Buddhist Psychology Quotes

I'm helped by a gentle notion from Buddhist psychology, that there are "near enemies" to every great virtue - reactions that come from a place of care in us, and which feel right and good, but which subtly take us down an ineffectual path. Sorrow is a near enemy to compassion and to love. It is borne of sensitivity and feels like empathy. But it can paralyze and turn us back inside with a sense that we can't possibly make a difference. The wise Buddhist anthropologist and teacher Roshi Joan Halifax calls this a "pathological empathy" of our age. In the face of magnitudes of pain in the world that come to us in pictures immediate and raw, many of us care too much and see no evident place for our care to go. But compassion goes about finding the work that can be done. Love can't help but stay present ~ Krista Tippett

The great gift of a spiritual path is coming to trust that you can find a way to true refuge. You realize that you can start right where you are, in the midst of your life, and find peace in any circumstance. Even at those moments when the ground shakes terribly beneath you - when there's a loss that will alter your life forever - you can still trust that you will find your way home. This is possible because you've touched the timeless love and awareness that are intrinsic to who you are. ~ Tara Brach

Awakening self-compassion is often the greatest challenge people face on the spiritual path. ~ Tara Brach

Each time you meet an old emotional pattern with presence, your awakening to truth can deepen. There's less identification with the self in the story and more ability to rest in the awareness that is witnessing what's happening. You become more able to abide in compassion, to remember and trust your true home. Rather than cycling repetitively through old conditioning, you are actually spiraling toward freedom. ~ Tara Brach

I recently read in the book My Stroke of Insight by brain scientist Jill Bolte Taylor that the natural life span of an emotion - the average time it takes for it to move through the nervous system and body - is only a minute and a half. After that we need thoughts to keep the emotion rolling. So if we wonder why we lock into painful emotional states like anxiety, depression, or rage, we need look no further than our own endless stream of inner dialogue. ~ Tara Brach

Buddhist Psychology

You can use enlightening Buddhist practices to transform your life. Unfortunately, many people do not know it, but the Buddhist Dharma, or teaching, is actually a scientific system of psychology, developed in India and further refined in Tibet. It is a psychology that works. I call it a „joyous science of the heart" because it is based on the idea that while unenlightened life is full of suffering, you are completely capable of escaping from that suffering. You can get well. In fact, you already are well; you just need to awaken to that fact.

And how do you do this? By analyzing your thought patterns. When you do, you realize that you are full of „misknowledge" - misunderstandings of yourself and the world that lead to anger, discontent, and fear. The target of Buddhist practice and the constant theme of this book is the primal misconception that you are the center of the universe, that your „self" is a fixed, constant, and bounded entity. When you meditate on enlightened insights into the true nature of reality and the boundlessness of the self, you develop new habits of thinking. You free yourself from the constraints of your habitual mind. In other words, you teach yourself to think differently. This in turn leads you to act differently. And voila! You are on the path to happiness, fulfillment, and even enlightenment.

The battle for happiness is fought and won or lost primarily within the mind. The mind is the absolute ~ Robert A.F. Thurman

Every living thing is sacred to me. Compassion and love can heal this world, which is set on fire of violence and hatred. I will teach the world about compassion, and end the suffering by halting these floods of sorrow. Said Prince Siddhartha and began his journey of saving the man kind." , ~ Ama H. Vanniarachchy

Beauty is something everybody longs for, needs, and tries to obtain in some way - whether through nature, or a man or a woman, or music, or whatever. The soul yearns for it. Psychology seems to have forgotten that. ~ James Hillman

From a Buddhist point of view, this is standing the truth on its head by considering goods as more important than people and consumption as more important than creative activity. It means shifting the emphasis from the worker to the product of work, that is, from the human to the sub-human, surrender to the forces of evil. ~ E.F. Schumacher

In the West the whole Western tradition of religion and psychology propounds, preaches, persuades people to have strong egos - because unless you have a strong ego, how can you survive? Life is a struggle; if you are egoless you will be destroyed. Then who will resist? Who will fight? Who will compete? And life is a continuous competition. Western psychology says: Attain to the ego, be strong in it. ~ Rajneesh

