This page collects every chapter’s opening (early Buddhist) and closing (contemporary) quote.
Setting out (00-05)
Ch 00 – Setting out with the workbook
Opening
No one can do it for you – you must do it for yourself.
- Speaker/Author: Luangpor Charoen Panchan (Parnchand)
- Source: Abbot, Wat Thamkrabok Monastery, Thailand (personal transmission to the author; contemporary, not a published text)
Ch 01 – An introduction to The RAFT to Freedom
Opening
Suppose there was a person traveling along the road. They’d see a large deluge, whose near shore was dubious and perilous, while the far shore was a sanctuary free of peril. But there was no ferryboat or bridge for crossing over. They’d think, ‘Why don’t I gather grass, sticks, branches, and leaves and make a raft? Riding on the raft, and paddling with my hands and feet, I can safely reach the far shore.’
- Speaker/Author: Gotama
- Source: Alagaddūpama Sutta (the raft simile), MN 22, trans. Bhikkhu Sujato
Closing
For me, there is no happiness without freedom, and freedom is not given to us by anyone; we have to cultivate it ourselves.
- Speaker/Author: Thich Nhat Hanh
- Source: Be Free Where You Are (Parallax Press)
Ch 02 – Gotama’s Intoxications
Opening
Violence gives birth to fear. Just look at people and their quarrels. I shall describe the sense of urgency in the way it was experienced by me. When I saw people thrashing about, like fish in a small puddle turning on one another, fear entered my heart. I saw nothing stable in the world. Everywhere, all things are changing. Wanting a place for myself, I saw that every spot was already taken. I was distressed by conflict everywhere. Then I saw an arrow here, so very hard to see, embedded in the heart.
- Speaker/Author: Gotama
- Source: Attadaṇḍa Sutta, Sn 4.15 (author-composed composite rendering, D89)
Closing
The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.
- Speaker/Author: Carl Rogers
- Source: On Becoming a Person: A Therapist’s View of Psychotherapy (1961)
Ch 03 – Generosity – the gift of open hands
Opening
If beings knew, as I know, the results of giving and sharing, they would not eat without having given, nor would the stain of miserliness overcome their minds.
- Speaker/Author: Gotama (the Buddha)
- Source: Dāna Sutta, Iti 26
Closing
Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity.
- Speaker/Author: Simone Weil
- Source: Letter to Joë Bousquet, 13 April 1942 (widely published in Gravity and Grace)
Ch 04 – The Five Gifts
Opening
Now, there are these five gifts, five great gifts – original, long-standing, traditional, ancient, unadulterated, unadulterated from the beginning – that are not open to suspicion, will never be open to suspicion, and are unfaulted by knowledgeable contemplatives and brahmans.
- Speaker/Author: Gotama (the Buddha)
- Source: Abhisanda Sutta, AN 8.39
Closing
We do good because it frees the heart. It opens us to a wellspring of happiness.
- Speaker/Author: Sharon Salzberg
- Source: Lovingkindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness (Shambhala, 1995)
Ch 05 – Māra – I know you: meeting the inner saboteur
Opening
Forms and sounds, tastes and odours, tactile objects that delight the mind: I offer them right back to you, for I, O Māra, do not need them.
- Speaker/Author: Vijayā Therī (addressing Māra)
- Source: Vijayā Sutta, SN 5.4, trans. Bhikkhu Bodhi
Closing
Seeing really clearly what we get when we get caught up in our behaviors, becoming disenchanted on a visceral level and from this disenchanted stance, naturally letting go.
- Speaker/Author: Dr Judson Brewer
- Source: TED talk, A simple way to break a bad habit (TEDMED 2015)
Recognise (06-14)
Ch 06 – Recognising life is painful, difficult and disappointing
Opening
Now this, monks, for the spiritually ennobled, is the painful (dukkha) true reality…
- Speaker/Author: Gotama (the Buddha)
- Source: Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta, SN 56.11, trans. Peter Harvey, in An Introduction to Buddhism (2013)
Closing
Yet those who face this truth do not find it a formula for despair…
- Speaker/Author: Jack Kornfield
- Source: ‘The Truth about Suffering’, jackkornfield.com (article, 24 May 2017)
Ch 07 – Compassion
Opening
There is the case where an individual keeps pervading the first direction…
- Speaker/Author: Gotama (the Buddha)
- Source: Brahmavihāra Suttas, AN 4.125-126, trans. Thanissaro Bhikkhu
Closing
Unlike self-criticism, which asks if you’re good enough, self-compassion asks: what’s good for you?
