To be awake is to be alive.

The truth is I love being alive. And I love feeling free. So if I can’t have those things then I feel like a caged animal and I’d rather not be in a cage. I’d rather be dead. And it’s real simple. And I think it’s not that uncommon.

Everything can change at any moment, suddenly and forever.

This life, which had been the tomb of his virtue and of his honour, is but a walking shadow; a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Life is all memory, except for the one present moment that goes by you so quickly you hardly catch it going.

You accept that this civilisation could be abolished and life will begin later on after a few thousand years because that is something that has happened in the history of this planet. When you have peace in yourself and accept, then you are calm enough to do something, but if you are carried by despair there is no hope.

I’m not trying to follow a set of rules and stuff. I’m just living my life.

Day by day we should weigh what we have granted to the spirit of the world against what we have denied to the spirit of Jesus, in thought and especially in deed.

This is the highest wisdom that I own; freedom and life are earned by those alone who conquer them each day anew.

More compassionate mind, more sense of concern for other’s well-being, is source of happiness.

If life were predictable it would cease to be life, and be without flavor.

He who does not mind his belly, will hardly mind anything else.

The quantity and quality of consciousness, one may say, have always been growing throughout geological times. In this respect man, in whom nervous organisation and therefore psychological powers have attained an undisputed maximum, may be considered, scientifically, as a natural centre of evolution of the primates.

It is not length of life, but depth of life.

Isn’t it funny how babies laugh a lot? I read a toddler, a young child laughs 300 times a day. The average adult laughs, like, four times a day. God put it in them. He put the laugh in us, but I think sometimes we let life get us down, you know, have bad breaks, and we lose our breaks.

Those who hope for no other life are dead even for this.

Always have something beautiful in sight, even if it’s just a daisy in a jelly glass.

The answer is, who you are cannot be defined through thinking or mental labels or definitions, because it’s beyond that. It is the very sense of being, or presence, that is there when you become conscious of the present moment. In essence, you and what we call the present moment are, at the deepest level, one.

Dying is one of the few things that can be done as easily lying down.

I don’t carry the burden of the past or the madness of the future. I live in the present.

The hardest thing to see is what is in front of your eyes.

The last act is bloody, however pleasant all the rest of the play is: a little earth is thrown at last upon our head, and that is the end forever.

True happiness is… to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future.

To be idle is a short road to death and to be diligent is a way of life; foolish people are idle, wise people are diligent.

Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life.

The movement of search can only be from the known to the known, and all that the mind can do is to be aware that this movement will never uncover the unknown. Any movement on the part of the known is still within the field of the known.

The momentous thing in human life is the art of winning the soul to good or evil.

For me, writing has always come out of living a fairly to-the-bone kind of life, just really being present to a lot of life. The writing has been really a byproduct of that.

Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.

The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.

To me, if life boils down to one thing, it’s movement. To live is to keep moving.

If life is a checker game, someone else is moving the pieces. It isn’t us. Don’t be surprised by amazing coincidences. There are no accidents. Consider, as I learned to do, the incredible interconnectedness of all of life.

We will be more successful in all our endeavors if we can let go of the habit of running all the time, and take little pauses to relax and re-center ourselves. And we’ll also have a lot more joy in living.

There are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle; you can live as if everything is a miracle.

It is not necessary that whilst I live I live happily; but it is necessary that so long as I live I should live honourably.

He only earns his freedom and his life Who takes them every day by storm.

Singleness of purpose is one of the chief essentials for success in life, no matter what may be one’s aim.

Pay attention, don’t let life go by you. Fall in love with the back of your cereal box.

Life’s like a play: it’s not the length, but the excellence of the acting that matters.

You can either be a host to God, or a hostage to your ego. It’s your call.

Engage your brain before you engage your weapon.

Lulled in the countless chambers of the brain, our thoughts are linked by many a hidden chain; awake but one, and in, what myriads rise!

If you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward, then you won’t see why we go.

Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.

Things in themselves have no life in them. A car can’t comfort or encourage you. A house means nothing if there’s no life and love inside.

Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you.

There’s not some idea I’m going to create a work that’s going to change everybody’s consciousness.

When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude.

My life is mine to remember.

All truly great thoughts are conceived by walking.

A word is dead when it is said, some say. I say it just begins to live that day.

Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile.

The tragedy of life is what dies inside a man while he lives.

Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.

Life is better than death, I believe, if only because it is less boring, and because it has fresh peaches in it.

Seek ye first the good things of the mind, and the rest will either be supplied or its loss will not be felt.

If every day you practice walking and sitting meditation and generate the energy of mindfulness and concentration and peace, you are a cell in the body of the new Buddha. This is not a dream but is possible today and tomorrow.

The main rule to me is to honor God with your life. To life a life of integrity. Not be selfish. You know, help others. But that’s really the essence of the Christian faith.

Life is the childhood of our immortality.

I am a simple Buddhist monk – no more, no less.

You get one life. I’m going to embrace mine.