When death finally comes you will welcome it like an old friend, being aware of how dreamlike and impermanent the pheneomenal world really is.
Interpretation
Embracing death as a natural part of life allows for a deeper understanding of existence.
This quote by Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche suggests that when we approach the end of our lives, we should do so with acceptance and familiarity, recognizing that life is transient and often feels surreal. It highlights the importance of acknowledging the impermanence of the world, which can bring us peace in the face of mortality.
In practice
In a eulogy, one might quote this to emphasize the acceptance of death.
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.
Life is fragile, like the dew hanging delicately on the grass, crystal drops that will be carried away on the first morning breeze.
If you vanquish ego-clinging today, tonight you will be enlightened.
Here, in Alethkar, men often spoke of the legends -- of mankind's hard-won victory over the Voidbringers. But when weapons created to fight nightmares were turned against common soldiers, the lives of men became cheap things indeed.
A psychoneurosis must be understood, ultimately, as the suffering of a soul which has not discovered its meaning.
The high destiny of the individual is to serve rather than to rule.
Unseen University had never admitted women, muttering something about problems with the plumbing, but the real reason was an unspoken dread that if women were allowed to mess around with magic they would probably be embarrassingly good at it.
Peter Keating: "Do you always have to have a purpose? Do you always have to be so damn serious? Can't you ever do things without reason, just like everybody else? You're so serious, so old. Everything's important with you. Everything's great, significant in some way, every minute, even when you keep still. Can't you ever be comfortable-and unimportant?" | Howard Roark: "No."
The empty blue sky of space says 'All this comes back to me, then goes again, and comes back again, then goes again, and I don't care, it still belongs to me
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