buddhists-from-the-united-states

"Things don't just happen in this world of arising and passing away. We don't live in some kind of crazy, accidental universe. Things happen according to certain laws, laws of nature. Laws such as the law of karma, which teaches us that as a certain seed gets planted, so will that fruit be."

"But if you want to tap into Berzin’s authority, then you should also acknowledge the latter’s belief in a soft and whitewashing view of Islam. He has devoted his best energies to Buddhist-Islamic dialogue, and like most people engaged in dialogue with Islam, he has interiorised a rosy view of Islam, where Jihad becomes a moral struggle against the evil in oneself, where “the enemies of religion” are not the unbelievers out there but the untamed passions inside. The same view prevails among Western converts to Buddhism about the “real” meaning of the Shambhala War, where the enemies of Buddhism who have to be destroyed are the evil tendencies in ourselves."

"The connotation of the Sanskrit word for a hell, Naraka, is a joyless."

"I found Buddhism to be more existential in character and not as concerned with doctrines to the extent I had encountered in my Christian experience. Buddhism understands the symbolic and provisional nature of human thought. The principle of not being attached to views and the understanding of egoism and delusion all gave me a different perspective on religious phenomena and experience."

"Because the only time I think about aging is when I’m asked about how I think about aging."

"I think awareness is probably a better word. Because if you are imbalanced, you’re aware enough to see it and to correct it."

"People talk about joy and happiness and ask me, ‘You seem like you’re so happy all the time’—and that’s just not the case. But I do choose it. And I choose it sometimes when it’s really hard to."

"I think aging is hard because it gets you closer to the inevitable—that we are impermanent. And the question becomes, what do you seek out of life? What is it that makes you feel alive and excited to be a part of this experience?"

"My ultimate end game and destination is far from the runways of New York. I want to continue my work in cinema and the arts. Nigeria is so nostalgic for me because it is the only place I have ever felt at home. When I get back to Nigeria to see dilapidated building, poor infrastructures and bad road network I begin to think that we need to do more to fix things beyond waiting for government. It is time to make things work for our race and country. Nobody will do this for the black race"

"When working I say to myself, ‘I am a product. It’s not about you. It’s about the vision these people have for their product and you just either happen to fit or not into their idea"

"It is a very difficult thing to take up modelling as a profession in Nigeria because of the influence of our parents. You won’t get your parents support especially when they want you to be something else like being a lawyer or doctor."

"I am on a mission to destigmatize America’s interpretation and views toward Islam. For the record, I am a Buddhist. The objective is to promote unity."

"When I got my hair dreadlocked ahead of New York fashion week, I had some pushback from people in the industry worried that I wouldn’t get jobs – the suggestion was that I might look “too black”. But I enjoy being different and standing out – so I decided to keep them and take my chances."

"I wanted to do a project that was digestible for everyone. The idea was to do a video that showed beauty in Muslim women. Just because you’re wearing a hijab doesn’t mean you’re scary. It is not about race. It’s not about religion. It’s not about clothes. It’s about beauty."

"I want to do documentaries that change the way people view Africa"

"A lot of images I’ve seen of women in hijabs are negative. I want to show the world that Islam isn’t a scary thing. I want everyone to see what I see."

"Because I am a different shape and color, I can fill the space that’s missing in a big puzzle piece and complete the picture"

"In other words, people of all colors shine their own color"

"Don’t hide your honesty in the shadows! Be who you really are and let your heart blossom!"

"The most important message of our denomination is to let people know that we can all be saved regardless of our sexuality, gender or fashion preferences."

"The enlightenment tradition discovered the micro and macro dimensions more than two thousand years ago by using sophisticated contemplative practices to augment the sixth mental sense of inner vision … This realm is supernatural only in relation to a constricted definition of natural. It is mystical only when its analytic investigation is not completed. It is magic only when the technique involved is not understood."

"She is one of the fearless people I ever met. She's just thoughtful about life and I am just gonna miss her a lot."

"Each one of us has to take responsibility for reality, and present it so that kids will grow up familiar with that and say, OK. I've seen that before. I'm not afraid of it."

"Lynda Carter played Wonder Woman and was one of the first female superheroes. It gives me more of an encouragement that we can be strong and can do whatever a guy can do."

"She came over as a refugee from Vietnam, escaping from Vietnam War. Her family came over by a boat, things that we could not fathom. Then they had to come here and learn a whole new language, and just integrate themseleves to America."

"I was in school studying civil engineering. A guy approached me on the street and said that I had a interesting look-very exotic. He told me I should try to be in the industry."

"Tell all the fans that I completely adore them, and tell them I say, 'Thank you so much', for their love and support; and that I miss them terribly, and hopefully I get to see them or they get to see me up on the screen soon. And send my love, definitely."

"To all the people out there, you know just live out your dreams, if you dream something, just pursue it and do it because if you can put your mind to it you can do basically anything and everything you want to. I mean look at me, I came from a country that was falling apart because of communism and escaping to America, not knowing the language and then not learning it from beginning, and overcoming that and where I am now, you know it just shows you that if you put your mind to it you can do anything you want to."

"But there is that feeling. And there’s always another challenge, and that keeps us humble. Life knocks you off your pedestal."

"We can't control what's going to happen but we can grow in awareness of what is happening."

"The experience of a sad and tender heart is what gives birth to fearlessness."

"But the Buddhist teachings are not only about removing the symptoms of suffering, they’re about actually removing the cause, or the root, of suffering."

"When we multitask and split up our mind into a million directions, we are actually creating our own suffering, because these habits strengthen strong emotional reactivity and discursive thought."

"The principle of nowness is very important to any effort to establish an enlightened society."

"Meditation helps you to meet your edge; it’s where you actually come up against it and you start to lose it."

"This is a standard meditation instruction that you can embody in the entirety of your life: do not act out and do not repress. See what happens if you don’t do either of those things."

"Life is a good teacher and a good friend. Things are always in transition, if we could only realize it."

"Every day, at the moment when things get edgy, we can just ask ourselves, “Am I going to practice peace, or am I going to war?”"

"Meditation is an invitation to notice when we reach our limit and to not get carried away by hope and fear."

"Emptiness is not what we thought. Neither is mindfulness or fear. Compassion—not what we thought. Love. Buddha nature. Courage."

"The trick is to keep exploring and not bail out, even when we find out that something is not what we thought... Nothing is what we thought."

"When things fall apart and we’re on the verge of we know not what, the test of each of us is to stay on that brink and not concretize."

"The very first noble truth of the Buddha points out that suffering is inevitable for human beings as long as we believe that things last — that they don’t disintegrate, that they can be counted on to satisfy our hunger for security."

"Thinking that we can find some lasting pleasure and avoid pain is what in Buddhism is called samsara, a hopeless cycle that goes round and round endlessly and causes us to suffer greatly."

"From this point of view, the only time we ever know what’s really going on is when the rug’s been pulled out and we can’t find anywhere to land. We use these situations either to wake ourselves up or to put ourselves to sleep."

"When anyone asks me how I got involved in Buddhism, I always say it was because I was so angry with my husband... When that marriage fell apart, I tried hard—very, very hard—to go back to some kind of comfort, some kind of security, some kind of familiar resting place... I knew that annihilation of my old dependent, clinging self was the only way to go."

"Impermanence becomes vivid in the present moment; so do compassion and wonder and courage. And so does fear."

"In fact, anyone who stands on the edge of the unknown, fully in the present without reference point, experiences groundlessness."

"Meditation is just gently coming back again and again to what's right here."

"The spiritual journey is not about heaven and finally getting to a place that’s really swell. In fact, that way of looking at things is what keeps us miserable."