Thanissaro Bhikkhu on the Ultimate Goal

"Whenever talking about awakening, there are always two dangers. The first danger is thinking that awakening is so far away that you give up any hope of attaining it. The other danger comes from the fact that there are many stages of concentration that sound very similar to awakening, and if you attain one of those you may think that you’ve attained awakening when in fact you haven’t. You’re still stuck in a fabricated state. In both cases, the danger lies in giving up your pursuit of being more skillful in your actions. The path to the end of suffering exists, but you stop or turn around. One way to avoid these dangers begins with having a right understanding of both kamma and mindfulness." ~ Thanissaro Bhikkhu "Kamma & Mindfulness Together"

"Remind yourself that everybody out there has pain to some extent or another. Some people are pain-free for the moment, but pain’s going to come. You’ve got to have compassion for everybody out there who’s got pain. That helps you realize it’s not just you. You don’t feel like you’re being singled out. Maybe you have the kamma that leads to that pain. In fact, you probably do. Now, the next question is: How can you cheat that kamma? We may tend to think that the universe is unfair in the way it hands out pains, but maybe it’s actually very fair. But the Buddha’s path allows you to cheat the system. You can get out. This path, the noble eightfold path, as the Buddha said, is the kamma that puts an end to kamma. Not only does it stop you from creating new kamma, but it also frees you from many of the effects of past kamma. The pains may be there in the body, but the mind doesn’t have to suffer from them. And that’s what matters. They’re like a big rock. The rock may b