It is a mistake to expect all of our needs to be met by one person or in one relationship. Honor and be grateful for that which you receive. Don't become bitter and spend all your time focusing on that which the person is not able to provide.

When we sit, we open our own treasure house. Rather than do this, however, most of us first seek to find the treasures another person can provide. We calculate their value to us. When we approach relationships in this manner, we are coming as beggars, seeing the other as a source of supply. When we can enter a relationship with our treasure house already open, there is no end to the wonders we can find, both within and between ourselves and another.

Change is the very basis of our life, not to be fought, to be welcomed and tasted, to be seen for the gift it truly is.

Zen practice asks you not to worry about who you 'should' become. Find out who you are right now.

When we are willing to accept our experience, just as it is, a strange thing happens: it changes into something else. When we avoid pain, struggle not to feel it, pain turns into suffering.

When we do not reject our suffering, or add anything to it, pain is simply pain. It is what we add to our pain that turns it into suffering.

We are what we think about. When we stay fixed on one person, thought or situation, we get caught in the grip of self-centered thoughts. The more we give attention to that which is upsetting, the more strength it has to rule our lives.