Machik Labdrön > Quotes

“Approach what you find repulsive, help the ones you think you cannot help, and go places that scare you. ”
― Machik Labdron

“Oh, noble child, everything is severing the mind. As for the mind, it is severing pride. There is nothing whatsoever that is not included in pride. If one simply understands that it is merely the production of pride, then, for example, one is like a thief in an empty house: by simply recognizing [the situation], grasping is impossible. Having correctly understood, there is no practice with an intentional objective. Because it crushes any hesitations (mi phod), it is explained as Chöd.”
― Machik Labdrön, Making the Old New Again and Again: Legitimation and Innovation in the Tibetan Buddhist Chöd Tradition

“Seeing the frightful transformations of Māra’s army, the Pure Being recognizes them all as a product of illusion. There is no demon, no army, no beings; there is not even a self. Like the image of the moon in the water, the cycle of the three worlds is misleading.”
― Machik Labdrön, Machik's Complete Explanation: Clarifying the Meaning of Chod (Expanded Edition)

“If there is destruction of hope, there is freedom from gods [lha]; if there is destruction of fear, there is freedom from spirits ['dre, demons].”
― Machik Labdrön, Making the Old New Again and Again: Legitimation and Innovation in the Tibetan Buddhist Chöd Tradition

“Without discursive thought it is just dharma practice. Hope together with aim obscures. One does not cut through pride by meditatively cultivating the desire for happiness. If there is hope, even the hope for buddhas, it is a negative force. If there is apprehension, even apprehension about hells, it is a negative force.”
― Machik Labdrön, Making the Old New Again and Again: Legitimation and Innovation in the Tibetan Buddhist Chöd Tradition

“Without hope, Chöd practitioners are freed from the limits of hope and fear; having cut the ropes of grasping, definitely enlightened, where does one go?”
― Machik Labdrön, Making the Old New Again and Again: Legitimation and Innovation in the Tibetan Buddhist Chöd Tradition

“The origin of all demons is in mind itself.”
― Machik Labdrön