Any form of idealism involves avoiding some specific pain or suffering. - Ken McLeod

When people thank and tell you how much you've helped them, what they say has nothing to do with you. This is just their way of expressing joy in their own experience. Remember this, too, when people complain or criticize.

The vast array of methods and techniques which comprise Buddhism, particularly the Tibetan tradition, are all to help us come to know simply what we are, buddha, awake and aware. Time and time again, we are told that we are buddha, that the buddha qualities are present now, but that we just don’t know it. The problem, for many of us, is that this knowing is not a form of knowing that we are used to. We need tools and methods to dismantle the emotional blocks, the habitual patterns, the worries, concerns, expectations, and hopes that keep us from trusting and knowing what we are.

At every stage of practice a price has to be paid for clarity. The price is the loss of an illusion.