Buddhist Psychology Quotes

“I recently read in the book My Stroke of Insight by brain scientist Jill Bolte Taylor that the natural life span of an emotion—the average time it takes for it to move through the nervous system and body—is only a minute and a half. After that we need thoughts to keep the emotion rolling. So if we wonder why we lock into painful emotional states like anxiety, depression, or rage, we need look no further than our own endless stream of inner dialogue.”
― Tara Brach

“Each time you meet an old emotional pattern with presence, your awakening to truth can deepen. There’s less identification with the self in the story and more ability to rest in the awareness that is witnessing what’s happening. You become more able to abide in compassion, to remember and trust your true home. Rather than cycling repetitively through old conditioning, you are actually spiraling toward freedom.”
― Tara Brach, True Refuge: Finding Peace and Freedom in Your Own Awakened Heart

“The great gift of a spiritual path is coming to trust that you can find a way to true refuge. You realize that you can start right where you are, in the midst of your life, and find peace in any circumstance. Even at those moments when the ground shakes terribly beneath you—when there’s a loss that will alter your life forever—you can still trust that you will find your way home. This is possible because you’ve touched the timeless love and awareness that are intrinsic to who you are.”
― Tara Brach, True Refuge: Finding Peace and Freedom in Your Own Awakened Heart

“Awakening self-compassion is often the greatest challenge people face on the spiritual path.”
― Tara Brach, True Refuge: Finding Peace and Freedom in Your Own Awakened Heart

“Buddhist Psychology

You can use enlightening Buddhist practices to transform your life. Unfortunately, many people do not know it, but the Buddhist Dharma, or teaching, is actually a scientific system of psychology, developed in India and further refined in Tibet. It is a psychology that works. I call it a „joyous science of the heart“ because it is based on the idea that while unenlightened life is full of suffering, you are completely capable of escaping from that suffering. You can get well. In fact, you already are well; you just need to awaken to that fact.

And how do you do this? By analyzing your thought patterns. When you do, you realize that you are full of „misknowledge“ - misunderstandings of yourself and the world that lead to anger, discontent, and fear. The target of Buddhist practice and the constant theme of this book is the primal misconception that you are the center of the universe, that your „self“ is a fixed, constant, and bounded entity. When you meditate on enlightened insights into the true nature of reality and the boundlessness of the self, you develop new habits of thinking. You free yourself from the constraints of your habitual mind. In other words, you teach yourself to think differently. This in turn leads you to act differently. And voila! You are on the path to happiness, fulfillment, and even enlightenment.

The battle for happiness is fought and won or lost primarily within the mind. The mind is the absolute key, both to enlightenment and to life. When your mind is peaceful, aware, and under your command, you will be securely happy. When your mind is unaware of its true nature, constantly in turmoil, and in command of you, you will suffer endlessly. This is the whole secret of the Dharma. If you recognize delusion, greed, anger, envy, and pride as the main enemies of your well-being and learn to focus your mind on overcomming them, you can install wisdom, generosity, tolerance, love, and altruism in their place. This is where enlightened psychology can be most useful. Psychology and philosophy are really one entity in Buddhism. They are called the inner science, the science of the human interior. In the flow of Indian history, it is fair to say that the Buddha was a great explorer of the human interior rather than some sort of religious prophet.

He came into the world at a time when people were just beginning to experiment with self-exploration, but mostly in an escapist way, using their focus on the inner world to run away from the sufferings of life by entering a supposed realm of absolute quiet far removed from everday existence. The Buddha started out exploring that way too, but then realized the futility of escapism and discovered instead a way of being happier here and now. (pp. 32-33)”
― Robert A.F. Thurman, Infinite Life: Awakening to Bliss Within

“We are taught in this culture that if we can grasp enough pleasurable experiences quickly, one after another, our life will be happy. By following a good game of tennis with a delicious dinner, a fine movie, then wonderful sex and sleep, a good morning jog, a fine hour of meditation, an excellent breakfast, and off to an exciting morning of work, over and over, our happiness will last. Our driven society is masterful at perpetuating this ruse. But will this satisfy the heart?”
― Jack Kornfield, A Path with Heart: A Guide Through the Perils and Promises of Spiritual Life

“Every living thing is sacred to me. Compassion and love can heal this world, which is set on fire of violence and hatred. I will teach the world about compassion, and end the suffering by halting these floods of sorrow. Said Prince Siddhartha and began his journey of saving the man kind.” ,”
― Ama H.Vanniarachchy, The Kind Prince

“Gautama found that there was a way to exit this vicious circle. If, when the mind experiences something pleasant or unpleasant, it simply understands things as they are, then there is no suffering. If you experience sadness without craving that the sadness go away, you continue to feel sadness but you do not suffer from it. There can actually be richness in the sadness. If you experience joy without craving that the joy linger and intensify, you continue to feel joy without losing your peace of mind.”
― Yuval Noah Harari

“According to the Dharma teaching, psychology is about understanding what human beings are made of, how our world works, how reality is put together, and how our minds function. The purpose of doing this, ultimately, is not to adjust people to go back and live according to how society tells them they should live, so that they can fit into some meaningless, supposedly wealth-producing, militaristic scheme. That‘s a total waste of human life. If somebody has the good sense to be depressed, malfunctioning, hallucinating, dropping out of society because their mind-body complex is saying „no“ to the whole nonsense and looking for some better way of being, a liberating psychology should not try to stuff them back into the box. They should not be just rushed straight ahead, encouraged to wash the dishes, do their jobs, and pounce on the enemy, just because that‘s what everybody else is doing. People who have the sensitivity and insight to see through the meaninglessness should be able to find someone to help them discover freedom, which is what they are looking for. They should be supported in their endeavors.”
― Robert A.F. Thurman, Infinite Life: Awakening to Bliss Within

“Life is but a wheel
Cycling birth and death around
Like seasons changing”
― Eric Overby, Senses

“So the Buddha took off, leaving his old life behind, and went into the jungle to be by himself so that he could quietly investigate the inner world through meditation. After many years, he gained tremendous insight into the functioning of the human mind and the problems we create for ourselves. He came to understand how negative states develop, how those negative states can be replaced by positive states, and how those positive states can be cultivated without limit. The Buddha realized that the human life-form is the ideal life-form in which to do that cultivation, each person ultimately by themselves but with the help of therapists and teachers and philosophers. And that was the birth of psychology, really: the beginning of the systematic scientific exploration of the way the mind works.”
― Robert A.F. Thurman, Infinite Life: Awakening to Bliss Within

“Times of suffering will come, use them
To grow into a better version of yourself.
Use the dirt to grow flowers. Let the storm water them. Watch them grow in the sunshine.”
― Eric Overby, Legacy

“Where does my next thought come from?
Hold your next thought as long as you can,
Try it.
It’s like holding water in your hands.
Like holding fog.
Allusory.
A new one springs up
From the nowhere
And dissipates as quickly.”
― Eric Overby, Legacy

“When an intention is rooted in clarity, and positive emotions like joy and enthusiasm, life can transform in miraculous ways.”
― Michele Kambolis, When Women Rise: Everyday Practices to Strengthen Your Mind, Body, and Soul