Enlightenment is not something you achieve. It is the absence of something. All your life you have been going forward after something, pursuing some goal. Enlightenment is dropping all that.
Joko BeckRead
There is a foundation for our lives, a place in which our life rests. That place is nothing but the present moment, as we see, hear, experience what is. If we do not return to that place, we live our lives out of our heads. We blame others; we complain; we feel sorry for ourselves. All of these symptoms show that we're stuck in our thoughts. We're out of touch with the open space that is always right here.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the importance of being present in the moment to fully experience life and avoid getting lost in negative thoughts.
Joko Beck highlights that our true foundation in life lies in the present moment, where genuine experiences occur. When we fail to connect with this present, we become trapped in our minds, leading to blame, complaints, and self-pity. This disconnection prevents us from enjoying the richness of life as it unfolds around us, highlighting the necessity of mindfulness and presence.
Themes
MindfulnessPresent MomentExperienceThoughtsLiving
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be shared during a mindfulness workshop to stress the importance of living in the moment.
More from Joko Beck
All quotes →What does open us is sharing our vulnerabilities. Sometimes we see a couple who has done this difficult work over a lifetime. In the process, they have grown old together. We can sense the enormous comfort, the shared quality of ease between these people. It is beautiful, and very rare. Without this quality of openness and vulnerability, partners don't really know each other; they are one image living with another image.
Joko BeckRead
We learn in our guts, not just in our brain, that a life of joy is not in seeking happiness, but in experiencing and simply being the circumstances of our life as they are; not in fulfilling personal wants, but in fulfilling the needs of life.
Joko BeckRead
How do we know if our practice is a real practice? Only by one thing: more and more, we just see the wonder. What is the wonder? I don't know. We can't know such things through thinking. But we always know it when it's there.
Joko BeckRead
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