Archives
“Find me someone who has gone to the darkest parts of their own character where they were so close to their own self-destruction and found a way to get up and out of it, and I will bow on my knees to you… You’re my teacher.”
Seane Corn, via Think Like A Monk (Page 259)
“It’s hard to think about selflessness when we are struggling. And yet that is exactly what I learned as a monk. Selflessness is the surest route to inner peace and a meaningful life. Selflessness heals the self.”
Jay Shetty, Think Like A Monk (Page 256)
“If you’ve lost yourself in the relationship, find yourself in the heartbreak.”
Jay Shetty, Think Like A Monk (Page 252)
“In every relationship you have the opportunity to set the level of joy you expect and the level of pain you’ll accept. No relationship is perfect, but if joy never reaches a certain height, or holds to a low average, that won’t change unless you both put in a lot of work. The same is true for how much disappointment you’re willing to bear. Your connection may get a slow start—it can take a while to know each other—but if it never reaches a satisfying level, you need to decide whether to accept it or move on.”
Jay Shetty, Think Like A Monk (Page 251)
“Often, we get crushes on others not because we truly love and understand them, but to distract ourselves from our suffering. When we learn to love and understand ourselves and have true compassion for ourselves, then we can truly love and understand another person.”
Jay Shetty, Think Like A Monk (Page 246)
“Nobody wants to sit with you at dinner while you’re on the phone. This is where we confuse time and energy. You can spend a whole hour with someone, but only give them ten minutes of energy. I’m not able to spend much time with my family, but when I’m with them I’m 100 percent there. I’d rather spend two hours with them, focused and engaged, than give them partial, distracted energy for a whole weekend.”
Jay Shetty, Think Like A Monk (Page 240)
“Do not ask your children
William Martin, The Parent’s Tao Te Ching
to strive for extraordinary lives.
Such striving may seem admirable,
but it is the way of foolishness.
Help them instead to find the wonder
and the marvel of an ordinary life.
Show them the joy of tasting
tomatoes, apples and pears.
Show them how to cry
when pets and people die.
Show them the infinite pleasure
in the touch of a hand.
And make the ordinary come alive for them.
The extraordinary will take care of itself.”
“Exerting more effort doesn’t help if you’re on the wrong trajectory.
– Working harder on the wrong thing just wastes more time.
– Learning more from a biased source will lead you further from the truth.
– Doubling down on a toxic relationship only sets you up for more headaches.
Before you try harder, make sure you are walking a path that leads where you want to go.”
James Clear
“One person might enter your life as a welcome change. Like a new season, they are an exciting and enthralling shift of energy. But the season ends at some point, as all seasons do. Another person might come in with a reason. They help you learn and grow, or they support you through a difficult time. It almost feels like they’ve been deliberately sent to you to assist or guide you through a particular experience, after which their central role in your life decreases. And then there are lifetime people. They stand by your side through the best and worst of times, loving you even when you are giving nothing to them.”
Jay Shetty, Think Like A Monk (Page 230)
“It’s okay—necessary, in fact—to protect yourself from those in your family who aren’t good for you. We should have the same standards for our family as we do for everyone else, and if the relationship is fraught, we can love them and respect them from a distance while gathering the family we need from the wider world. This doesn’t mean we should neglect our families. But forgiveness and gratitude come more easily when we accept that we have friends and family, and we have friends that become family.”
Jay Shetty, Think Like A Monk (Page 229)
“If you tend to be intellectual, it will be difficult. Life is simple, nonintellectual. The whole problem of humanity is metaphysics. Life is as simple as a rose—there’s nothing complicated about it—and yet it is mysterious. Although there is nothing complicated about it, we are not able to comprehend it through the intellect. You can fall in love with a rose, you can smell it, you can touch it, you can feel it, you can even be it, but if you start dissecting it, you will only have something dead in your hands.”
Osho, Everyday Osho (Page 98)
