Top 120 Matthieu Ricard Quotes (2025 Update)
Page 3 of 3

101. “What strange hesitancy, fear, or apathy stops us from looking within ourselves, from trying to grasp the true essence of joy and sadness, desire and hatred? Fear of the unknown prevails, and the courage to explore that inner world fails at the frontier of our mind.”

— Matthieu Ricard

102. “Happiness is not given to us, nor is misery imposed. At every moment we are at a crossroads and must choose the direction we will take.”

— Matthieu Ricard

103. “In vain he flees his troubles on a horse – They share the saddle and see him on his course.4.”

— Matthieu Ricard

104. “The belief that human nature is essentially corrupt taints our vision of life with pessimism and makes us question the very basis of the search for happiness, that is, every human being’s potential for perfection.”

— Matthieu Ricard

105. “Happiness is thus viewed as being just a deceptively calm moment in the middle of a storm.”

— Matthieu Ricard

106. “Understanding that the essential nature of consciousness is neutral permits us to understand that it is possible to change our mental universe. We can transform the content of our thoughts and experiences.”

— Matthieu Ricard

107. “To imagine happiness as the achievement of all our wishes and passions is to confuse the legitimate aspiration to inner fulfillment with a utopia that inevitably leads to frustration.”

— Matthieu Ricard

108. “Pleasure is the happiness of madmen, while happiness is the pleasure of sages,” wrote the French novelist and critic Jules Barbey d’Aurevilly.”

— Matthieu Ricard

109. “Empathy is indeed needed to trigger the arising of compassion, but the space of that compassion should be vast enough so that empathy does not turn into uncontainable distress.”

— Matthieu Ricard

110. “Had I renounced the Western world? Renunciation, at least as Buddhists use the term, is a much-misunderstood concept. It is not about giving up what is good and beautiful. How foolish that would be! Rather it is about disentangling oneself from the unsatisfactory and moving with determination toward what matters most. It is about freedom and meaning – freedom from mental confusion and self-centered afflictions, meaning through insight and loving-kindness.”

— Matthieu Ricard

111. “There is indeed an element of relaxation in meditation, but it is connected with the relief that comes from letting go of hopes and fears, of attachments and the whims of the ego that never stop feeding our inner conflicts.”

— Matthieu Ricard

112. “When you see a great black cloud in a stormy sky, it seems so solid that you could sit on it. But when you approach it, there’s nothing to grab on to; it is only vapor and wind. The experience of anger is like having a high fever. It is a temporary condition, and you do not need to identify with it. The more you look at anger in this manner, the more it evaporates under your gaze, like white frost under the sun’s rays.”

— Matthieu Ricard

113. “The great master Padmasambhava said, Even if my view is higher than the sky, The attention I pay to my actions and their effects is finer than flour.”

— Matthieu Ricard

114. “We all strive, consciously or unconsciously, competently or clumsily, passionately or calmly, adventurously or routinely, to be happier and suffer less. Yet we so often confuse genuine happiness with merely seeking enjoyable emotions.”

— Matthieu Ricard

115. “Pleasure is exhausted by usage, like a candle consuming itself. It is almost always linked to an activity and naturally leads to boredom by dint of being repeated.”

— Matthieu Ricard

116. “More often than not, we come to understand this only after the crisis has passed. It is at the very moment of anger’s emergence that we must recognize its empty nature. That understanding will strip thoughts of their power to build into a stream of obsession and oppression. They cross the mind without leaving a trace, like the trackless flight of a bird through the sky.”

— Matthieu Ricard

117. “Anyone who enjoys inner peace is no more broken by failure than he is inflated by success.”

— Matthieu Ricard

118. “Over the course of discussions with Tania and her collaborators, we noted that compassion and altruistic love were associated with positive emotions. So we arrived at the idea that burnout was in fact a kind of “empathy fatigue” and not “compassion fatigue.”

— Matthieu Ricard

119. “The common factor to all of these experiences would seem to be the momentary disappearance of inner conflicts. The person feels in harmony with the world and with herself. Someone enjoying such an experience, such as walking through a serene wilderness, has no particular expectations beyond the simple act of walking. She simply is, here and now, free and open.”

— Matthieu Ricard

120. “This is what Khyentse Rinpoche has to say on the matter: Remember that a thought is only the fleeting conjunction of myriad factors and circumstances. It does not exist by itself. When a thought arises, recognize its empty nature. It will immediately lose its power to elicit the next thought, and the chain of delusion will be broken. Recognize that emptiness of thoughts and allow your thoughts to rest a moment in the relaxed mind so that the mind’s natural clarity remains limpid and unchanged.6.”

— Matthieu Ricard

121. “Others, however, point out that science is incapable of revealing all truths, and that while technology has produced huge benefits, the ravages it has caused are at least as great. What is more, science is silent when it comes to providing wisdom about how we should live.”

— Matthieu Ricard

122. “Fundamental science is theoretical knowledge, while technology is utilitarian knowledge and contemplative science is liberating knowledge. They can thus complete each other without any conflict.”

— Matthieu Ricard

123. “It is not possible to live happily if one does not lead a beautiful, righteous, and wise life, or to lead a beautiful, righteous, and wise life if one is not happy. EPICURUS.”

— Matthieu Ricard

124. “We look for happiness outside ourselves when it is basically an inner state of being. If it were an exterior condition, it would be forever beyond our reach. Our desires are boundless and our control over the world is limited, temporary, and, more often than not, illusory. We forge bonds of friendship.”

— Matthieu Ricard

125. “Instead of turning your attention to the “target,” simply stare attentively at the emotion itself. You will see that it cannot sustain itself and soon runs out of steam.”

— Matthieu Ricard

126. “According to Buddhism, suffering will always exist as a universal phenomenon, but every individual has the potential for liberation from it.”

— Matthieu Ricard

127. “Once we get used to looking at thoughts the moment they appear and then allowing them to dissipate before they overwhelm the mind, it is much easier to maintain control over the mind and to manage the conflictive emotions in our active lives.”

— Matthieu Ricard

128. “We have come to take the dysfunctional aspect of ourselves for granted without realizing that it is possible to free ourselves from the vicious circle that is exhausting us.”

— Matthieu Ricard

129. “Rather than distinguishing between emotions and thoughts, Buddhism is more concerned with understanding which types of mental activity are conducive to one’s own and others’ well-being, and which are harmful, especially in the long run.”

— Matthieu Ricard

130. “We try to fix the outside so much, but our control of the outer world is limited, temporary, and often, illusory.”

— Matthieu Ricard