I think the discipline comes with turning that cellphone and Blackberry off and unplugging completely. You do that and you go through some withdrawals in the beginning. You start thinking, ‚Oh, do I need to do this? Do I need to do that?‘ You forget that we were doing just fine with the payphone.

No valid plans for the future can be made by those who have no capacity for living now.

Nothing is worth more than this day.

Do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Let the day’s own trouble be sufficient for the day.

You don’t have to give way to careless speech or complaining. You don’t have to let your feelings get in the way of what God wants to do in your life.

Most humans are never fully present in the now, because unconsciously they believe that the next moment must be more important than this one. But then you miss your whole life, which is never not now.

When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive – to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.

There is a fine balance between honoring the past and losing yourself in it. For example, you can acknowledge and learn from mistakes you made, and then move on and refocus on the now. It is called forgiving yourself.

People sacrifice the present for the future. But life is available only in the present. That is why we should walk in such a way that every step can bring us to the here and the now.

Take no thought of who is right or wrong or who is better than. Be not for or against.

Because in a split second, it’s gone.

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.

We are dying from overthinking. We are slowly killing ourselves by thinking about everything. Think. Think. Think. You can never trust the human mind anyway. It’s a death trap.

Never let yesterday use up too much of today.

It is more difficult to rule yourself than to rule a city.

Be content with what you are, and wish not change; nor dread your last day, nor long for it.

Meditation demands an astonishingly alert mind; it is the understanding of the totality of life in which every form of fragmentation has ceased.

Meditation can help us embrace our worries, our fear, our anger; and that is very healing. We let our own natural capacity of healing do the work.

Realize deeply that the present moment is all you ever have. Make the Now the primary focus of your life.

You might not have the things you want, but if you check carefully, you got all you need.

Whatever you dwell on in the conscious grows in your experience.

All truly great thoughts are conceived by walking.

Every day I try to be in communication with the universe in an unconscious way.

God has equipped you to handle difficult things. In fact, He has already planted the seeds of discipline and self-control inside you. You just have to water those seeds with His Word to make them grow!

I have found that no exertion of the legs can bring two minds much nearer to one another.

Nothing is more terrible than activity without insight.

By letting it go it all gets done. The world is won by those who let it go. But when you try and try. The world is beyond the winning.

Health is the greatest gift, contentment the greatest wealth, faithfulness the best relationship.

Meditation is to be aware of every thought and of every feeling, never to say it is right or wrong, but just to watch it and move with it. In that watching, you begin to understand the whole movement of thought and feeling. And out of this awareness comes silence.

I am very strict about what I eat. I do not consume anything that my body does not require. It takes a lot of sacrifice and discipline. It wasn’t easy before but now its second nature for me.

Small is the number of people who see with their eyes and think with their minds.

I spent years studying the teachings of Patanjali, and he reminded us several thousand years ago that when we are steadfast – which means that we never slip in our abstention of thoughts of harm directed toward others – then all living creatures cease to feel enmity in our presence.

Forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair.

You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait, be quiet still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked, it has no choice, it will roll in ecstasy at your feet.

I love to sit and eat quietly and enjoy each bite, aware of the presence of my community, aware of all the hard and loving work that has gone into my food.

Calm mind brings inner strength and self-confidence, so that’s very important for good health.

When anger rises, think of the consequences.

I know that one of the great arts that the writer develops is the art of saying, ‚No. No, I’m finished. Bye.‘ And leaving it alone. I will not write it into the ground. I will not write the life out of it. I won’t do that.

Don’t wait to be successful at some future point. Have a successful relationship with the present moment and be fully present in whatever you are doing. That is success.

The most valuable of all education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have to do, when it has to be done, whether you like it or not.

I’m one of the slowest drivers on the road. I mosey along. If you’re doing anything too fast, including living life too fast, that creates sudden death. If I have to be somewhere on time, I make sure I leave early enough.

It’s normal for human beings to identify with their own separate self. The problem is that we get caught in that notion of ourself as a separate individual and caught in that individual self’s agenda.

It makes no sense to worry about things you have no control over because there’s nothing you can do about them, and why worry about things you do control? The activity of worrying keeps you immobilized.

When I’m dancing, I’m not thinking about anything. I am here. I am totally there. You know? And the feeling is a sensation of being away from myself. My soul dances with the angels, and my body dances with my wife.

The extent of your consciousness is limited only by your ability to love and to embrace with your love the space around you, and all it contains.

Freedom from effort in the present merely means that there has been effort stored up in the past.

Hatred does not cease by hatred, but only by love; this is the eternal rule.

A man watches his pear tree day after day, impatient for the ripening of the fruit. Let him attempt to force the process, and he may spoil both fruit and tree. But let him patiently wait, and the ripe pear at length falls into his lap.

If you aren’t in the moment, you are either looking forward to uncertainty, or back to pain and regret.

I try to live what I teach. A lot of things come against us in life, but we should try to find something to be grateful for, and see each day as a gift.

Sometimes, I want to talk on a song and be angry, because I am angry. Then there’s always a part of me that remembers that this record lives past my being angry, and so do I really want to be angry about that? Is that feeling going to have longevity?

Things done well and with a care, exempt themselves from fear.

If you have the chance to be exposed to a loving, understanding environment where the seed of compassion, loving kindness, can be watered every day, then you become a more loving person.

A quick temper will make a fool of you soon enough.

Anybody can become angry – that is easy, but to be angry with the right person and to the right degree and at the right time and for the right purpose, and in the right way – that is not within everybody’s power and is not easy.

If a man has nothing to eat, fasting is the most intelligent thing he can do.

Memories are thoughts that arise. They’re not realities. Only when you believe that they are real, then they have the power over you. But when you realize it’s just another thought arising about the past, then you can have a spacious relationship with that thought. The thought no longer has you in its grip.

Wow, I get to wake up again? Ok. You have to make good with what you’ve got.

I like to let things breathe.

I wonder how many decisions we make every day. I believe it’s probably hundreds. We decide whether or not to get out of bed, what we’ll eat, what we’ll do, what we’ll think about, what we’ll say… and on and on.