B. Alan Wallace Quotes & Sayings

Tibetans look at a person who holds himself above others, believing he is better than others and knows more, and they say that person is like someone sitting on a mountain top: it is cold there, it is hard, and nothing will grow. But if the person puts himself in a lower position, then that person is like a fertile field. — B. Alan Wallace

When you are asked, "What am I holding in my hand?" and answer, "a cup," you have just grasped on to "cup-ness." You have identified an object within the context of a conceptual framework - a word, a sign. So the mind that latches on to a sign - here an image commonly designated as a "cup" - does so through grasping. Although you are merely identifying "That's a cup," this is also a form of grasping. It may not be the kind of grasping that will lead to endless misery, but it is a subtle form of grasping. — B. Alan Wallace

Again and again, counteract the agitation and turbulence of the mind by relaxing more deeply, not by contracting the body or mind. — B. Alan Wallace

I suggest that if you were able to focus your attention at will, you could actually choose the universe you appear to inhabit. — B. Alan Wallace

If you wish to take shamatha all the way to its ground, however, it requires a supportive, serene environment, good diet, proper exercise, and very few preoccupations. The necessary internal conditions are minimal desires, few activities and concerns, contentment, pure ethical discipline, and freedom from obsessive, compulsive thinking. It is my feeling that the achievement of shamatha is so rare today because those circumstances are so rare. It is difficult to find a conducive environment in which to practice at length and without interference - even more so to have that and access to suitable spiritual friends for support and guidance. Therefore, if the causes are difficult to bring together, the result - shamatha - is also necessarily rare. — B. Alan Wallace

We are persons whose bodies can be objectively studied according to the impersonal laws of physics but whose minds are subjectively experienced in ways science has not yet been able to fathom. In short, by radically seperating science from religion, we are not merely segregating two human institutions; we are fragmenting ourselves as individuals and as a society in ways that lead to deep, unresolved conflicts in terms of our view of the world, our values, and our way of life. — B. Alan Wallace

Integrated meditation practice is like a healthy diet
which is indispensable for maintaining your vitality and resistance to disease.
Likewise, a balanced meditative practice in the course of a socially engaged way of life
heightens your psychological immune system, so that you are less vulnerable to mental imbalances of all kinds. — B. Alan Wallace

Life is a flash of lightning in the dark of night. It is a brief time of tremendous potential. — B. Alan Wallace

One of the most persistent of all delusions is the conviction that the source of our dissatisfaction lies outside ourselves. — B. Alan Wallace

The point of Buddhist meditation is not to stop thinking, for ... cultivation of insight clearly requires intelligent use of thought and discrimination. What needs to be stopped is conceptualisation that is compulsive, mechanical and unintelligent, that is, activity that is always fatiguing, usually pointless, and at times seriously harmful. — B. Alan Wallace

Mindfulness was experienced as not holding onto the past, the future, or 'nowness:' but relaxing into the immediacy of whatever was happening. — B. Alan Wallace

Meditation is a balancing act between attention and relaxation. — B. Alan Wallace

The mind that reaches out to other people, to the environment, to provide what it seems to lack itself, is a mind that is ignorant of its own resources for peace and happiness. — B. Alan Wallace

An indispensable ingredient for spiritual maturation is the cultivation of fortitude: strength, forbearance, and patience. — B. Alan Wallace