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Lucky bamboo and Zen book ask: You look, but do you see? You hear, but do you listen?
250 Good Spiritual Quotes Below are 250 quotes (actually 254... I keep adding!) I've collected that I find (and you may too) to be enlightening as well as inspirational/helpful. It is recommended that you take your time as you go through each one. A contemplative reflection of each quote will yield far more of the truth that it is pointing to than a cursory reading. Enjoy! -Michael
 I found myself rushing around today, urgently trying to get things done, when a voice inside me inquired, "Where are you going? What is the hurry?" I said, "Who are you!?" The voice said, "Stillness. Who are you?" -Michael Jeffreys
"The chief cause of problems is solutions." -Milton Berle
"When you wake up you realize ego just to be thoughts... so what. If you know thoughts are temporary, why do you want to get rid of them? A better question is if thoughts are temporary, what could be trying to get rid of them but another thought?" - Matt Kahn
Be ever so still, all movement is mind- one thought is a cloud, do not stir it about the sky. -Rafael Stoneman
Once a man succumbs to ideas he will never find happiness.
-Dr. Shankar, Kivalya Gita Vol. 2
(any idea is just a concept and not real)
No matter where we are or what may be happening, connecting with the Self, our True Nature, is readily available as the in-breath.
-Cathy Rosewell Jonas
Suffering: the sense that things should be different than they are. -Wayne Liquorman
You are the Awareness of this Moment. Everything that you "experience" is NOT you. You are the Nothingness that is Aware of the Everythingness. BE what you are! :) -Michael Jeffreys
A concept never is conscious or alive; it doesn't know it is there. Only Consciousness Itself is conscious to know anything.
-Peter Francis Dziuban
True love has no object. It is a state of being. -John McAfee
The separation never happened. Hear me well. The separation is not real. The separation is but a figment of imagination, and nothing more. -Jeshua (from THE OTHER VOICE by Brent Haskell)
And when we speak of the separation, we refer exactly, and only, to that belief that your body and space and time are real. That belief, which is harbored deep within you, was created by you, is cherished by you, and valued by you. Were that not so, you would not, and could not, be able to imagine it real.
-Jeshua (from THE OTHER VOICE by Brent Haskell)
Death is whatever you imagine it to be... until the moment it happens. -Michael Jeffreys
It's really all an escape from death, which is an escape from being nothing. That's what death is, a plunge into nothingness. The mind wants control, and death is showing us that there is no control.
-Jeff Foster
Well that's the problem, I knew who I was. -Jeff Foster
A thought has exactly as much power as YOU give it. -Michael Jeffreys
It's the question that drives us Neo. It's the question that brought you here. The answer is out there. It's looking for you... and it will find you. - Trinity to Neo in The Matrix
The biggest advances are not made by being a great teacher; they are made by being a great student.
-Pursah (from The Disappearance of the Universe by Gary Renard)
Even judgment in its most basic form, such as to label something good or bad, would be to differentiate between things that are actually the same because of their unreality. Thus, it is not really valid to judge anything.
-Arten (from The Disappearance of the Universe by Gary Renard)
Outside of Love there are no achievements. -Beinsa Douno
As long as you identify with ego-mind, you miss the obvious--your own formless presence. -Mooji
Wherever there is identity, there is an 'I' entity. Find out what this 'I' entity is. See if it is real. -Mooji
Continuing to identify with the little mind of ego OR your conscious
surrender to reality is what defines your present awareness.
-J.M. Harrison
The joy you are is uncovered when the conditioning of the mind is withdrawn, for only then do you create enough space to truly ‘see’ yourself and reality as they are.
