Wanting things to be otherwise is the very essence of suffering. We almost never directly experience what pain is because our reaction to it is so immediate that most of what we call pain is actually our experience of resistance to that phenomenon. And the resistance is usually a good deal more painful than the original sensation.

Loss is the absence of something we were once attached to. Grief is the rope burns left behind, when that which is held is pulled beyond our grasp.

Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me. There is nothing to do but be.

If there is a single definition of healing it is to enter with mercy and awareness those pains, mental and physical, from which we have withdrawn in judgment and dismay. (48)

If sequestered pain made a sound, the atmosphere would be humming all the time.

[D]etachment means letting go and nonattachment means simply letting be. (95)

Letting ourselves be forgiven is one of the most difficult healings we will undertake. And one of the most fruitful. (79)