Quotes from Thich Nhat Hanh

Fear gives life to anger. You don't have peace when fear is there, so it becomes the soil on which anger can grow. Fear is based on ignorance, and this lack of understanding is also a primary cause of anger.

To love is, first of all, to accept ourselves as we are.

All concepts, including those of "unity" and of duality, are foreign to experience which can be described as non-conceptual.

With nonattachment, we see both being and nonbeing as creations of our mind, and we ride the wave of birth and death. We don't mind birth. We don't mind death. [...] Reality transcends both birth and death.

Looking deeply can become a way of life. We can practice conscious breathing to help us be in touch with things and look deeply at their impermanent nature. This practice will keep us from complaining that everything is impermanent. Impermanence is what makes transformation possible. Thanks to impermanence, we can change suffering into joy.

We should not try to escape from our pain. We should look at it directly. Looking at suffering deeply, we will have deep insight into its nature, and the path of transformation and healing will present itself to us.

When we go home to the present moment, we understand there are so many conditions of happiness that we don't need to go running after yet another one. We already have enough conditions to be happy. Happiness is entirely possible right in the here and now. The

mindfulness is not something that is only done in a meditation hall; it is also done in the kitchen, in the garden, when we are on the telephone, when we are driving a car, when we are doing the dishes. If

Start where you are. The past is gone, the future is not yet here, and if we do not go back to ourselves in the present moment, we cannot be in touch with life.

We blame our suffering on another person or group, or on bad luck, but outside conditions are not the reason it appears. Our suffering was already there.

If the United States wants safety, it has to take care of the safety of other nations also. If Great Britain wants safety, it has to think of the safety of other groups of people. Any of us could be victims of violence and terrorism. No country is immune.

We tend to focus on the object and call it reality. We don't notice how our mind intervenes in our perception.