When death finally comes you will welcome it like an old friend, being aware of how dreamlike and impermanent the pheneomenal world really is.
Dilgo Khyentse RinpocheRead
Life is fragile, like the dew hanging delicately on the grass, crystal drops that will be carried away on the first morning breeze.
Interpretation
Life is delicate and can change or disappear unexpectedly.
This quote emphasizes the fragility of life by comparing it to dew drops, which are beautiful and ephemeral. Just as dew can vanish with the slightest change in the environment, so too can life be fleeting, reminding us to cherish each moment and appreciate the beauty around us.
In practice
This quote can be used in a speech about appreciating life during times of uncertainty.
When death finally comes you will welcome it like an old friend, being aware of how dreamlike and impermanent the pheneomenal world really is.
Sentient beings, self and others, enemies and dear ones-all are made by thoughts. It is like seeing a rope and mistaking it for a snake. When we think that the rope is a snake, we are scared, but once we see that we are looking at a rope, our fear dissipates. We have been deluded by our thoughts. Likewise, mentally fabricating self and others, we generate attachment and aversion.
We live under threat from painful emotions: anger, desire, pride, jealousy and so on. Therefore we should always be ready to counter these with the appropriate antidote. True practitioners may be recognized by their unfailing mindfulness.
To go beyond samsara and nirvana, we will need _x000D_ the two wings of emptiness and compassion. _x000D_ From now on, let us use these two wings _x000D_ to fly fearlessly into the sky of the life to come.
To feel overflowing love and almost unbearable compassion for all living creatures is the best way to fulfil the wishes of all the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. Even if for the moment you cannot actually help a sentient being in an external way, meditate on love and compassion constantly over the months and years until compassion is knit inseparably into the very fabric of your mind.
If you vanquish ego-clinging today, tonight you will be enlightened.
We do survive every moment, after all, except the last one.
She spoke of evenings in the country making popcorn on the porch. Once this would have gladdened my heart but because her heart was not glad when she said it I knew there was nothing in it but the idea of what one should do.
When my parents were liberated, four years before I was born, they found that the ordinary world outside the camp had been eradicated. There was no more simple meal, no thing was less than extraordinary: a fork, a mattress, a clean shirt, a book. Not to mention such things that can make one weep: an orange, meat and vegetables, hot water. There was no ordinariness to return to, no refuge from the blinding potency of things, an apple screaming its sweet juice.
I wanted so much to have a life. Even just once, even for a second.
There were many moments in the Vine like that one--where you might think today was yesterday, and yesterday was tomorrow, and so on. Because we all believed we were tragic, and we drank. We had that helpless, destined feeling. We would die with handcuffs on. We would be put a stop to, and it wouldn't be our fault. So we imagined. And yet we were always being found innocent for ridiculous reasons.
I'd sleep and forget it; I had my own life, my own sad and ragged life forever.
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