Latest Robert Thurman Quotes from Interviews

Quotes about:

• A possession can't make you happy.

  Robert Thurman

  Make You Happy, Possession

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com. December 1, 2013.

• That love, in the sense of wishing their happiness, will cause your actions to be effective in relation to that person.

  Robert Thurman

  Wish, Causes, Action

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• If someone gets a bigger house, does that automatically make them happy? Maybe for a second. But then they worry about the bigger house and how to take care of it.

  Robert Thurman

  Worry, House, Doe

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com. December 1, 2013.

• The person who is tormenting the Tibetans feels they have to get rid of the Tibetans in order to be happy.

  Robert Thurman

  Order, Tibetan, Feels

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com. December 1, 2013.

• The problem in our society is the ego psychology and conventional wisdom about "look out for #1." That conventional wisdom thinks that "love your enemy" is to some a principle no one can ever live by.

  Robert Thurman

  Love You, Thinking, Psychology

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• Take the example of people who are being most unrealistic - people who are beating monks to death and torturing them. Why shouldn't you be angry or hate that person? Well, the person who is doing that is very unhappy. They are being ordered by a higher-up.

  Robert Thurman

  Hate, People, Unhappy

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• You take up energy towards someone because you think loving your enemy doesn't just mean caving into your enemy. It means first of all liberating yourself.

  Robert Thurman

  Mean, Thinking, Loving You

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• Hate poisons your life.

  Robert Thurman

  Hate, Poison

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• If you love your enemy, that means you want your enemy to be happy.

  Robert Thurman

  Love You, Mean, Enemy

• If your enemy is happy, then why would they be bothered to be your enemy? Being someone's enemy is no fun. It does not add to happiness.

  Robert Thurman

  Fun, Enemy, Doe

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com. December 1, 2013.

• It isn't the meaning of love where you somehow desire that one or you want them or want them to love you.

  Robert Thurman

  Love You, Desire, Want

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• Human beings are such social animals. We're very connected with the feelings of those we're close to, so we can't really be happy when the ones we are close to are unhappy.

  Robert Thurman

  Animal, Feelings, Unhappy

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• The most important enemy for everyone is their own illusion that makes them unrealistic or exaggerates their sense of self-importance in the world. Ironically, you're the super secret enemy. Whether lay or householder, everyone has that internal enemy.

  Robert Thurman

  Self, Secret, Enemy

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• Everyone has the same life purpose, which is the quest of happiness for oneself and for others.

  Robert Thurman

  Purpose, Quests, Purpose Of Life

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• I think humans will find their humanity sometime, somehow.

  Robert Thurman

  Thinking, Humanity, Humans

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• This question, Is loving your enemy a life practice?, I like that question. It is a life practice, certainly, for everyone. It relates to
  the idea of, Is this a householder practice or is it a monk practice? I think it's both. Everyone has that practice.

  Robert Thurman

  Thinking, Practice, Ideas

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• I think about the trends at the moment in the planet and how it looks for my grandchildren. I don't panic over it, even though rationally maybe I should. I have faith that these terrible trends will change, and they will not go to their logical conclusions of climate change, militarism, pollution, overpopulation.

  Robert Thurman

  Thinking, Grandchildren, Trends

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• People in Tibet have an expression. When you reach a certain degree of venerableness and age, and people ask, "How are you?," there is an expression that people use that means, "Just barely not dead." Some people might be frightened by it but I think it's quite funny.

  Robert Thurman

  Mean, Thinking, Expression

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• What makes me fully alive is anything. Really just being alive is enough.

  Robert Thurman

  Alive, Just Being, Enough

  Interview with Maranda Pleasant, www.marandapleasantmedia.com.

• The Chinese people absolutely need good spiritual examples. They also could use a citizen of their own, who is free and happy, and pleased with them, and represents them in a positive way to the world. Especially now that they're becoming this mega-power, and no longer known as a puppet in the game, or strictly business people.

  Robert Thurman

  Spiritual, Games, People

  Source: theindiespiritualist.com

• They [Chinese] will need a sympathetic intercessor with other people in the world to avoid conflict and create trust, and of course, Dalai Lama would be ideal. In another ten years from now though, he won't have the time to be really effective for them. They're truly wasting their time not using him now.

  Robert Thurman

  Years, People, Chinese

  Source: theindiespiritualist.com

• The better teachers recognize that by freeing yourself of the rigid ego identity habit, you actually strengthen the resilient, flexible, creative ego, and you then can be more effective in helping others, and creative in whatever work you do.

  Robert Thurman

  Teacher, Helping Others, Creative

  FaceBook post by Robert Thurman from Mar 25, 2017

• You're more responsible ethically for being there with your interconnection to the world, but the you now is an always changing one, and you're responsible for how you change it. It's very important to understand that whole thing about the ego.

  Robert Thurman

  Ego, Important, World

  Source: theindiespiritualist.com

• Actually there's a very bad trend in some cults about how Guru's are supposed to be mean to their students, and there are some who revel in this and are abusive.

  Robert Thurman

  Mean, Trends, Students

  Source: theindiespiritualist.com

• You have to be responsible for yourself, refer to yourself, develop yourself, help others, whatever it may be. So we shouldn't have an idea that the whole thing is to shatter ones ego.

  Robert Thurman

  Helping Others, Ideas, Ego

  Source: theindiespiritualist.com