To forgive is not to forget. The merit lies in loving in spite of the vivid knowledge that one that must be loved is not a friend. There is not merit in loving an enemy when you forget him for a friend.
Mahatma GandhiRead
The sacrifice which causes sorrow to the doer of the sacrifice is no sacrifice. Real sacrifice lightens the mind of the doer and gives him a sense of peace and joy. The Buddha gave up the pleasures of life because they had become painful to him.
Interpretation
True sacrifice brings joy and peace, rather than sorrow.
This quote emphasizes that genuine sacrifice should not bring pain or regret to the person making the sacrifice. Instead, it should lead to a sense of inner peace and happiness, reflecting the idea that the choices we make should enhance our well-being rather than detract from it, as exemplified by Buddha's renunciation of life's pleasures when they became sources of suffering.
In practice
During a speech on community service, this quote can highlight the true essence of selflessness.
To forgive is not to forget. The merit lies in loving in spite of the vivid knowledge that one that must be loved is not a friend. There is not merit in loving an enemy when you forget him for a friend.
Love never claims, it ever gives. Love ever suffers, never resents never revenges itself.
Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will.
The real test of nonviolence lies in its being brought in contact with those who have contempt for it.
Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.
The devotion of such titans of spirit as Lenin to an Ideal must bear fruit. The nobility of his selflessness will be an example through centuries to come, and his Ideal will reach perfection.
Men develop ideas and systems of explanation by absorbing past knowledge and critiquing and superseding it. Women, ignorant of their own history [do] not know what women before them had thought and taught. So generation after generation, they [struggle] for insights others had already had before them, [resulting in] the constant inventing of the wheel.
To have become a deeper man is the privilege of those who have suffered.
He that goes a borrowing goes a sorrowing.
The men and women who are truly filled with light are those who have gazed deeply into the darkness of their own imperfect existence.
Until you have learned to be tolerant with those who do not always agree with you, you will be neither successful nor happy.
The best way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas.
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