When you realize the nature of mind, layers of confusion peel away. You don't actually "become" a buddha, you simply cease, slowly, to be deluded. And being a buddha is not being some omnipotent spiritual superman, but becoming at last a true human being.
Interpretation
Understanding your mind helps eliminate confusion and leads to true enlightenment.
This quote emphasizes that enlightenment is not about acquiring special powers or becoming superhuman, but rather about shedding misconceptions and reaching a state of authenticity. It highlights that realizing the nature of our mind allows us to peel away layers of ignorance, leading to a more genuine human experience.
In practice
In a meditation class, when discussing mindfulness and self-awareness.
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.
Why reasonable people go stark raving mad when anything involving a Negro comes up, is something I don't pretend to understand.
Democracy will prevail when men believe the vote of Judas as good as that of Jesus Christ.
If there's one thing that really annoys a god, it's not knowing something.
Because he is a living divinity, when he acts, the universe acts.
As hypocrisy is said to be the highest compliment to virtue, the art of lying is the strongest acknowledgment of the force of truth.
The ugliness of bigotry stands in direct contradiction to the very meaning of America.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.