- Speaker/Author: Kristin Neff
- Source: Self-Compassion: The Proven Power of Being Kind to Yourself (2011)
Ch 08 – The First Anchor – Mindfulness of Body
Opening
…this is the direct path for the purification of beings…
- Speaker/Author: Gotama (the Buddha)
- Source: Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta, MN 10, trans. Bhikkhu Ñāṇamoli and Bhikkhu Bodhi
Closing
Now one of the marvelous things about the body is that it is always in the present moment…
- Speaker/Author: Gil Fronsdal
- Source: Introduction to Mindfulness Meditation, Week 2 transcript, Insight Meditation Center, 10 October 2007
Ch 09 – Mindfulness of Breathing
Opening
This concentration by mindfulness of breathing, when developed and cultivated, is peaceful and sublime…
- Speaker/Author: Gotama (the Buddha)
- Source: Vesālī Sutta, SN 54.9, trans. Bhikkhu Bodhi
Closing
Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky…
- Speaker/Author: Thich Nhat Hanh
- Source: Stepping into Freedom: An Introduction to Buddhist Monastic Training
Ch 10 – Mindfulness of Posture
Opening
Yet it is just within this fathom-long body, with its perception and conceiving mind…
- Speaker/Author: Gotama (the Buddha)
- Source: Rohitassa Sutta, AN 4.45 / SN 2.26, trans. Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu
Closing
No matter what posture you are in, if your mind is aware with understanding, you are meditating.
- Speaker/Author: Sayadaw U Tejaniya
- Source: Don’t Look Down On The Defilements, They Will Laugh At You (2008)
Ch 11 – Mindfulness with Clear Comprehension
Opening
When going forward and returning, he makes himself fully alert.
- Speaker/Author: Gotama (the Buddha)
- Source: Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta, MN 10, trans. Thanissaro Bhikkhu
Closing
Establishing mindfulness in this way allows a crucial pause before taking action…
- Speaker/Author: Bhikkhu Anālayo
- Source: ‘Early Buddhist Meditation, Part 3: The Establishments of Mindfulness’, Mindfulness 15 (2024), 733-736
Ch 12 – Mindfulness of the Reality of the Body
Opening
Again, a practitioner reviews this same body up from the soles of the feet…
- Speaker/Author: Gotama
- Source: Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta, MN 10, trans. Bhikkhu Ñāṇamoli and Bhikkhu Bodhi
Closing
You just break the body apart in this way, and it becomes clear – yes, it’s just a collection of parts.
- Speaker/Author: Andrea Fella
- Source: Mindfulness of the Body and Exploring the Elements, Dharma talk, Spirit Rock Meditation Center, 6 February 2024
Ch 13 – Mindfulness of the Body Through the Lens of the Elements
Opening
… a practitioner reflects on this very body, however it be placed or disposed, by way of the material elements…
- Speaker/Author: Gotama
- Source: Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta, MN 10, trans. Bhikkhu Ñāṇamoli and Bhikkhu Bodhi
Closing
Earth in my bones, water in my blood, fire in my belly, air in every breath.
- Speaker/Author: Lin Wang Gordon
- Source: ‘Connecting to the Elements: Finding the Sacred in the Ordinary’, Tricycle Dharma Talk transcript, April 2026
Ch 14 – Mindfulness of the Body’s Impermanence
Opening
“All conditioned things are impermanent” – when one sees this with wisdom, one turns away from suffering. This is the path to purification.
- Speaker/Author: Gotama (the Buddha)
- Source: Dhammapada, verse 277, translated by Acharya Buddharakkhita
Closing
We are part of, not apart from, the rest of nature. And when the end of consciousness comes, there’s nothing to be afraid of. Nothing at all.
- Speaker/Author: Anil Seth
- Source: TED talk, “How does your brain construct your conscious reality?” (2017)