Leo Babauta Quotes

Simplicity boils down to two steps: Identify the essential. Eliminate the rest.

The things that matter most should never be at the mercy of the things that matter least. - Goethe

Stop waiting for the right person to come into your life. Be the right person to come to someone's life

The comfort of certainty and perfection vs. the fear of uncertainty and being suboptimal. This is the struggle.
Let me let you in on a secret: no one is free from this struggle.

Create your own source of built-in happiness. Walk around as a whole, happy person, needing nothing. Then come from this place of wholeness, of self-reliance and independence, and love others. Not because you want them to love you back, not because you want to be needed, but because loving them is an amazing thing to do.

The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less. - Socrates

Find a quiet place, and just read. If you're reading an ebook, clear away everything else but your ebook reader.
Then you settle into the reading, and enjoy it. Bask in the luxury of reading without distractions.

The point of simple living, for me has got to be:
A soft place to land
A wide margin of error
Room to breathe
Lots of places to find baseline happiness in each and every day

Adding little amounts over time makes a huge difference

Sometimes hard stuff needs to be done in order to make the stuff you love possible

It's one that is stripped of the unnecessary, to
make room for that which gives you joy.
It's a removal of clutter in all its forms,
leaving you with peace and freedom and
lightness.
A minimalist eschews the mindset of more, of
acquiring and consuming and shopping, of
bigger is better, of the burden of stuff.
A minimalist instead embraces the beauty of
less, the aesthetic of spareness, a life of
contentedness in what we need and what
makes us truly happy.
A minimalist realizes that acquiring stuff
doesn't make us happy. That earning more
and having more are meaningless. That
filling your life with busy-ness and
freneticism isn't desirable, but something to
be avoided.
A minimalist values quality, not quantity, in
all forms.

less TV, more reading less shopping, more outdoors less clutter, more space less rush, more slowness less consuming, more creating less junk, more real food less busywork, more impact less driving, more walking less noise, more solitude less focus on the future, more on the present less work, more play less worry, more smiles breathe

The beginning is half of every action. Greek Proverb

If your mind isn't clouded by unnecessary things, then this is the best season of your life." - Wu-Men

The way I define happiness is being the creator of your experience, choosing to take pleasure in what you have, right now, regardless of the circumstances, while being the best you that you can be.

The life you have left is a gift. Cherish it. Enjoy it now, to the fullest. Do what matters, now.

See how everything is temporary, and wanting it to be permanent will only cause you to suffer. And then see how letting go of that wishing, and accepting the changing nature of things, and being unattached to each moment of those changing things, will help you to be calmer and happier. Embrace the non-attachment. Embrace the changing nature of things as beautiful. Accept the impermanence.

Now I have a tiny bit of knowledge, but more interestingly, a bit of an awareness of my vast ignorance. This is humbling, and at the same time exciting, because it shows how amazing this world is.

If you can focus on doing things that make you happy, you'll have less of a need for stuff.

Pause. Breathe. Let all of that fade.

Happiness is not outside ourselves.