No one else can hold your hand or take this voyage of the soul for you, and yet at no time will you be alone, for you can never truly be alone. -J.M. Harrison (from his book, Naked Being)
The best way to conquer fear is to consciously move toward the feeling and breath. Be conscious of feeling the fear as you move forward. As you do this, the fear dissolves. Fear is just a feeling; it cannot hurt you. Don't be afraid of your feelings. Feel and continue to move forward. -Christine Day
(from the book, Pleiadian Initiations of Light)
Look at you, you madman, screaming you are thirsty and are dying in the desert when all around you is nothing but water! -Kabir
In any situation, either I feel separate or there is presence. In separation, no matter what happens I feel separate. In presence, the self is no more and there is simply "that which is." -Tony Parsons
The world is the externalized human mind. -Eckhart Tolle
Dance into the fire until nothing remains. -Matt Kahn
The less there is of 'I,' the more there is of God. -Meister Eckhart
The infinite expression of One, through our mind, is divided into individual people, moments and experiences. When you know that this is what the mind does than you can appreciate it and enjoy it. Otherwise, you end up being someone at a magic show trying to tell everyone how it's all an illusion... but you came to be a part of the illusion, so enjoy the magic. If you aren't enjoying the magic, you're missing the point. -Matt Kahn
You are here to be you. And you are an expression of it all. Can you notice that in everything you see? -Matt Kahn
Just be aware. Because awareness is aware. Is awareness having a problem with this feeling or is it just aware? Is awareness having a problem with this thought or is it just aware? Who has the problem, the idea or the awareness of the idea? -Matt Kahn
Not doing anything to my experience is the most compassionate and loving thing I could do to myself. And if I see that I am meddling with my experience, I cease and desist. -A.H. Almaas
This seems to be the central dilemma of human life--that it is easier to desire what is over there than to appreciate what is right here.
Your spirit or your soul--your original unconditioned
consciousness--exists only in you, so going elsewhere can never give you
access to your essential nature, to who you really are.
-Byron Brown
(from the editor's preface to The Unfolding Now by A.H. Almaas)
The final practice: Leaving yourself alone. Not doing anything to yourself. Not interfering with your own experience. Letting your experience be exactly the way it is 100%. -A.H. Almaas
The recognition of awareness as our real identity reveals all separation to be illusory, not only between people but between all apparent things. -Scott Kiloby
Whatever the mind says about life only tells about the mind and not life. -Dr. Vijai Shankar
You cannot own anything in this universe as everything belongs to existence itself. The moment you understand that everything belongs to existence, the ego disappears to become the witnesser! You will realize that so far the noisy mind was precious to you. Now it is no more. You are silent, you are in love, you are love. -Dr. Vijai Shankar
The master is totally at one with this moment. He or she does not oppose, internally, this moment. He or she offers no inner-resistance to this moment... to the isness of now... to whatever arises now... it is not resisted internally. -Eckhart Tolle
Life is not cumulative, nor is it subtractive. It's spontaneous!
-Michael Jeffreys
Understand that love never asks. If loved asked, then it would be noise, and love is silence and not noise. -Dr. Vijai Shankar
The most basic truth of life: One Being is creating all of this--all of these different expressions of life. There's only one Being here, and not only are you it but everyone else is it. Let that sink in a moment.
-Gina Lake
When anybody laughs, he has no mind, no thought, no problem, no suffering. -Papaji
The silver lining of the cloud of depression is that it sometimes opens us to fresh perspective. When our strategies have failed and we have found no consolation in any quarter, we can either fall into madness or into realizing that what we have always wanted--passionate aliveness as peace itself--is, strangely enough, found in a simple shift in perception. -Catherine Ingram
Because man believes life is what it appears to be, he thinks it should be taken seriously. But is life what it appears to be? This is a question man has not addressed seriously! - Dr. Vijai Shankar
Only what is still can still the stillness in other things. -Confucius
Mind guesses. Life knows. -Dr. Vijai Shankar
Man comes to know that something has happened in the present only after it has happened. - Dr. Vijai Shankar
The Universe doesn't really want to wake up. The universe wants candy to make it feel better, but the candy is designed to bind you to the Universe. -Arten
(from The Disappearance of the Universe by Gary Renard)
Neelam on Death: Consciousness doesn’t move, the physical
elements just dissolve.
I saw sorrow holding a cup of pain. I said, 'hey sorrow!', sorry to see you this way. what's troubling you? What's with the cup? Sorrow said, what else can I do?All this Joy that you have brought to the world has killed my business completely. -Rumi
When you judge something, you are giving it power over you.
