“All experience is preceded by mind, led by mind, made by mind. Speak or act with a peaceful mind, and happiness follows, like a never-departing shadow.”

— The Buddha (in the Dhammapada)

Much has been written about the scientifically proven benefits that mindfulness meditation has on a person’s wellbeing. Thanks to research that has been conducted on the brain’s response to mindfulness meditation, it is now accepted as a therapeutic way to relax and create better mental health. As a foundational teaching of the Buddha, some of our favorite Buddhist Masters speak below on its importance in our daily life today.

Mark Nunberg: “Fortunately, suffering can wake us up. It can highlight how ineffective our habits of struggling with the conditions of life are.  Instead of following these impulses to push away unpleasant experience or hold on to pleasant experience, we can learn to relate to the ups and downs of life with wisdom and equanimity. Mindfulness naturally leads to the letting go of suffering and the arising of inherent wisdom and compassion.” 

Jack Kornfield: “Instead, listen to your thoughts with mindful awareness. You will see the evanescent nature of feelings and thoughts, that they are fleeting, all impermanent. And then you can begin to realize that just because you have a feeling or thought doesn’t mean you have to believe it—much less act on it—and certainly not get caught up in a whole stream of them. You can release the mind of some of its more dangerous patterns. Observing the mind with mindfulness brings liberation.”

Joseph Goldstein:  “Imagine holding on to a hot burning coal. You would not fear letting go of it. In fact, once you noticed that you were holding on, you would probably drop it quickly. But we often do not recognize how we hold on to suffering. It seems to hold on to us. This is our practice: becoming aware of how suffering arises in our mind and of how we become identified with it, and learning to let it go. We learn through simple and direct observation, seeing the process over and over again until we understand.”

Thich Nhat Hanh: “This is a very important practice. Live your daily life in a way that you never lose yourself. When you are carried away with your worries, fears, cravings, anger, and desire, you run away from yourself and you lose yourself. The practice is always to go back to oneself..

Life can be found only in the present moment. 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.”

Pema Chodron: “When something is bothering you—a person is bugging you, a situation is irritating you, or physical pain is troubling you—you must work with your mind, and that is done through meditation. Working with our minds is the only means through which we’ll actually begin to feel happy and content with the world that we live in.”