Pema Chodron Quotes About Enemies

Quotes about: Enemies

• Usually we regard loneliness as an enemy. Heartache is not something we choose to invite in. It's restless and pregnant and hot with the desire to escape and find something or someone to keep us company. When we can rest in the middle, we begin to have a nonthreatening relationship with loneliness, a relaxing and cooling loneliness that completely turns our usual fearful patterns upside down.

  Pema Chodron

  Loneliness, Heartache, Justice

  Pema Chodron (2000). “When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times”, p.71, Shambhala Publications

• Welcome the present moment as if you had invited it. It is all we ever have, so we night as well work with it rather than struggling against it. We might as well make it our friend and teacher rather than our enemy.

  Pema Chodron

  Inspirational, Friends, Teacher

• We can stop struggling with what occurs and see its true face without calling it the enemy. It helps to remember that our spiritual practice is not about accomplishing anything - not about winning or losing - but about ceasing to struggle and relaxing as it is. That is what we are doing when we sit down to meditate. That attitude spreads into the rest of our lives.

  Pema Chodron

  Spiritual, Attitude, Struggle

  Pema Chodron (2008). “The Pocket Pema Chodron”, p.138, Shambhala Publications

• Just pausing for two to three breaths is a perfect way to stay present. This is a good use of our life. Indeed, it is an excellent, joyful use of our life. Instead of getting better and better at avoiding, we can learn to accept the present moment as if we had invited it, and work with it instead of against it, making it our ally rather than our enemy.

  Pema Chodron

  Two, Perfect, Enemy

  Pema Chodron (2009). “Taking the Leap: Freeing Ourselves from Old Habits and Fears”, p.50, Shambhala Publications

• Over time, as the thinking mind begins to settle [through the practice of meditation], we’ll start to see our patterns and habits far more clearly. Sometimes this can be a painful experience. I can’t overestimate the importance of accepting ourselves exactly as we are right now, not as we wish we were or think we ought to be. By cultivating nonjudgmental openness to ourselves and to whatever arises, to our surprise and delight we will find ourselves genuinely welcoming the never-pin-downable quality of life, experiencing it as a friend, a teacher, and a support, and no longer as an enemy.

  Pema Chodron

  Teacher, Thinking, Painful Experiences

• As for our inner level of obstacle, perhaps the only enemy we have is that we don't like the way reality is now and therefore wish it would go away fast. But what we need to acknowledge is that nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know.

  Pema Chodron

  Reality, Taught Us, Enemy

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