Connect with the energy of the moment. Not the "things" appearing inside the moment, but the energetic aliveness that all moments require simply to be. -Michael Jeffreys
As the perception changes it can happen that your life, which once felt like a failure, now feels like a success. Not in outer terms, but because you have peace and contentment. -Juhana Harju
Your good times in the world are good only in comparison to the bad times. You will eventually learn that it's all a trick, that your perception is simply lying to you. -Arten
(from The Disappearance of the Universe by Gary Renard)
The intellect cannot reveal the timeless Self, beyond all perceptions. Those who know they are neither body nor mind, but the immemorial Self, the Divine. Beyond right and wrong, beyond cause and effect, beyond past and future. When OM reverberates unceasingly within the heart.
The all knowing self was never born, nor will it die. This Self is eternal and immutable. If the slayer believes he can be killed, or the slain believes he can be killed, neither knows the truth. The eternal Self slays not, nor is ever slain. Hidden in the heart of every creature lies the Self. Greater than the greatest. Though still, he moves everything everywhere. Formless in the midst of form. Changeless in the midst of change. The Self cannot be known by anyone.
(Excerpts from The Katha Upanishad - Death as Teacher)
The apparent self can do nothing to discover that it is itself an illusion--an appearance cannot discover reality. -Richard Sylvester
The world is full of hoops... but the hooks are ours. -Nisargadatta
The radio sings and speaks, but if you open it you will find no one inside. Similarly, my existence is like the space; though this body speaks like the radio, there is no one inside as a doer.
-Ramana Maharshi
Do you think I know what I'm doing? That for one breath or half-breath I belong to myself? As much as a pen knows what it's writing, or the ball can guess where it's going next. -Rumi
You impose limits on your true nature of infinite being. Then you get displeased to be only a limited creature. Then you begin spiritual practices to transcend these non-existing limits. But if your practice itself implies the existence of these limits, how could they allow you to transcend them. -Ramana Maharshi
The Vastness that we all are is like an ocean that exists in relation to everything--as the Infinite noticing of everything being just what it is--Itself included. It sees thoughts for thoughts and feelings for feelings and sensations for sensations. There is never a desire or request that anything be anything but what it is. -Suzanne Segal
Who distinguishes between the true and the false (self)? And true and false for whom? Thoughts, feelings, sensations, and energetic frequencies do not mean anything about some imaginary someone; they simply are what they are. -Suzanne Segal
We "love" another in order to get something for ourselves. That, in fact, is what passes for love in the dream world. There can be no greater mistake than that, for love is incapable of asking for anything. -ACIM (A Course In Miracles)
Bondage is when the mind longs for something, grieves about
something, rejects something, holds on to something, is pleased
about something or displeased about something.
- Ashtavakra Gita
The heaviest thing you will ever pick up is a thought. –Michael Jeffreys
Nothing is outside you. All is in you. It is you who project it, and it comes back to you. It has all its reality in you; welcome it completely. When you really welcome, there is no pain. In the converging of pain and joy, there is real joy. That joy is not relative, the other joy is still relative because it is the contrary of pain. -Jean Klein
The gap between your expectations and reality is your suffering.
-John St. Augustine
O seeker, These thoughts have such power over you. From nothing you become sad, From nothing you become happy. -Rumi
Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else... you are the one getting burned.
-Zen Proverb
If you realize that you have enough, you are truly rich. -Zen Proverb
In the practice of tolerance, one's enemy is the best teacher.
-Dalai Lama
Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood.
-Marie Curie
So long as you are still worried about what others think of you, you are owned by them. Only when you require no approval from outside yourself can you own yourself. -Neale Donald Walsch
Everything that occurs—everything that has occurred, is occurring, and ever will occur—is the outward physical manifestation of your innermost thoughts. –Neale Donald Walsh
By healing the soul, sometimes the body can be healed. -John of God
The universe is perfect, intervene at your peril.
Just
think of the trees: they let the birds perch and fly, with no intention
to call them when they come and no longing for their return when they
fly away. If people's hearts can be like the trees, they will not be
off the Way. -Zen Proverb
One moon shows in every pool, in every pool the one moon.
-Zen Proverb
Joy is not in things, it is in us.
Fear only comes in with the concept of 'I'. - John Wheeler
There is no Death for anyone. Why? Because there is no separate "You" to die!
