If we can feel confident in our goodness, it will illuminate our life and society

Movement is good for the body. Stillness is good for the mind.

We suffer because we want life to be different from what it is. We suffer because we try to make pleasurable what is painful, to make solid what is fluid, to make permanent what is always changing.

There is a tendency sometimes within the Shambhala community to make it just about meditating and, so, less about compassion. Shambhala is based upon compassion, but a lot of people come in and say, "I need to get more meditation. I need to do this for me, me, me." That's fine, but the view here is much more societal.

A lot of people talk about the spirituality of Buddhism, and it is a spiritual discipline. But in Shambhala there also is a notion that you have to be synchronized with both heaven and earth.

I hope you will attain enlightenment. I am here to tell you that you already have! But you don't know... The difference between the Buddha and us is the confidence in knowing that he was enlightened.

If the mind is flexible, the world is flexible.