness is intrinsic to the nature of our minds, and it is not damaged through uncertainty and change.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “Lovingkindness”, p.27, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Integrity, Meditation, Mind, Metta

We don’t need any sort of religious orientation to lead a life that is ethical, compassionate & kind.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Jul 18, 2011

Topics: Religious, Needs, Kind

In Buddhist teaching, ignorance is considered the fundamental cause of violence - ignorance... about the separation of self and other... about the consequences of our actions.

Topics: Buddhist, Teaching, Ignorance, Consequences Of Our Actions

I've always said that lovingkindness and compassion are inevitably woven throughout meditation practice even if the words are never used or implied, no matter what technique or method we are using.

source: - "Opening the Heart with Lovingkindness" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. March 3, 2011.

Topics: Compassion, Meditation Practice, Technique, Lovingkindness, Implied

From the Buddhist point of view, it is true that emptiness is a characteristic of all of life - if we look carefully at any experience we will find transparency, insubstantiality, with no solid, unchanging core to our experience. But that does not mean that nothing matters.

source: - "Buddhism: Between Desire and Emptiness" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 3, 2010.

Topics: Buddhist, Mean, Views, Nothing Matters

Everyone loses touch with their aspiration, and we need the heart to return to what we really care about. All of this is based on developing greater lovingkindness and compassion.

source: - "Opening the Heart with Lovingkindness" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. March 3, 2011.

Topics: Heart, Compassion, Needs, Lovingkindness

Our path, our sense of spirituality demands great earnestness, dedication, sincerity & continuity.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Apr 30, 2013

Topics: Dedication, Demand, Path

As an ability, love is always there as a potential, ready to flourish and help our lives flourish. As we go up and down in life, as we acquire or lose, as we are showered with praise or unfairly blamed, always within there is the ability of love, recognized or not, given life or not.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “The Kindness Handbook: A Practical Companion: Easy Read Comfort Edition”, p.9, ReadHowYouWant.com

Topics: Love Is, Helping, Praise, Given Life

In our own lives and in our communities, we need to find a way to include others rather than exclude them. We need to find a way to allow our pain and suffering, individually and collectively.

source: - "Taking a Shot at Peace" by Suna Senman, www.huffingtonpost.com. April 9, 2013.

Topics: Pain, Community, Suffering

I stepped onto the spiritual path moved by an inner sense that I might find greatness of heart, that I might find profound belonging, that I might find a hidden source of love and compassion. Like a homing instinct for freedom, my intuitive sense that this was possible was the faint, flickering, yet undeniable expression of faith.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2003). “Faith: Trusting Your Own Deepest Experience”, p.18, Penguin

Topics: Spiritual, Heart, Greatness

It is taught, we too can be enlightened, every one of us. We can be completely freed from the bonds of limitation and conditioned confusion through our own endeavor, inspiration, effort and development. There is a path, and we can traverse it.

source: - "A True Refuge" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. January 21, 2012.

Topics: Inspiration, Confusion, Effort, Traverse

It's interesting that people bring different things to oppressive and difficult situations, when they're reduced to the barest terms of survival. That's what provides tension in a lot of films.

Topics: Difficult Situations, People, Interesting

I've spent quite a bit of my life as a meditation teacher and writer commending the strengths of love and compassion.

source: - "Fierce Compassion" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. August 14, 2012.

Topics: Teacher, Compassion, Meditation, Love Strength

The embodiment of kindness is often made difficult by our long ingrained patterns of fear & jealousy.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Jul 15, 2011

Topics: Kindness, Long, Patterns

Meditation is a cyclical process that defies analysis, but demands acceptance.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from May 13, 2013

Topics: Acceptance, Meditation, Analysis

Rapture is the gateway to nirvana.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2008). “Lovingkindness”, p.43, Shambhala Publications

Topics: Gateways, Rapture

I will love myself as long as I never make a mistake.

source: - Sharon Salzberg (2010). “Real Happiness: The Power of Meditation: A 28-Day Program”, p.146, Workman Publishing

Topics: Mistake, Long, Love Myself

It is so powerful when we can leave behind our ordinary identities, no longer think of ourselves primarily as a conductor, or writer, or salesclerk, and go to a supportive environment to deeply immerse in meditation practice.

source: - "Meditation Practice: A Paradigm Shift" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. February 9, 2011.

Topics: Powerful, Thinking, Meditation Practice

My earliest experiences in meditation were in a context of intensive retreats.

source: - "Meditation Practice: A Paradigm Shift" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. February 9, 2011.

Topics: Meditation, Retreat

My ideal registration system would be an opt-out one, where every single person is registered once they turn 18. In Australia, I’m told, everyone is registered to vote and you pay a fine if you don’t vote.

source: - "Who to Vote For?" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. September 26, 2012.

Topics: Australia, Would Be, Pay, Registration

Some people have a mistaken idea that all thoughts disappear through meditation and we enter a state of blankness. There certainly are times of great tranquility when concentration is strong and we have few, if any, thoughts. But other times, we can be flooded with memories, plans or random thinking. It's important not to blame yourself.

Topics: Strong, Memories, Thinking, Blankness

We all want to be happy. We need to expand the notion of what that means, to make it bigger and wiser.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Feb 20, 2011

Topics: Mean, Needs, Want

Once someone appears to us primarily as an object, kindness has no place to root.

source: - FaceBook post by Sharon Salzberg from Jul 21, 2011

Topics: Kindness, Roots, Objects

Even on the spiritual path, we have things we'll tend to cover up or be in denial about.

source: - "A Way Out of Suffering: An Interview With Sharon Salzberg". "Omega Institute" Interview, www.huffingtonpost.com. August 26, 2012.

Topics: Spiritual, Cover Ups, Denial

As we work to reweave the strands of connection, we can be supported by the wisdom and lovingkindness of others.

source: - "There Is Always Trauma In The Room" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. September 18, 2009.

Topics: Connections, Strands, Lovingkindness

Doing nothing means unplugging from the compulsion to always keep ourselves busy, the habit of shielding ourselves from certain feelings, the tension of trying to manipulate our experience before we even fully acknowledge what that experience is.

source: - "How Doing Nothing Can Help You Truly Live" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 24, 2010.

Topics: Mean, Feelings, Trying

When we see the relatedness of ourselves to the universe, that we do not live as isolated entities, untouched by what is going on around us, not affecting what is going on around us, when we see through that, that we are interrelated, then we can see that to protect others is to protect ourselves, and to protect ourselves it to protect others.

source: - "One Who Protects The Truth Will Be Protected By It" by Sharon Salzberg, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 10, 2010.

Topics: Entity, Protect, Isolated

Every day seems to reveal a new piece of research about meditation, or new clinical applications of mindfulness or compassion practice, or new corporations or foundations or non-profits bringing mindfulness to work.

source: - "A conversation with meditation teacher and co-founder of Insight Meditation Society: Sharon Salzberg". Interview with Nancy Alder, www.marandapleasantmedia.com. August 4, 2013.

Topics: Compassion, Practice, Meditation, Clinicals, Non Profit

I am totally amazed at the spread of interest in meditation. When I first came back from studying in India in 1974, I would be asked in social situations what I did. When I replied, "I teach meditation" they would frequently look at me as though to say "That is weird," and sort of sidle away.

source: - "A conversation with meditation teacher and co-founder of Insight Meditation Society: Sharon Salzberg". Interview with Nancy Alder, www.marandapleasantmedia.com. August 4, 2013.

Topics: Meditation, Firsts, India

My experience working with lots of creative people is that they don't lose their artistic edge when they lose a fierce level of anguish. They just create from a different place.

Topics: People, Creative, Different