Detective Sergeant Lincoln Gibbs was a tall, thin African-American with mocha-colored skin, a profoundly receding hairline, and tortoiseshell spectacles. He looked like a college professor, which was a look he cultivated. He had twenty-eight years on the job, less than Tomsic, but more time in grade as a detective sergeant, so Linc Gibbs would be in charge. He arrived with Detective-three Pete Bishop, a twenty-two-year veteran with an M.A. in psychology and five divorces. Bishop rarely spoke, but was known to make copious notes, which he referred to often. He had a measured IQ of 178 and a drinking problem. He was currently in twelve-step. ~ Robert Crais

I've been practicing Buddhism for a while. So, I call myself a Jew-Bu, because my tribe is still Jew. But my philosophy and my practice is really Buddhist. ~ Goldie Hawn

Investing is the intersection of economics and psychology. ~ Seth Klarman

We humans have existed in our present form for about a hundred thousand years. I believe that if during this time the human mind had been primarily controlled by anger and hatred, our overall population would have decreased. But today, despite all our wars, we find that the human population is greater than ever. This clearly indicates to me that love and compassion predominate in the world. And this is why unpleasant events are "news"; compassionate activities are so much a part of daily life that they are taken for granted and , therefore, largely ignored. ~ Dalai Lama

In his business, some customers come in and buy a suit, but what they're really buying is confidence for that job interview that's coming up. The older businessman browsing new cuff links and ties is actually looking for a way to show he's made it. The woman shopping for socks and underwear for her husband isn't there to buy socks and underwear-she's there to show her man how special he is, how much she recognizes and appreciates his uniqueness. If she wanted socks and underwear for him, she could go to any department store at the mall. The manager at this men's store realized the psychology of his particular clientele. ~ T.D. Jakes

In the ages of faith a very inadequate grasp of religion would pass muster; in these searching days none but the humble and the pure could stand the test for long, unless indeed they were protected by a miracle of ignorance. The alliance of Psychology and Materialism did indeed seem, looked at from one angle, to account for everything; it needed a robust supernatural perception to understand their practical inadequacy. ~ Robert Hugh Benson

Synchronicity - the sense of significance beyond chance ~ Elisabeth Y. Fitzhugh

Pride has quite a bit to do with hatred. In many a case in which one hates another, one subconsciously begins patterns of cherry-picking and selective hearing: he continues to look only for things about the other person which he can use to justify his hatred, things which will then make him feel less guilty about hating someone. In this regard, hatred is not so much an emotion as it is a decision. ~ Criss Jami

Wisdom is not guaranteed with age but is realized through one's sensitivity to humanity and the universe ~ I. Alan Appt

Once in a while, you will see someone really drippy. The person has to stare at the teacher all the time with that devoted and disgusting and sick look. It's boring, misplaced devotionalism. ~ Frederick Lenz

Your personality is so convinced that the habit thoughts running along with your body are you that it comes up with any number of reasons why replacing those thoughts is impossible. Even if those reasons can be addressed rationally, there is still an emotional component that is often reticent to admit that it is already talking to itself all the time. Repeating the same thoughts over and over, reacting to events in the same habitual way day in and day out, entertaining the same memories, most of which are based on pain and loss – the personality keeps the moment-to-moment awareness overwhelmed with the sense of a personal history in order to maintain the continuity of its artificial identity. ~ William Douglas Horden

I've noticed that the more flooding there is, the more bullshit gets talked. I mean it was very noticeable in the Asian tsumai. It happened around Christmas-New Year. The Muslims of Sri Lanka said 'We knew this would happen because the Christians were using alcohol for their Christmas celebrations.' The Buddhists said 'We knew this would happen because of the horrible Muslim slaughter practices.' It's amazing to see how apocalypse or catastrophe makes people behave primitively. ~ Christopher Hitchens

