Don’t try to undo the past or the present, but you just accept where you are and work from there

In human life, if you feel that you have made a mistake, you don’t try to undo the past or the present, but you just accept where you are and work from there. Tremendous openness as to where you are is necessary. This also applies to the practice of meditation, for instance. A person should learn to meditate on the spot, in the given moment, rather than thinking, “. . . When I reach pension age, I’m going to retire and receive a pension, and I’m going to build my house in Hawaii or the middle of India, or maybe the Gobi Desert, and THEN I’m going to enjoy myself. I’ll live a life of solitude and then I’ll really meditate.” Things never happen that way.

— Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, Transcending Madness

Clean Up After Ourselves

Being tidy and meticulous is the Buddhist message—meticulous in cleaning your oryoki bowls, meticulous in how you walk, meticulous in how you treat your clothing and your household articles. We can’t get away with being sloppy; we have to introduce the principle of tidiness more and more into our lives. When economic chaos or family chaos takes place, apart from obvious issues of economic mismanagement, marital problems, or emotional problems, we find that domestic details have not been taken care of. There are cockroaches running all over; there is never enough toilet tissue; the toilet bowls are overflowing; and the dishes are not washed. All those problems come from a careless attitude. It is predictable. But when we clean up after ourselves, according to exactly the same principles we follow in oryoki, we have nothing to blame. When we begin to live our lives in that way, cleaning up after ourselves, what is left is further vision and further openness, which leads to cleaning up the rest of the world.

~ Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche

A person should learn to meditate on the spot

In human life, if you feel that you have made a mistake, you don’t try to undo the past or the present, but you just accept where you are and work from there. Tremendous openness as to where you are is necessary. This also applies to the practice of meditation, for instance. A person should learn to meditate on the spot, in the given moment, rather than thinking, “. . . When I reach pension age, I’m going to retire and receive a pension, and I’m going to build my house in Hawaii or the middle of India, or maybe the Gobi Desert, and THEN I’m going to enjoy myself. I’ll live a life of solitude and then I’ll really meditate.” Things never happen that way.

—Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche, Transcending Madness

Surrendering Aggression

Love is a state of mind without a center or self. Therefore, it doesn’t feel threatened. Since, it is not afraid it isn’t obliged to judge everything on the basis of what it stands to lose or gain in the relationship. So, love is able to simply appreciate the present moment without seeking ownership or destruction. It is free of aggression… This sort of open door policy is generosity. Of course, this is scary from a certain point of view…

The ego devotes all of its time and energy to keeping the door shut. However, the door swinging open is always a possibility precisely because there is a door! This possibility drives the ego mad or gives rise to a a certain kind of paranoia. On the other hand, this door is our “soft spot” or “basic goodness.” It is the indestructible quality of sanity. The door is an eternal reminder that sanity is all that there is.

We could be in the midst of a knock down drag out fight with our significant other. In our rage we say something hurtful, and then BOOM! We see it in their face. We made them sad; their feelings are hurt. Our selfish/ self-centered agenda has destroyed itself. Egocentricity is unsustainable. Life shatters all of our silly little selfish plans. Sanity immediately recognizes this sadness in the other, and begins to express itself. Insanity is revealed to be nothing more than sanity misunderstood, and we remember that we love this person, and that is all that matters! It is a soft spot…

The most subtle expression of generosity is mindfulness, or simply observing. Listening. Watching. Generosity is participation free of aggression or the neurotic need to control. No need to grasp or defend- simply listen. Life is very spacious; all we have to do is acknowledge it. Basic goodness is the potential embedded in the human condition that invites us to do just that.

~ Chogyam Trungpa

Chogyam Trungpa | Decency

“If you are a warrior, decency means that you are not cheating anybody at all. You are not even about to cheat anybody. There is a sense of straightforwardness and simplicity. With setting-sun vision, or vision based on cowardice, straightforwardness is always a problem. If people have some story or news to tell somebody else, first of all they are either excited or disappointed. Then they begin to figure out how to tell their news. They develop a plan, which leads them completely away from simply telling it. By the time a person hears the news, it is not news at all, but opinion. It becomes a message of some kind, rather than fresh, straightforward news. Decency is the absence of strategy. It is of utmost importance to realize that the warrior’s approach should be simple-minded sometimes, very simple and straightforward. That makes it very beautiful: you having nothing up your sleeve; therefore a sense of genuineness comes through. That is decency.

- Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche

Sometimes I wonder about this straightforwardness, and I wonder if I am just naive or truly the "warrior" that I was supposed to be. It seems the world don't make it easy for someone trying to be decent in this world. I wish it was easier.