Our conceptions of the world affect our perceptions of the world which, in turn, condition the way we subsequently conceive the world.

The origin of the conflict, frustration, and anxiety we experience does not lie in the nature of the world itself but in our distorted conceptions of the world.

Buddhism, I think, is probably facing the single most difficult transition from one historical epoch to another, which is really the transition to modernity.

Consciousness is an emergent, contingent, and impermanent phenomenon. It has no magical capacity to break free from the field of events out of which it springs.

While 'Buddhism' suggests another belief system, 'dharma practice' suggests a course of action. The four ennobling truths are not propositions to believe; they are challenges to act.

What is it that makes a person insist passionately on the existence of metaphysical realities that can be neither demonstrated nor refuted? (176)

In taking life for granted, we fail to notice it.

The problem with certainty is that it is static; it can do little but endlessly reassert itself. Uncertainty, by contrast, is full of unknowns, possibilities, and risks.

The greatest threat to compassion is the temptation to succumb to fantasies of moral superiority.

To embrace suffering culminates in greater empathy, the capacity to feel what it is like for the other to suffer, which is the ground for unsentimental compassion and love.

This body is fragile. It is just flesh. Listen to the heartbeat. Life depends on the pumping of a muscle.

When nothing becomes the vocalThen nothing becomes the focalAnd nothing’s becoming at all

Ambition is to the mind what the cap is to the falcon; it blinds us first, and then compels us to tower by reason of our blindness.

We are half ruined by conformity, but we should be wholly ruined without it.

What if the word of God was enough to inspire passionate worship among his people?

Music creates a certain mood and then people dress accordingly. I think it's all quite closely intertwined.

The True One was there from time immemorial. He is there today and ever there you will find. He never died nor will he ever die. ... Look within, you will see Him there enshrined.

No man is worthy of unlimited reliance-his treason, at best, only waits for sufficient temptation.

White House and State Department foreign-policy experts are overwhelmingly directed towards military and diplomatic issues, not development issues.

The power to Love is God's greatest gift to man, For it never will be taken from the Blessed one who loves.

There are some things that cannot be expressed through words. And that is why we dance.