Category Archive

Real honesty is never vague.    

The delusion that spiritual practice will lead to more and more pleasurable or “good” experiences and fewer and fewer painful or “bad” experiences misses the point completely. The point is to know our true nature.    

The Guru’s instructive shining of a light is taken for cruelty by the shrunken self.    

Caring is not reaching out at someone, or discussing only things I can relate with, or making what you experience the same as whatever I’ve experienced.    

“If I identify as a victim, I do not need to change.” Not true—I am half of the problem.    

What the shrunken self wants: to stay the way it is, continue to bring to the table what it has always brought to the table, and have everything work out in its favor unconditionally.  

Self-punishment is not a tool for good. Beating yourself up is a way of not learning.

The stronger and more ingrained the attachment, the less capable we become of discerning right and wrong.

We have to go over our experience again and again and try to ascertain the facts. Because the facts matter. If we only take a few puzzle pieces and fill in the gaps with things that suit our shrunken self’s narrative, we will only do injury, to ourselves and maybe to others.  

If we just try to do things in our idea of “the right way”, assuming instead of asking, we lose our humanity.