86 Quotes by Joseph Goldstein

The last of the ten unwholesome actions is wrong view, basic misperceptions that become the cause of difficulty and suffering in our lives.

Covetousness keeps the mind agitated and unhappy, far from the peace of contentment.

In our own culture, we might call it “catalogue consciousness,” obsessively rifling through the pages to see what else we might want. It’s “wanting to want,” and it’s a disease our culture keeps nourishing.

The great discovery in our practice is that, on one level, birth and death, existence and nonexistence, self and other are the great defining themes of our lives. And on another level, it’s all just a dance of insubstantial appearances, what the Buddha called “the magic show of consciousness.

Merit” is the usual translation of the Pali word punna, which more literally means “virtue” or that which purifies and cleanses the life stream, bringing good results.

Our progress in meditation does not depend on the measure of pleasure or pain in our experience. Rather, the quality of our practice has to do with how open we are to whatever is there.

Not Seeing Dukkha Is Dukkha.

The second kind of unwholesome speech is the use of harsh, angry, or aggressive language.

Most people believe that we are the thoughts that come through our mind. I hope not, because if we are, we are in big trouble! Those thoughts coming through have clearly been conditioned by something: by different events in our childhood, our environment, our past lives, or even some occurrence that has happened two minutes before.