-Michael Jeffreys
True love simply does not see any fragmentation. It sees and loves the whole because it is the whole looking at itself. -Scott Kiloby
Your identity is determined by whatever thoughts of past arise in present awareness. -Scott Kiloby
Time is thought. You cannot touch past or future except through thinking. -Scott Kiloby
When my heart is open, LOVE is my experience. When my heart is closed, FEAR is my experience. When I look into the eyes of a new born, LOVE is my experience. When I watch the news, FEAR is my experience. And when I allow ALL experiences to be exactly as they are, PEACE is my experience. And when I let go of ALL experiences, there is just this moment, exactly as it is. And that is more than enough... -Michael Jeffreys
(This photo and the one below were taken at beautiful Douglas Park in Santa Monica on the evening of 2-8-08)
When you have a disease in the body, those bacteria or microbes have as much right to life as we do. -Sailor Bob Adamson
If you take away all beliefs, none of this ever happened. -Jac O'Keeffe
All searching is driven by thought; even the attaining of enlightenment does not exist beyond a concept. - Jac O'keeffe
When you realize you are, in your essence, the same, beautiful person you took your teacher to be, you will be free.
-Jim Dreaver
When I walk into a room, I know that everyone in it loves me. I just don't expect them to realize it yet. -Byron Katie
Believing what you think is very painful. -Byron Katie
You see, to me, to argue with reality is to argue with God.
-Byron Katie
I look at my own story the same as I would someone else's. They are both just stories. It's natural for us to be without the story. I am a lover of reality. When you live from 'what is' you always get your way. -Byron Katie
All you know is the inarticulable fact that you are and that you are in this wildness. -John Sherman
The simple fact of being, your own presence, is the changeless constant. It is doubtless, clear, beyond questions and undeniable. It is the very ground from which the mind, the body and the universe emerge. -John Wheeler
I express who I am by simply being it. -Jason Nelson
There is absolutely nothing to do or fix - ever. Doing and fixing
are outgrowths of imagining a separate person and a 'doer'. Is there
really any entity in there doing anything, making anything happen at
all? Or are thoughts, feelings and perceptions spontaneously appearing?
If so, then all is happening as it is bound to happen, and there is no
basis for imagining 'doership'.
-John Wheeler
Essence is emptiness. Emptiness brings peace to your loving. Everything else, disease. In this world of trickery, emptiness is what your soul wants. -Rumi
The very search for pleasure is the cause of pain. -Sri Nisargadatta
(The great Indian sage is pointing out that happiness can only exist in the present moment (along with everything else), so the very act of searching takes you away from happiness, and thus pain and suffering arises! -mj)
Consciousness cannot be known by the mind.The mind is an object. It does not know anything. It is itself known by Consciousness.
- Rupert Spira
(This one is worth spending some time on. What it is pointing at can make all the difference in the world! -mj)
The space that is being looked for is the space that is looking.
-Rupert Spira
Let go of what has passed. Let go of what may come. Let go of what is happening now. Don't try to figure anything out. Don't try to make anything happen. Relax, right now, and rest. -Tilopa
My life is a succession of events, just like yours. Only I am detached and see the passing show as a passing show, while you stick to things and move along with them.
- Sri Nisargadatta
Your high opinion of me is your opinion only. Any moment you may change it. Why attach importance to opinions, even your own?
- Sri Nisargadatta
Worry is like a rocking chair, it gives you something to do but it doesn't get you any where.
- Zen proverb
Only when you can understand yourself as All Pervading Consciousness can you possibly understand that all the universe is an emanation of your mind. Everything that you see comes out of you.
- Robert Adams
You experience everything as a thought in your mind, and every thought is a concept. However, YOU are not a concept. You are Consciousness; that which sees ALL concepts. Consciousness can exist without concepts, but concepts cannot exist without something being aware of them, i.e., Consciousness!
-Michael Jeffreys
At my core I am Aware Emptiness, and it is because I am empty that I am able to be filled, because I am no-thing that I am capacity for everything.
- J.C. Amberchele
Separation is an illusion created by thought.
-Scott Kiloby
Don't personalize your experience.
The longest journey there is is from the head to the heart.
