Dalai Lama Quotes

Everything depends on inner change; when this has taken place, then, and only then does the world change.

In our world everybody thinks of changing humanity, and nobody thinks of changing himself.

Peace can start with just one heart.

Do you want to change the world? Then change yourself first. Do you want to change yourself? Then remain completely silent inside the silence-sea.

The world can only change from within.

I was trying to change things on the outside and you can't. You've got to feel it on the inside and everything else will change.

You change your life by changing your heart.

To reform a world, to reform a nation, no wise man will undertake; and all but foolish men know, that the only solid, though a far slower reformation, is what each begins and perfects on himself.

No more materialism, no more this egoism, I must become spiritual.

Each of us has some change within us, we cannot change the political or the social system of the world unless we change inside of us as individuals and that’s the direction I am in now which I call spiritual.

Is sobriety all that we are to expect of a spiritual awakening? No, sobriety is only a bare beginning; it is only the first gift of the first awakening. If more gifts are to be received, our awakening has to go on. As it does go on, we find that bit by bit we can discard the old life - the one that did not work - for a new life that can and does work under any conditions whatever.

We can’t change the world. The only thing we can change is ourselves, by trying to get a better understanding of our own messed-up wiring.

When meditation releases energy in you, it will find all sorts of ways to be expressed.

Political activism is seductive because it seems to offer the possibility that one can improve society, make things better, without going through the personal ordeal of rearranging one's perceptions and transforming one's self.

Through awareness, you get a certain attitude. That's the way, you see, to achieve more peaceful, more compassion, more friendship through that way.

The way you get more is by having a daily spiritual practice.

To transform the world, we must begin with ourselves; and what is important in beginning with ourselves is the intention. The intention must be to understand ourselves and not to leave it to others to transform themselves or to bring about a modified change through revolution, either of the left or of the right. It is important to understand that this is our responsibility, yours and mine.

You cannot change the world if you don't change your own world first.

Only changed people can change the world. Start with yourself.

What we can and should change is ourselves: our impatience, our egoism (including intellectual egoism), our sense of injury, our lack of love and forbearance. I regard every other attempt to change the world, even if it springs from the best intentions, as futile.

One of the most difficult things is not to change society - but to change yourself.

And yet not a dream, but a mighty reality- a glimpse of the higher life, the broader possibilities of humanity, which is granted to the man who, amid the rush and roar of living, pauses four short years to learn what living means

Self-sabotage is the proverbial hammer over the head that finally wakes us up, demanding that we pay attention. For most of us, it takes something devastating to crack us open, to get us out of our minds and into our hearts.

I'm becoming more and more myself with time. I guess that's what grace is. The refinement of your soul through time.

Revolution begins with the self, in the self.