Enlightenment is not something you achieve. It is the absence of something. All your life you have been going forward after something, pursuing some goal. Enlightenment is dropping all that.
Joko BeckRead
What does open us is sharing our vulnerabilities. Sometimes we see a couple who has done this difficult work over a lifetime. In the process, they have grown old together. We can sense the enormous comfort, the shared quality of ease between these people. It is beautiful, and very rare. Without this quality of openness and vulnerability, partners don't really know each other; they are one image living with another image.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Sharing vulnerabilities strengthens relationships, leading to deeper connections between partners.
This quote emphasizes the importance of openness and vulnerability in intimate relationships. By sharing their true selves and the challenges they face, partners can develop a stronger bond and mutual understanding over time, contrasting with superficial connections where individuals maintain façades instead of authentic communication. The depth of their emotional connection grows, resulting in a rare beauty that is deeply comforting.
Themes
VulnerabilityRelationshipsOpennessConnectionAuthenticity
In practice
Example use cases
Use this quote in a relationship workshop to discuss the importance of emotional honesty.
More from Joko Beck
All quotes →We learn in our guts, not just in our brain, that a life of joy is not in seeking happiness, but in experiencing and simply being the circumstances of our life as they are; not in fulfilling personal wants, but in fulfilling the needs of life.
Joko BeckRead
There is a foundation for our lives, a place in which our life rests. That place is nothing but the present moment, as we see, hear, experience what is. If we do not return to that place, we live our lives out of our heads. We blame others; we complain; we feel sorry for ourselves. All of these symptoms show that we're stuck in our thoughts. We're out of touch with the open space that is always right here.
Joko BeckRead
How do we know if our practice is a real practice? Only by one thing: more and more, we just see the wonder. What is the wonder? I don't know. We can't know such things through thinking. But we always know it when it's there.
Joko BeckRead
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