Western laziness consists of cramming our lives with compulsive activity, so that there is no time at all to confront the real issues.
Interpretation
The quote highlights the idea that excessive busyness can distract us from addressing important life challenges.
Sogyal Rinpoche's quote reflects on the nature of modern life, suggesting that our tendency to fill our days with constant activity can prevent us from confronting deeper, more meaningful issues that require reflection and thoughtful consideration. The idea is that in our rush to be productive, we may overlook significant personal or societal problems that need our attention, ultimately leading to a less fulfilling existence.
In practice
This quote can be shared during a mindfulness seminar to encourage participants to slow down and reflect on their lives.
Sit, then, as if you were a mountain, with all the unshakeable, steadfast majesty of a mountain. A mountain is completely natural and at ease with itself, however strong the winds that try to bother it, however thick the dark clouds that swirl around its peak. Sitting like a mountain, let your mind rise and fly and soar
Real devotion is an unbroken receptivity to the truth. Real devotion is rooted in an awed and reverent gratitude, but one that is lucid, grounded, and intelligent.
There would be no chance at all of getting to know death if it happened only once. But fortunately, life is nothing but a continuing dance of birth and death, a dance of change. Every time I hear the rush of a mountain stream, or the waves crashing on the shore, or my own heartbeat, I hear the sound of impermanence. These changes, these small deaths, are our living links with death. They are death's pulses, death's heartbeat, prompting us to let go of all the things we cling to.
{While meditating} I sit quietly and rest in the nature of mind; I don't question or doubt whether I am in the "correct" state or not. There is no effort, only rich understanding, wakefulness, and unshakable certainty. When I am in the nature of mind, the ordinary mind is no longer there. There is no need to sustain or confirm a sense of being: I simply am.
We may idealize freedom, but when it comes to our habits, we are completely enslaved.
Death is a vast mystery, but there are two things we can say about it: It is absolutely certain that we will die, and it is uncertain when or how we will die. The only surety we have, then, is this uncertainty about the hour of our death, which we seize on as the excuse to postpone facing death directly. We are like children who cover their eyes in a game of hide and seek and think that no one can see them.
Whenever you become anxious or stressed, outer purpose has taken over, and you lost sight of your inner purpose. You have forgotten that your state of consciousness is primary, all else secondary.
When we respect everybody around us, we are in peace with everybody around us.
The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience.
Shrines! Shrines! Surely you don't believe in the gods. What's your argument? Where's your proof?
After a cup of tea (two spoonsful for each cup, and don't let it stand more than three minutes,) it says to the brain, "Now, rise, and show your strength. Be eloquent, and deep, and tender; see, with a clear eye, into Nature and into life; spread your white wings of quivering thought, and soar, a god-like spirit, over the whirling world beneath you, up through long lanes of flaming stars to the gates of eternity!
Yes, I will put it out there - I will work for anyone for free if they're prepared to make their clothing Fair Trade and organic. It's really hard to get people interested in it.
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