If we think that we know something objective about ourselves or the world, then whatever that something is that we think we know will condition our subsequent enquiry into the nature of experience. -Rupert Spira
Consciousness becomes dimmed chiefly through one's captivation and abiding interest in external objects.
- Sri Atmananda (Atma Darshan)
You can't have fear without need.
-Candace Silvers
If you can think about, it's not the truth.
-Robert Adams
You are the knower of your body, senses and mind, but the knower can never be known, because you are it and there's nobody to know it. It can never become an object of observation because it is your totality.
(What Pandiji, one of Jean Klein's earliest teachers, said to Jean that helped him glimpse reality. From the book, Transmission of the Flame.)
If there is attachment to it, there will be suffering. -Jac O'Keeffe
When
the idea of the objects falls away gradually, and attention is more and
more fixed upon the awareness, it will be seen that it is Reality which
pervades everyhing. -Atma Darshan
You cannot change what you are inside by changing conditions. -Robert Adams
(This is one of the deepest quotes I have ever read. If you fully understand, if you see, what Robert is pointing at here, awakening can happen. There is a part of you that never changes. Forget about your life circumstances. Stay with the changeless that is always present. Feel it. It is you. Everything else is not.)
If you have conditioning, you cannot awaken. -Robert Adams
(Meaning anything you believe yourself to be keeps you tied to the body/mind. Let go of it all! It is not you! Nothing you can be aware of is you. As soon as you think about this, it is no longer it because then you have left the absolute and gone into mind/conditioning. Just BE. There is nothing to do and nowhere to go.)
Where real happiness exists, you do not. -Gina Lake
This moment is the final destination. 'This' is as much God as it gets. -Florian Schlosser
The seeking comes to an end when it is seen that the seeker never existed. -Michael Jeffreys
Your experiences cannot tell you who you are; they do not define you in any way. Only the concepts that you hold about yourself to be true can be influenced by your experiences. -Jac O'Keeffe
Searching for "it" is keeping you in the belief that the movie is real. -Jac O'Keeffe
Time is the interval between two thoughts. So without thoughts, there is no time! -Richard Miller
(Sharing what someone told him during his interview with Chuck Hillig on Never Not Here.)
You learned your thoughts, beliefs and identity. Why then would you imagine you can't unlearn them? -Isira
There is the limited mind's world and there is present reality. Each moment provides a new opportunity to choose which one to experience. -Michael Jeffreys
I used to be into 'self-help,' until it became clear that the self I thought needed help doesn't even exist! -Michael Jeffreys
What you assume yourself to be doesn't exist. -Charlie Hayes
When nothing satisfies, general motivation to live lessons. In truth, this is a moment to be celebrated. Arriving at the place where you know that there must be more to life and to you is an opening, not a dead end. -Jac O'keeffe
The only thing that can stop you from feeling happiness is you. To continue to look outside for something that is already inside only serves to distract you from looking within. -Jac O'keeffe
The freedom you look for is where you look from. -Jac O'Keeffe
The observer and the observed are appearances within awareness.
Suffering seems real because we don't have a clear understanding of our true nature. Instead, we believe the passing thoughts, such as 'I am no good,'I am not there yet,' 'I am stuck' or whatever the thought may be. Eventually we understand that we are not those thoughts. Once our real self is pointed out, the suffering loses its grip.
-John Wheeler
Beyond right thinking and wrong thinking there is a field. I'll meet you there. -Rumi
Truth begins where thought ends.
The world is as you are. -David Lynch
I am not the knower, nor the known, nor the knowing. These three are not real. They only seem to be when I am not known.
- Ashtavakra Gita
Two from one! This is the root of suffering. -Ashtavakra Gita
It does not matter what goes on in the mind, it really doesn't. -Mooji
(The mind's thoughts are only important to the mind. Since YOU are not your mind, believing them to be important keeps you attached to your mind.-mj)
What you are, in actuality, is nothing (no-thing)... so you have nothing to lose! -Michael Jeffreys
The mind deals and operates exclusively in the realm of thought. Since "you" are not a thought, it cannot know "you." -Michael Jeffreys
By accepting what is you become bigger than what is.
