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

I have striven not to laugh at human actions, not to weep at them, nor to hate them, but to understand them.

Keep silence for the most part, and speak only when you must, and then briefly.

He who knows that enough is enough will always have enough.

Nurture your minds with great thoughts. To believe in the heroic makes heroes.

People do not understand what a great revenue economy is.

Constant kindness can accomplish much. As the sun makes ice melt, kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust, and hostility to evaporate.

The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.

You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view.

Engage your brain before you engage your weapon.

My head’s never really quiet. The only time I can get it to turn off is if I watch ‚CSI‘ or ‚Law & Order,‘ where I have to follow the crime. If I can’t turn my head off during that, I know I’ve really got a problem.

Back when I was in school, few people understood dyslexia and what to do for it. My teachers thought I was lazy and not very clever, and I got bored easily… thinking of all the things I could do once I left school. I couldn’t always follow what was going on.

Black people comprehend the South. We understand its weight. It has rested on our backs… I knew that my heart would break if ever I put my foot down on that soil, moist, still, with old hurts. I had to face the fear/loathing at its source or it would consume me whole.

I cannot always control what goes on outside. But I can always control what goes on inside.

We hear only those questions for which we are in a position to find answers.

There is never time in the future in which we will work out our salvation. The challenge is in the moment; the time is always now.

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?

Philosophy is written in this grand book, the universe, which stands continually open to our gaze. But the book cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and read the letters in which it is composed.

Compared to what we ought to be, we are half awake.

I, not events, have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be. Yesterday is dead, tomorrow hasn’t arrived yet. I have just one day, today, and I’m going to be happy in it.

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.

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

True self is non-self, the awareness that the self is made only of non-self elements. There’s no separation between self and other, and everything is interconnected.

If you can’t read, the only thing you can do is enjoy the pictures, not the whole story. Reading is the key to knowledge. Knowledge is the key to understanding. So read on, young man! Read on, young lady!

Wide diversification is only required when investors do not understand what they are doing.

Just as the wave cannot exist for itself, but is ever a part of the heaving surface of the ocean, so must I never live my life for itself, but always in the experience which is going on around me.

Now I am older, I understand we have to accept who we are.

And thou wilt give thyself relief, if thou doest every act of thy life as if it were the last.

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

A man should always consider how much he has more than he wants.

Ultimately, a real understanding of history means that we face nothing new under the sun.

What’s the good of drawing in the next breath if all you do is let it out and draw in another?

Arrange whatever pieces come your way.

We can learn to see each other and see ourselves in each other and recognize that human beings are more alike than we are unalike.

Even if it turns out that time travel is impossible, it is important that we understand why it is impossible.

Everything that happens happens as it should, and if you observe carefully, you will find this to be so.

If you don’t get out of the box you’ve been raised in, you won’t understand how much bigger the world is.

We must find our duties in what comes to us, not in what might have been.

Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.

He who does not understand your silence will probably not understand your words.

We can’t just continue living as if there was no tomorrow, because there is a tomorrow.

Man only likes to count his troubles, but he does not count his joys.

Fear keeps us focused on the past or worried about the future. If we can acknowledge our fear, we can realize that right now we are okay. Right now, today, we are still alive, and our bodies are working marvelously. Our eyes can still see the beautiful sky. Our ears can still hear the voices of our loved ones.

Die to everything of yesterday so that your mind is always fresh, always young, innocent, full of vigor and passion.

His talent was as natural as the pattern that was made by the dust on a butterfly’s wings. At one time he understood it no more than the butterfly did and he did not know when it was brushed or marred.

We’re in very bad trouble if we don’t understand the planet we’re trying to save.

Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood. All is riddle, and the key to a riddle is another riddle.

My wife and I don’t compete. We know each other’s preferences, and we work to provide those for each other. One will take over when the other is faced with something he or she dislikes. That’s what friends do.

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.

My goal is simple. It is a complete understanding of the universe, why it is as it is and why it exists at all.

All our knowledge begins with the senses, proceeds then to the understanding, and ends with reason. There is nothing higher than reason.

I don’t think culture is something you can describe.

You hear about actors being late and all that sort of stuff, but you never find that with an actor who’s directed, because an actor who’s directed understands all the problems your production is going through.

Mind over mattress.

Meditation is not following any system; it is not constant repetition and imitation. Meditation is not concentration.

Metaphysics means nothing but an unusually obstinate effort to think clearly.

Every day we have plenty of opportunities to get angry, stressed or offended. But what you’re doing when you indulge these negative emotions is giving something outside yourself power over your happiness. You can choose to not let little things upset you.

The mind that is anxious about the future is miserable.

Fear, separation, hate and anger come from the wrong view that you and the Earth are two separate entities, the Earth is only the environment. You are in the centre and you want to do something for the Earth in order for you to survive. That is a dualistic way of seeing.

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.

The world we see that seems so insane is the result of a belief system that is not working. To perceive the world differently, we must be willing to change our belief system, let the past slip away, expand our sense of now, and dissolve the fear in our minds.