Pema Chodron Quotes

Compassion is sometimes the fatal capacity for feeling what it is like to live inside somebody else's skin. It is the knowledge that there can never really be any peace and joy for me until there is peace and joy finally for you too.

Are we truly being our sisters' keepers? Initially, that dog-eat-dog mentality within us may bark and say that we aren't responsible for other people, but if that was truly the case, then why are we even here? We have so much to offer and give to this world.

I have vanity and greed enough for one person. But at the same time, I feel in my bones you lose a lot of life's value if you don't see yourself as a member of the family of man.

We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men.

I think the point of our country, our planet, the reason we're all here, one of the best things that we can do is be concerned about something even when it doesn't concern us. That's the whole point.

Philanthropic work reminds you of everyone's common humanity, and that's really the common denominator for everyone.

A compassionate mind is very difficult to cultivate because compassion demands a sense of equality between all living beings.

Fraternity and compassion are written into nature's DNA.

I believe we have a higher responsibility to each other.

What the warrior renounces is anything in his experience that is a barrier between himself and others. In other words, renunciation is making yourself more available, more gentle and open to others.

Anything you do to and for another person, you do it to and for yourself

That's the great secret of humans: we're all the same person. The best thing to do is just go for the hug.

No man can live happily who regards himself alone, who turns everything to his own advantage. Thou must live for another, if thou wishest to live for thyself.

Compassion is the awareness of a deep bond between yourself and all creatures.

Whatever you are doing, take the attitude of wanting it directly or indirectly to benefit others. Take the attitude of wanting it to increase your experience of kinship with your fellow beings.

Just remember, Someone is on your side (our side) Someone else is not While we're seeing our side Maybe we forgot: they are not alone. No one is alone.

Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.

Accustomed long to contemplating love and compassion I have forgotten all difference between myself and others

Once you get below the floor of our personal identities, we're all connected. Perhaps that's why we can move into others' lives.

Compassion- which means, literally, "to suffer with"- is the way to the truth that we are most ourselves, not when we differ from others, but when we are the same. Indeed the main spiritual question is not, "What difference do you make?" but "What do you have in common?" It is not "excelling" but "serving" that makes us most human. It is not proving ourselves to be better than others but confessing to be just like others that is the way to healing and reconciliation.

We become compassionate not from altruism which denies the self for the sake of the other, but from the insight that sees and feels one is the other.

This will wreck you! Today, treat everyone you meet as if they're going to be dead by midnight. extend all the kindness and understanding you can, and do it with no thought of any reward.

What I've come to learn is that the world is never saved in grand messianic gestures, but in the simple accumulation of gentle, soft, almost invisible acts of compassion, everyday acts of compassion. In South Africa they have a phrase called ubuntu. Ubuntu comes out of a philosophy that says, the only way for me to be human is for you to reflect my humanity back at me.

To help all created things, that is the measure of all our responsibility; to be helped by all, that is the measure of our hope.

Skip the religion and politics, head straight to the compassion. Everything else is a distraction.