Mental Health is measured though motivation to live; the more plans you have and the more significant they are, the more healthy you are. ~ Mark Brightlife

I manifested in a dreamlike way to dreamlike beings and gave a dreamlike Dharma, but in reality I never taught and never actually came. ~ Gautama Buddha

Real happiness provides you the confidence that you never thought was obtainable. ~ Asa Don Brown

The quest of the alchemists to turn lead into gold is a metaphor for our attempts to turn the base metal of ourselves, that person hooked on consumerism, filled with angst and ambition, into the gold of what we can be and really are. ~ Chloe Thurlow

I've seen women insist on cleaning everything in the house before they could sit down to write ... and you know it's a funny thing about house cleaning ... it never comes to an end. Perfect way to stop a woman. ~ Clarissa Pinkola Estes

And my experience in the music scene had shown me that there were places for places in the world where misfits were welcome. ~ John Elder Robison

I make a distinction between Buddhism with a Capital 'B' and buddhism with a small 'b'. Sri Lanka has the former, in which the state uses Buddhism as an instrument of power, so there are even Buddhists monks who say the Tamils should be eliminated. Thai Buddhists are not perfect either. Some Thai Buddhist monks have compromised with the kind and possess cars and other luxuries. In many Buddhist countries, the emphasis is on being goody-goody, which is not good enough. I am for buddhism with a small 'b' which is non-violent, practical and aims to eliminate the cause of suffering.. ~ Sulak Sivaraksa

Many people implicitly believe in the Hydraulic Theory of Violence: that humans harbor an inner drive toward aggression (a death instinct or thirst for blood), which builds up inside us and must periodically be discharged. Nothing could be further from a contemporary scientific understanding of the psychology of violence. Aggression is not a single motive, let alone a mounting urge. It is the output of several psychological systems that differ in their environmental triggers, their internal logic, their neurobiological basis, and their social distribution. ~ Steven Pinker

What is left over if I subtract the fact that my arms goes up from the fact that I raise my arm? ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein

An act of terrorism
is not an ideology,
nor religion.
It is the lack of hope,
of opportunity
and of love.
When there is no recourse,
no other way
there is only insurrection.
Understanding, compassion
and respect for all life
is what will save us all. ~ Mahima Martel

and he said,

"regret is a sorry word, too late for those words spoken or actions already done. ~ Anthony T Hincks

When you sit down to play a game you should think only about the position, but not about the opponent. Whether chess is regarded as a science, or an art, or a sport, all the same psychology bears no relation to it and only stands in the way of real chess. ~ Jose Raul Capablanca

It pains me to say, that almost all of humanity has become obsessed with the pompous and fake glory of fame, that's why the dumbest words of the famous appear wise and the wisest words of the commoner seem dumb. Such is the society you live in - such is the society we all are proud to be a part of - shame on us! ~ Abhijit Naskar

I am not a human being enjoying a spiritual life, I am a spiritual being enjoying a human life. ~ Pierre Teilhard De Chardin

The pain of severe depression is quite unimaginable to those who have not suffered it, and it kills in many instances because its anguish can no longer be borne. The prevention of many suicides will continue to be hindered until there is a general awareness of the nature of this pain. ~ William Styron

When you love someone you have chosen to relinquish a part of yourself in order to inherit a part of them, and what perpetuates that love is the feeling of confident appreciation for such a potentially debilitating trade. That's why heartbreak feels like a sudden void. ~ Samuel Armen

Through positive thinking and related approaches, we seek the safety and solid ground of certainty, of knowing how the future will turn out, of a time in the future when we'll be ceaselessly happy and never have to fear negative emotions again. But in chasing all that, we close down the very faculties that permit the happiness we crave. ~ Oliver Burkeman

The perfect man of pagans was the perfection of the man there is; the perfect man of christians, the perfection of the man there isn't; the buddhists' perfect man, the perfection of not existing a man. ~ Fernando Pessoa

Do not expose yourself too much with the negative messages of the news media. Keep yourself informed but don't cultivate fear psychology. ~ Amit Ray