-Eckhart Tolle
As things are interpreted or labeled by the mind they slowly cease to be what they are and start to become what is thought about them. -John Greven
Seeking is simply a game that is played until the recognition that there is nothing to find. -Unmani Liza Hyde
In not-knowing there is no doubt. In not-knowing there is absolute clarity. Simply the direct recognition of what is. This is what I am. I am Life itself. -Unmani Liza Hyde
When we attempt to limit the unlimited, suffering occurs.
-Michael Jeffreys
Many of our ideas and beliefs about ourselves and the world are so deeply ingrained that we are unaware that they are beliefs and take them, without question, for the absolute truth. - Rupert Spira
The dilemma for the individual is NOT that it can't get what it wants, the dilemma IS the individual. -Tony Parsons
It's not a doing, but a recognition. -Swami Premodaya
You go from reacting to observing. There is an emotional disconnection that must take place; non-attachment. This doesn't mean not feeling anything, but being okay with whatever outcome manifests. -Swami Premodaya
We are actors in a play who have forgotten they are in a play.
-Swami Premodaya
Once you have been in deep water, your experience of going into shallow water is never the same. -Swami Premodaya
Did you ever stop to realize—the only one that thinks thinking is so special, is that very same thinking? –Peter Francis Dziuban
There is nothing more important to true growth than realizing that you are not the voice of the mind--you are the one who hears it.
-Michael A. Singer
The past is thinking and thinking is the past. It's the same.
- Florian Schlosser
Let the moment decide your response.
(My neighbor and I were discussing the recent Air-France plane crash, and since he just returned from India, I asked him how he would react if his flight were going down. His response was beautiful... "I would let the moment decide.")
Suppressing activity to reach stillness just creates agitation. -zenbitchslap.com
Looking closely, you see it's always the stuff you seem to be aware of that's changing and passing, never Awareness itself. Awareness, all by itself alone, is present as pure Being, a changeless presence which simply, immovably is. -Peter Francis Dziuban
It turns out that the source of everything is also who you are. Since the source of everything doesn't come and go, it must be here right now, in this very moment. -Nirmala
Consciousness simply never leaves being present—and
one cannot have a memory of the present. -Peter Francis Dziuban
The root of all suffering is desire. -Buddha
Whatever you are pushing against, you are stuck to. -Werner Erhard
It’s amazing what an unlimited well of energy you have when you are insanely
clear about your purpose in life. - Jonathan Nasman
(Someone emailed me and asked a good question: "Michael, if there is no "you," how can "you" have a purpose?" The answer is that in the Absolute sense you can't, since "you" don't exist, and without a "you," there is no one there to have anything!
But on a relative level, that which your body-mind organism operates in, you most definitely have a purpose. And to discover what yours is, all you need do is ask one question: "How is Life calling me to serve it?" If you hold this question in your heart, eventually the answer will come to you much clearer than if you try to figure it out using your mind.)
Enlightenment is the falling away of the sense of personal doership.
-Wayne Liquorman
(When you see that you are not the one creating your moment-to-moment experience, but that life is unfolding perfectly (of course, not the ego's definition of perfection), resistance to what is drops away and you are free to just experience the fullness of the moment. -mj)
If you can't improve on silence, don't speak. -Zen Proverb
There can never be an "enlightened person," there is only the realization that there is no separation. -Halina Pytlasinka'
The biggest mistake is: "My mind has created the thought, my brain has created the thought." No! Every thought, however simple or complicated, comes from outside, and your brain reacts to that thought according to your genes and conditioning. -Ramesh Balsekar
So the question Who am I? is not an idle one. How you answer the question will determine how you live the rest of your life. It will determine the quality of your life. -Neale Donald Walsch
All thoughts achieve the same outcome. They take you out of the truth of life, out of the present moment, and into a world of illusion. -Leonard Jacobson
Either you live in the world of desire and fear, or you live in freedom. - Sri Nisargadatta
Practice not-doing. And everything will fall into place. - Tao Te Ching
Every cell that is occupied by the self is one less cell that can be occupied by God. -Sri Pranananda
You are this moment itself. Anything you add to it is an illusion. –Michael Jeffreys
Until you’ve given the world its freedom, you’ll never have your freedom. -Adyashanti (Adya means the complete letting go of judgement)
What it means to live spiritually is to not participate in this struggle. It means that the events that happen in the moment belong to the moment. They don't belong to you. -Michael A. Singer
IS means now, present tense ONLY. Is means being or presently
existing. In IS there is absolutely no provision for passing time, past or
future. The past would be that which is-not-anymore, and future would be that
which is-not-yet. Time would be that-which-is-not. IS cannot be IS
and simultaneously be is-not. -Peter Francis Dziuban
You are the only thing that does not have an opposite! -Michael Jeffreys
There is nothing more important to true growth than realizing that you are not the voice of the mind--you are the one who hears it. -Michael A. Singer
Question this very "me," this "I" you take yourself to be. With deep self-inquiry you will discover it is just a "story" too--the story-teller. The "I" telling the story is no more real than any other thought.
