In Love with the World: A Monk's Journey Through the Bardos of Living and Dying

But birth and death are just ideas. All we need to do is overcome these ideas. When I learned that, I saw that such a feat was not impossible. These two ideas have imprisoned us for so many lifetimes.

WHAT KEEPS US unhappy and stuck in a limited view of reality is our tendency to seek pleasure and avoid pain, to seek security and avoid groundlessness, to seek comfort and avoid discomfort. This is how we keep ourselves enclosed in a cocoon. Out there are all the planets and all the galaxies and vast space, but we’re stuck here in this cocoon. Mom

While the specific details of rebirth, in what form and when, are ultimately unknowable, the Buddhism described in this book stresses the importance of seeing the big picture—discovering the eternity of life within oneself. In this Buddhism, the challenge presented by the issue of death is to find the most valuable way to live.

We need to know this, and to be in touch with the reality that we are living the life of no birth and no death. The word know here is very important. To know is to realize. Realization is mindfulness. All the work of meditation is aimed at awakening us in order to know one thing: that birth and death can never touch us in any way whatsoever.