If you become a monk because it's an easy life, because you're going to be fed, and sheltered and people will respect you, then that is not a very meritorious motivation.

Most of the people I talk to are not going to go off and live in a cave. Why should they? So I talk about how people can stop separating dharma practice - going on retreats, going to dharma centers, hearing talks, reading books - from their ordinary life.

For some people, every door opens, and they meet just who they need to meet when they need to meet them, all the conditions come together. For other people, there is one problem after the other, even though they are so sincere. And from a Tibetan point of view, this is because of a lack of merit.

From the point of view of emptiness, there is neither being nor non-being, but we're not on the point of view of emptiness, we're on the point of view of our relative being.

Don't be thinking that this lama over there is giving better teachings or that this lama over here is giving more secret initiations. Leave that. Just keep the practice very simple, try to stay in the moment and try to stay mindful.

The Buddha himself said, "I still use conceptual thinking, but I'm not formed by it." And that's the Buddha.

Some students went to Milarepa and said, we should stop living in caves and meditating because we should go out and help beings as bodhisattvas. And Milarepa said that as long as space exists, so long will there be beings for you to help.