The main requirement for spiritual growth: A yearning to know who you really are. –Adyashanti
Spiritual Awakening is awakening from the dream of thought.
–Eckhart Tolle
Who are you? You are that which is aware of your thoughts. – Michael Jeffreys
Your degree of absence of thought is your measuring stick on the spiritual path. - Ramana Maharshi Watch the mind as it tries, in every moment, to co-opt experience by translating it into a story. It tries to draw you away from experience into a mental world that simulates experience. If it succeeds, that story becomes your experience. –Gina Lake
When I look within and see that I am nothing,
that is wisdom. When I look without and see that I am everything, that is love. And between these two, my life turns. -Sri Nisargadatta
The moment--the now--is like a river, which carries you forward, ever-changing and ever moving. You either flow with this now or reject it and fight it, but that doesn't stop the flow; it only determines your experience of it. -Gina Lake
Enlightenment is the direct result of freedom from the illusion of a separate self. A profound understanding of this ultimate simplicity provides all that is required for an awakening to enlightenment. -Gary Crowley
We sit together, the mountain and me, until only the mountain remains. -Li Po
Authentic spirituality… does not render the self content, it renders it undone. – Ken Wilbur
The dream we are living has absolutely no purpose other than our awakening. – Tony Parsons
When there is a waking up from fantasy, there is no one who does it. –Toni Packer
An individual is the very thought he seeks to be free from! Nothing is to be clung to as I, me, or mine. – Buddha The most remarkable event in the history of humanity is the phenomen of people dissolving their identification with the prevailing systems of thoughts, beliefs, rituals, and practices, and entering an experience of unconditioned awareness. -Peter Fenner
We transcend suffering, not because our problems are solved, but because we experience a level of consciousness in which nothing is missing, a way of being that doesn't depend on the conditions of our mind, body, and life situation. -Peter Fenner
The difference between me and you is that I don't mind what happens. -Krishnamurti
To be enlightened is to be unconditionally intimate with this moment. -Scott Morrison
Not letting things bother you is cool! -Bobby Hall
It's not possible to have a problem without believing a prior thought. To notice this simple truth is the beginning of peace. -Byron Katie
Whenever you are immersed in compulsive thinking, you are avoiding what is. You don't want to be where you are. Here, Now.
–Eckhart Tolle
What are thoughts? They are sounds and images passing through awareness. -Tom Stine (admitted former think-aholic!)
Why are you unhappy? Because 99.9% of everything you think and do is for yourself - and there isn't one. -Wei Wu Wei
As long as there is a 'you' doing or not doing, thinking or not-thinking, meditating or not-meditating, you are no closer to home than the day you were born. -Wei Wu Wei
This bundle of ideas that we have held as being who we are is not actually the one who can make progress in the spiritual realm. –Alice Gardner
Free, we are not the number One, the first of all our objects, but Zero - their universal and Absolute Subject. - Wei Wu Wei
What we are looking for is what is looking. -St. Francis of Assissi
Each moment missed is a moment unlived. – Jon Kabat-Zinn
Desire and fear walk hand in hand. –Katie Davis
EGO stands for: Edge God Out -Dr. Wayne Dyer
You wouldn't worry what people think of you if you knew how seldom they did. -Charlie Greer (This dead-on quote came both as a shock and a relief to my ego!-MJ)
Doing one thing at a time. (The definition of Zen)
Feel gratitude for everything. When we see every situation as being perfect just the way it is, happiness grows and grows. -Daniel Levin
The ego tends to equate having with Being: I have therefore I am. And the more I have, the more I am. -Echart Tolle
When you lose touch with inner stillness, you lose touch with yourself. -Eckhart Tolle
The mind looks to past for identity and the future for fulfillment.
