The ego always looks toward the next moment for some kind of fulfillment.

The mind is essentially a survival machine. Attack and defense against other minds, gathering, storing, and analyzing information - this is what it is good at, but it is not at all creative. All true artists, whether they know it or not, create from a place of no-mind, from inner stillness.

Humans eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and bad. Suddenly, they start cutting reality up into bits and pieces, which is what the thinking mind does.

Thinking without awareness is the main dilemma of human existence.

The tools of science and technology amplified the effects of the madness of the egoic mind. So the survival of the planet began to be threatened, and with it the survival of humanity.

Different ages have certain approaches, which may be more effective for one age and no longer effective in another age. The world that we live in now has much greater density to it; it is much more all-pervasive. And when I say "world," I include the human mind in it. The human mind has grown even since the time of the Buddha, 2,500 years ago. The human mind is more noisy and more all-pervasive, and the egos are bigger.

Whatever you do, whatever you're working with, whether it's manual work or talking to people or buying or selling, every little thing encompasses the power and simplicity of presence.