When we don't ask, we don't let others give. When we fear rejection, we don't let generosity arise.

When we bear witness, when we become the situation - homelessness, poverty, illness, violence, death - the right action arises by itself. We don't have to worry about what to do. We don't have to figure out solutions ahead of time. Peacemaking is the functioning of bearing witness. Once we listen with our entire body and mind, loving action arises.

whatever judgment we make is a subjective one we're making now, and that it could change.

When we go... to bear witness to life on the streets, we're offering ourselves. Not blankets, not food, not clothes, just ourselves.

I always tell people that if you get upset over what someone says, imagine him or her with a clown's nose on and you won't get so angry.

It's very rare to be in a state where there's nothing in, where you have no attachment to any idea or concept about yourself. In that state you've immediately raised the mind of compassion, because if nothing is in, everything is in, and you are now free to experience yourself as the world.

When we don't ask, we don't let others give. When we fear rejection, we don't let generosity arise.