The Records That Count

The basic problem we seem to be facing is that we are too involved
with trying to prove something, which is connected with paranoia and
a feeling of poverty. When you are trying to prove or get something,
you are not open anymore, you have to check everything, and you have
to arrange it "correctly." It is such a paranoid way to live and it
really does not prove anything. One might set records in terms of
numbers and quantities -- that we have built the greatest, the
biggest; we have collected the most, the longest, the most gigantic.
But who is going to remember the record when you are dead? Or in one
hundred years? Or in ten years? Or in ten minutes? The records that
count are those of the given moment, of now -- whether or not
communication and openness are actually taking place now....In the
sacred writings, you never read stories of the bodhisattvas, the
great practitioners of mahayana, receiving medals. And quite rightly
so, because there is no need for them to prove anything. Their action
is spontaneous. It is the open life, open communication, which does
not involve struggle or speed at all.

From "The Open Way," in CUTTING THROUGH SPIRITUAL MATERIALISM, pages
102 to 103.

All material by Chogyam Trungpa is copyright Diana J. Mukpo and used
by permission.

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Ocean of Dharma Quotes of the Week: teachings by Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche.
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