Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

As long as you think that the cause of your problem is “out there”—as long as you think that anyone or anything is responsible for your suffering—the situation is hopeless. It means that you are forever in the role of victim, that you’re suffering in paradise.

A thought is harmless unless we believe it. It’s not our thoughts, but our attachment to our thoughts, that causes suffering. Attaching to a thought means believing that it’s true, without inquiring. A belief is a thought that we’ve been attaching to, often for years.

I am a lover of what is, not because I'm a spiritual person, but because it hurts when I argue with reality.

Our parents, our children, our spouses, and our friends will continue to press every button we have, until we realize what it is that we don't want to know about ourselves, yet. They will point us to our freedom every time.

If you put your hand into a fire, does anyone have to tell you to move it? Do you have to decide? No: When your hand starts to burn, it moves. You don’t have to direct it; the hand moves itself. In the same way, once you understand, through inquiry, that an untrue thought causes suffering, you move away from it.

Peace doesn't require two people; it requires only one. It has to be you. The problem begins and ends there.

You are your only hope, because we're not changing until you do. Our job is to keep coming at you, as hard as we can, with everything that angers, upsets, or repulses you, until you understand. We love you that much, whether we're aware of it or not. The whole world is about you.

You move totally away from reality when you believe that there is a legitimate reason to suffer".

We don't attach to people or to things; we attach to uninvestigated concepts that we believe to tbe true in the moment.

Whatever it takes for you to find your freedom, that's what you've lived.

In my experience, we don't make thoughts appear, they just appear. One day, I noticed that their appearance just wasn't personal. Noticing that really makes it simpler to inquire.

It is easy to be swept away by some overwhelming feeling, so it’s helpful to remember that any stressful feeling is like a compassionate alarm clock that says, “You’re caught in the dream.” Depression, pain, and fear are gifts that say, “Sweetheart, take a look at your thinking right now. You’re living in a story that isn’t true for you.

Isn’t it marvelous to discover that you’re the one you’ve been waiting for? That you are your own freedom?

I am a lover of what is, not because I’m a spiritual person, but because it hurts when I argue with reality. We can know that reality is good just as it is, because when we argue with it, we experience tension and frustration. We don’t feel natural or balanced. When we stop opposing reality, action becomes simple, fluid, kind, and fearless.

We’re all looking for love, in our confusion, until we find our way back to the realization that love is what we already are.

There’s only one thing harder than accepting this, and that is not accepting it.

Thoughts are like the breeze or the leaves on the trees or the raindrops falling. They appear like that, and through inquiry we can make friends with them. Would you argue with a raindrop? Raindrops aren’t personal, and neither are thoughts. Once a painful concept is met with understanding, the next time it appears you may find it interesting. What used to be the nightmare is now just interesting. The next time it appears, you may find it funny. The next time, you may not even notice it. This is the power of loving what is.

Dying is everything they were looking for in life.

And when people die, it’s so wonderful that they never come back to tell you.

Peace and joy naturally, inevitably, and irreversibly make their way into every corner of your mind, into every relationship and experience. The process is so subtle that you may not even have any conscious awareness of it. You may only know that you used to hurt and now you don’t.

Everyone is a mirror image of yourself—your own thinking coming back at you.

The Work is merely four questions; it’s not even a thing. It has no motive, no strings. It’s nothing without your answers. These four questions will join any program you’ve got and enhance it. Any religion you have—they’ll enhance it. If you have no religion, they will bring you joy. And they’ll burn up anything that isn’t true for you. They’ll burn through to the reality that has always been waiting.

Katie: We live; we die. Always right on time, not one moment sooner or later than

You move totally away from reality when you believe that there is a legitimate reason to suffer.

That’s what inquiry is for, to break through stressful mythology. These

My experience is that the teachers we need most are the people we’re living with now.

In reality, the pain we feel about a past event is created in the present,

I love not rushing the process. Mind doesn’t shift until it does, and when it does shift, it’s right on time, not one second too late or too soon. People are just like seeds waiting to sprout. We can’t be pushed ahead of our own understanding. To

Self-realization is the sweetest thing. It shows us how we are fully responsible for ourselves, and that is where we find our freedom.

And have you also noticed that it’s hopeless to dictate people’s awareness or behavior? So let’s turn it around. She loves you, but she may not know it yet, and that lack of awareness is very painful. I am very clear that the whole world loves me. I just don’t expect them to realize it yet. [The audience laughs.]