Daily Buddhist Verses

last SG · 2005-05-29T17:49:29+00:00

Our normal way of relating people is to see ourself as separate from the others.To objectify beings as separate you and make them an object of attachment is...

cycle SG

Notice your attachments to food, clothing, shelter, and adopt monastic practices of contentment to a layperson's life. Be satistified with adequate food, clothing, and shelter. Use the additional free time for meditation so that you can overcome more problems.

~ The Dalai Lama

cycle SG

A person who accepts responsibilty for his decision is in a position to effect great change in his life while someone who continuously attributes his failures and confusion to others digs himself into a hole...
When we take responsibility for our decisions, then we give the power to change.

~ Venerable Thubten Chodron

cycle SG

Many animals were living in a forest. One fateful day the forest was on fire and there was no way out except one exit route which was separated by a river. All the animals reached this dead end and couldn't do anything.

At that moment, The Great Deer immediately laid himself over the river using his front and back legs on opposite river-banks; and using his body as a bridge, one by one, the animals stepped on his back to cross the river.

The flesh on The Great Deer's back had opened up badly thus, but with a great compassion to save others, he endured the excruciating pain with all his might right till the last rabbit crossed over to safety. After that, The Great Deer's back snapped and he fell to his death into the river.

~ A story from sutra: Da Zhi Du Run

cycle SG

With a good heart, compassion for others whenever a problem arises, you experience it for others, on behalf of other sentient beings. If you experience happiness, you experience it for others. If you enjoy a luxury life, comfort, you dedicate it to others. And if you experience a problem, you experience it for others - for others to be free of problems and to have happiness up to enlightenment, complete perfect peace and bliss. Wishing others to have happiness, you experience problems on their behalf.

~ Lama Zopa Rinpoche, The Joy Of Compassion

cycle SG

The mind, the Buddha, living creatures-
These are not three different things.

~ Avatamasaka Sutra

cycle SG

The eating of meat extinguishes the seed of great compassion.

~Mahaparinirvana Sutra

cycle SG

If a person does not harm any living being,
and does not kill or cause others to kill,
that person is a true spiritual practitioner.

~ Buddha

cycle SG

I'm like a fallen leaf on the surface of the water,
Flowing forward, flowing away.
Suddenly stopping, suddenly spinning.
Sometimes waves arise, submerging it.
Sometimes it is calm, but still it flows on.
Why is it like that?
Not only does the fallen leaf not understand,
the one like the fallen leaf does not understand.
Some insights are realised in the moment,
some upon hindsight.
Everything about me changes within limitlessly complex
causes and conditions.
Causes and conditions are that real,
yet that unfathomable!

~Venerable Ying shun

cycle SG

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

~Yasutani Roshi

cycle SG

We must learn to face, accept, overcome
and detach from troubles.

~ Buddha

cycle SG

To be angry is to let other's mistakes punish yourself.
To forgive others is to be good to yourself.

~ Zen Master Sheng Yan

An Eternal Now SG

Wow cycle, alot of nice quotes.. where did you find them from?

cycle SG

Well, after telling you that I'd try to contribute to this thread, I've been speed reading all the Buddhism books, articles, magazines, websites etc, searching for interesting quotes for posting. It takes some time cos I hv to understand what I'm going to post. Most of my materials are in mandarin, so I hv a hard time translating them. Those chim ones I hv to give up, I don't want to quote wrongly. Smile

cycle SG

Human beings act like machines whose funtion is to make money. This is absolutely wrong. The purpose of making money is the happiness of humankind, not the other way round. Humans are not for money, money is for humans. We need enough to live, so money is neccessary, but we also need to realize that if there is too much attachment to wealth, it does not help at all. As the saints of India and Tibet tell us, the wealthier one becomes, the more suffering one endures.

~ The Dalai Lama, How To Practice

cycle SG

This existence of ours is as transient as autumn clouds.
To watch the birth and death of beings is like
looking at the movements of a dance.
A lifetime is like a flash of lightening in the sky,
rushing by, like a torrent down a steep moutain.

~Buddha

cycle SG

As one lamp senses to dispel a thousand years of darkness,
so one flash of wisdom destroys ten thousand years of ignorance.

~Hui neng

An Eternal Now SG

Oh I see.. thanks a lot. You're very resourceful and helpful Very Happy

cycle SG

Nah... applying the law of cause and effect, you're the one that started this useful thread and I learn a lot too while searching for materials; and hopefully the effect is everyone will get inspired by these words of wisdom. Smile

cycle SG

All conditioned phenomena
Are like a dream, an illusion, a bubble, a shadow
like the dew, or like lightning
You should discern them like this

~ The Diamond Sutra

cycle SG

Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.

~ Albert Einstein

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