–Eckhart Tolle
We don’t realize that our future is being consumed by our past.
- JZ Knight
(Meaning that we are living on autopilot from our past emotions, rather than from the fresh, new, alive present moment.-MJ)
All emotions, if practiced regularly, grow in size. -The Dalai Lama
You should BE the change you want to see in the world. - Mahatma Gandhi
A positive state of mind is not merely good for you, it benefits everyone with whom you come into contact, literally changing the world. - The Dalai Lama
The greatest gift you can give another is the purity of your attention. - Richard Moss
The equivalent of external noise is the inner noise of thinking. The equivalent of external silence is inner stillness. -Eckhart Tolle
Love is embracing everything and avoiding nothing.
–Edwin Carl Smith
Authentic (as opposed to Egoic) LOVE =
Non-Judgement
Non-Attachment
Non-Resistance
We come back to where we started and know the place for the first time. -T.S. Elliot
Not being in opposition to the present moment brings clarity.
Enjoy the discovery, the journey.
You are the essence of life; everything and nothing, the seen and the unseen. –Michael Jeffreys
Sit quietly and open up to spirit. –Sharon Janis
Consciousness runs through every human being just like water runs through every wave in the ocean.
–Michael Jeffreys
Stillness is your essential nature. -Eckhart Tolle
There cannot be the ultimate understanding without the ultimate sacrifice.
No gratitude, no humility, and no sense of humor = no enlightenment.
–Michael Jeffreys
Your true self is perfect; it wants/needs nothing. Your ego is imperfect; it wants/needs everything. -Michael Jeffreys
What you call “your” thoughts are just thoughts arising in consciousness. Taking ownership of them is what causes suffering.
-Michael Jeffreys
Before you think/say anything to yourself, ask yourself if you would say that to God; because in essence, you are.
–Michael Jeffreys
Positive thinking is still thinking (it takes you out of the now); silence, on the other hand, requires no thinking, and thus leaves you fully present. – Michael Jeffreys
The ego treats the present moment in 3 ways:
1. As a means to an end.
2. As an obstacle.
3. As an enemy.
–Eckhart Tolle
Seeing the extraordinary, even when there is no “you” to see it.
–Jeff Foster
The lens in a telescope is neutral; it doesn’t care what you look at. It has no opinions, makes no judgment. It just is. You are the lens through which life sees itself.
–Michael Jeffreys
The separate self can never discover the truth–in the end, the truth just awakens to itself through you. - Stephan Bodian
When I cease to own [physical or emotional pain], I liberate myself from its bondage and see it simply as it is. - Tony Parsons
The mind can never give you an accurate picture of reality. It can only give you one tiny point-of-view among billions.
–Michael Jeffreys
Accept the present moment without judgment.
–Eckhart Tolle
While eating your appetizer, don’t be concerned with dessert. –Dr. Wayne Dyer (on staying in the Now)
Your ego’s biggest trick is getting you to spend your entire lifetime looking outside yourself for something you already are.
-Michael Jeffreys
To me, spirituality is about two things: The liberation of consciousness from all illusion, so that the true nature can shine and an embodiment in life that is an alternative to the patterns of manipulation and greed that dominate our current culture. –Christian Opitz
When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change. – Dr. Wayne Dyer
Each moment is its own reward. -Tony Parsons
In what way is this perfect present moment deficient? -Michael Jeffreys
The very search for pleasure is the cause of pain.
Pain is god disguised as your greatest teacher. The greater the pain, the bigger the opportunity for a breakthough. -Michael Jeffreys
You can find the sacred in the most ordinary of things. - Oprah
Consciousness brings matter into being wherever there’s energy. – Martha Beck
My Zen Koan: If you lost the ability to think, what would you know? -Michael Jeffreys
(I took these two photos at beautiful Douglas Park in Santa Monica on the evening of 2-8-08).
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