Without loving-kindness for ourselves, it is difficult, if not impossible, to genuinely feel it for others.

Hope and fear come from feeling that we lack something; they come from a sense of poverty. We can’t simply relax with ourselves. We hold on to hope, and hope robs us of the present moment. We feel that someone else knows what is going on, but that there is something missing in us, and therefore something is lacking in our world.

Constantly apply cheerfulness, if for no other reason than because you are on this spiritual path. Have a sense of gratitude to everything, even difficult emotions, because of their potential to wake you up.

To put it concisely, we suffer when we resist the noble and irrefutable truth of impermanence and death.

Holding on to anything blocks wisdom.

This moving away from comfort and security, this stepping out into what is unknown, uncharted and shaky - that's called liberation.

If your everyday practice is open to all your emotions, to all the people you meet, to all the situations you encounter, without closing down, trusting that you can do that - then that will take you are far as you can go. And then you'll understand all the teachings that anyone has ever taught.