“I read of a Buddhist teacher who developed Alzheimer's. He had retired from teaching because his memory was unreliable, but he made one exception for a reunion of his former students. When he walked onto the stage, he forgot everything, even where he was and why. However, he was a skilled Buddhist and he simply began sharing his feelings with the crowd. He said, "I am anxious. I feel stupid. I feel scared and dumb. I am worried that I am wasting everyone's time. I am fearful. I am embarrassing myself." After a few minutes of this, he remembered his talk and proceeded without apology. The students were deeply moved, not only by his wise teachings, but also by how he handled his failings.There is a Buddhist saying, "No resistance, no demons.”

“I approached Buddhism the way I approach almost everything. I read books about it. Even though, at first, I didn't understand much of what I was reading, I found the writing soothing. Reading made me feel lighter and more positive. It somehow gentled me toward myself. I intuitively responded to Buddhist ideas. They helped me see the world and my place in it more clearly.”

“Do what the Buddhists do. Every day, have a little bird on your shoulder that asks, 'Is today the day? Am I read? Am I doing all I need to do? Am I being the person i want to be?'" He turned his head to his shoulder as if the bird were there now. "Is today the day I die?" he said.”

“I practiced what the Dalai Lama calls 'inner disarmament.' Of course, I still had judgments, but I tried to accept even my judgments without judgment. At a glacial pace, I moved beyond repression and self-criticism to something more skillful. I discovered the difference between recoiling from feelings and opening to them. I trained myself to be more curious than fearful. Sometimes I even felt compassion for myself as I struggled.”

“Then he asked me to tell him some stories about India, about America, about Italy, about my family. That's when I realized that I am not Ketut Liyer's English teacher, nor am I exactly his theological student, but I am the merest and simplest of pleasures for this old medicine man- I am his company. I'm somebody he can talk to because he enjoys hearing about the world and he hasn't had much of a chance to see it.”

“Everything, including our pain, is His. I am thankful He will meet me in it.”

“This boy," he said, indicating the paintings with one sweep of his arms, "was romantic. He thought that it was beauty that bound everything together. And for him it was true. Life had been beautiful for him. He was very young. He knew very little of life. He saw beauty but he did not feel any true passion. How could he? He did not know. He had not really encountered the force of beauty's opposite.""Are you more cynical now, then?" she asked him."Cynical," he frowned, "No, not that. I know that there is an ugly side of life-and not just human life. I know that everything is not simply beautiful. I am not a romantic as this boy was. But I am not a cynic either. There is something enduring in all of life, Anne, something tough. Something. Something terribly weak yet incredibly powerful...”