The most difficult thing to adjust to, apparently, is peace and contentment.
You cannot know, should I discribe to you; the feelings of a parent . . . . Four years have already past away since you left your native land, and this rural Cottage-Humble indeed, when compared to the Palaces you have visited, and the pomp you have been witness to. But I dare say you have not been so inattentive an observer, as to suppose that Sweet peace, and contentment, cannot inhabit the lowly roof, and bless the tranquil inhabitants, equally guarded and protected, in person and property, in this happy Country, as those who reside in the most elegant and costly dwellings.
Conventions of generality and mathematical elegance may be just as much barriers to the attainment and diffusion of knowledge as may contentment with particularity and literary vagueness... It may well be that the slovenly and literary borderland between economics and sociology will be the most fruitful building ground during the years to come and that mathematical economics will remain too flawless in its perfection to be very fruitful.
We are beset by problems and if we look for their source, we find they arise because of our selfishness, because we tend to pursue our own interests at the expense of others. Our various religious traditions exist to help us reduce these problems. They all teach ways to overcome suffering through cultivating love and compassion, tolerance, patience and contentment.
My writer friends, and they are legion, do not go around beaming with quiet feelings of contentment. Most of them go around with haunted, abused, surprised looks on their faces, like lab dogs on whom very personal deodorant sprays have been tested.
Total contentment is only for cows.
I realized that there are some things about all of us, no matter where we're from, that we are connected and we are all still humans, and we are all still looking for the same sort of contentment in our life in one way or another. Some people are searching a little harder than others, granted. But we're not so different.
If we are at peace with God and our own conscience, what enemy among men need we fear?
Let thy discontents be thy secrets; if the world knows them 'twill despise thee and increase them.
There are two things that kill a genius - a fatal disease and contentment.
The nature of men and of organized society dictates the maintenance in every field of action of the highest and purest standards of justice and of right dealing.... By justice the lawyer generally means the prompt, fair, and open application of impartial rules; but we call ours a Christian civilization, and a Christian conception of justice must be much higher. It must include sympathy and helpfulness and a willingness to forego self-interest in order to promote the welfare, happiness, and contentment of others and of the community as a whole.
Skateboarding and that whole industry just became so far away. I was trying to find that ultimate place, that place of contentment but I couldn't. I didn't find it in pushing the dark things of life to the limit either.
Let's live with that small pittance which we have; Who covets more is evermore a slave.
With all our crime and all our immorality ... and about as much contentment and respose as a fresh-caged hyena, we go to tell the whole world: we are the only one with the right idea!
All religions try to benefit people, with the same basic message of the need for love and compassion, for justice and honesty, for contentment. So merely changing formal religious affiliations will often not help much. On the other hand, in pluralistic, democratic societies, there is the freedom to adopt the religion of your choice. This is good. This lets curious people like you run around on the loose!
There's no one there to understand, there's just understanding, which flourishes in you as peace, joy and contentment.
The same know contentment, for beauty is their lover, and beauty is never absent from this world.
We'll therefore relish with content, Whate'er kind providence has sent, Nor aim beyond our pow'r; For, if our stock be very small, 'Tis prudent to enjoy it all, Nor lose the present hour.
Our ideas of happiness, gratification, contentment, satisfaction, all demand that those feelings come from within us. If you flip that on its head and say "What if I took the world at face value?" and then ask "What can I do with what is given?" it's an interesting trick to turn around the whole problem of how you feel.
There are only moments of happiness - from contentment to ecstacy.
Happy the man, of mortals happiest he, Whose quiet mind from vain desires is free; Whom neither hopes deceive, nor fears torment, But lives at peace, within himself content; In thought, or act, accountable to none But to himself, and to the gods alone.
If by happiness you mean instead an ordinary contentment, then yes - I'm fairly contented. Not satisfied - contented.
Perhaps Westerners are in a better position to practice true renunciation than uneducated Orientals because most Western people, by the time they come to the Dharma, have led a pretty full worldly life with lots of sensual pleasures, money and lots of toys to play with. They have seen that the path of accumulation of worldly treasure does not lead to happiness or contentment. That's why they come to the Dharma.
Contentment is an undervalued grace.
Contentment is not happiness. Contentment is stagnation and decay, whereas happiness is life and growth.
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