Meditation Mind Quotes

The West is concentration of the mind: the East is meditation of the mind. The West is thinking: the East is non-thinking. The West is mind: the East is no-mind. ~ Rajneesh

You can set up an altar to God in your minds by means of prayer. And so it is fitting to pray at your trade, on a journey, standing at a counter or sitting at your handicraft. ~ Saint John Chrysostom

Meditation is the study of making the mind still. As your mind becomes still, a power enters you. This power transmogrifies your mind, it escalates your evolution and you begin to cycle through many incarnations in one lifetime. ~ Frederick Lenz

Meditation, then, is a state of mind in which the 'me' is absent. And therefore that very absence brings order. ~ Jiddu Krishnamurti

Meditation is acceptance. It is the acceptance of life within us, without us and all around us. Acceptance of life is the beginning of human satisfaction. ~ Sri Chinmoy

Meditation is one of the most therapeutic things that one can do for the body and mind. Specifically, studies demonstrate a reduction in blood pressure, heart rate, and other stress marker indicators. ~ Tim McCarthy

The ordinary man is living a very abnormal life, because his values are upside down. Money is more important than meditation; logic is more important than love; mind is more important than heart; power over others is more important than power over one's own being. Mundane things are more important than finding some treasures which death cannot destroy. ~ Rajneesh

We live, in fact, in a world starved for solitude, silence, and private: and therefore starved for meditation and true friendship. ~ C.S. Lewis

The Buddha said that all conscious beings possess an enlightened nature.
Because of that, we have this natural purity, peacefulness and power.
We can rest the mind naturally because we are already in possession of these qualities.
If one can rest the mind naturally, that's the best meditation. ~ Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

Curb your senses and your mind and see the Lord within your heart. ~ Adi Shankara

The practice of Transcendental Meditation creates a natural situation in the mind so that the mind entertains right thoughts, useful thoughts, thoughts that are cherished by nature and whose fulfillment is worked out by all the laws of nature. ~ Maharishi Mahesh Yogi

This is the way of meditation: encountering the present in all its tremendous beauty, just being in the present. Inside, the mind stops. Outside, the world changes totally. It is no more the ordinary world you have known before. In fact, you have not known it at all. Your mind was distorting everything, your mind was creating fantasies. Your eyes were full of fantasies and you were looking though those fantasies. They never allowed you to see that which is. If the mind is gone, even for a moment, suddenly the whole existence explodes upon you. ~ Rajneesh

Now an extraordinary and helpful fact is that by making Mind the object of our attention, not only does the serenity which is its nature begin to well up of its own accord but its steady unchanging character itself helps spontaneously to repel all disturbing thoughts. ~ Paul Brunton

When you are in the highest vibrational state you will not feel the need to; over eat, over spend money, insist on having a certain relationship, or even become a millionaire because you have shifted into the abundance that you are and from this place you dont feel any lack at all. ~ Renae A. Sauter

Meditation is not supposed to be the fabrication or the reinforcement of some particular state, but simply the cultivation of the awareness of whatever is arising in the mind. ~ Thrangu Rinpoche

Each action we take is an act of self-expression. We often think of large-scale or important deeds as being indications of our real selves, but even how we sharpen a pencil can reveal something about our feelings at that moment. Do we sharpen the pencil carefully or nervously so that it doesn't break? Do we bother to pay attention to what we're doing? How do we sharpen the same pencil when we're angry or in a hurry? Is it the same as when we're calm or unhurried?
Even the smallest movement discloses something about the person executing the action because it is the person who's actually performing the deed. In other words, action doesn't happen by itself, we make it happen, and in doing so we leave traces of ourselves on the activity. The mind and body are interrelated. ~ H.E. Davey

Mindfulness meditation is the embrace of any and all mind states in awareness, without preferring one to another. ~ Jon Kabat-Zinn

People are scared to empty their minds
fearing that they will be engulfed by the void.
What they don't realize is that
their own mind is the void. ~ Huangbo Xiyun

Whose meditation is real and effective? Who can really surrender to the will of God? Only the person whose mind has been purified by selfless work. ~ Swami Vivekananda

Mind without agitation is meditation. Mind in the present moment is meditation. Mind that has no hesitation, no anticipation is meditation. Mind that has come back home, to the source, is meditation. Mind that becomes no mind is meditation. ~ Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

He kept coming back to the silence. It was so big. And surprising. Even when a donkey brayed somewhere in the same valley - loud, long and loaded with loneliness - it did not change the silence, it enhanced it. Like jewels around a beautiful neck. Ed smiled. You can be at the poshest hotel in the country, on the planet even, but a farmer can still put a lonely donkey in the field next door.
In the same way he couldn't control what arose in his mind - or appears in the world around him - but he could give it space. ~ Matt Padwick

There is a simple path to follow, that appears only when you calm your mind. ~ Bryant McGill

When mind knows, we call it knowledge. When heart knows, we call it love. And when being knows, we call it meditation. ~ Rajneesh

We do not want to deny existence. Yet we also do not want to limit existence. Thus, we observe and honor without forming opinion, labeling, or adding a story to the object of our observation. ~ Alaric Hutchinson

Recovering from the suicide of a loved one, you need all the help you can get, so I very much recommend a meditation program. The whole picture of how to recover from this has to do with body, mind, and spirit. That's applicable to any kind of depression. ~ Judy Collins

The mind is a wonderful problem-solving machine without which there exists not even a single problem. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

When there is no thought in the mind, no thought of thought, when the mind is quiet but fully alert, we experience a little bit of enlightenment. ~ Frederick Lenz

It takes a little time to create a gap between the witness and the mind. Once the gap is there, you are in for a great surprise, that you are not the mind, that you are the witness, a watcher. And this process of watching is the very alchemy of real religion. Because as you become more and more deeply rooted in witnessing, thoughts start disappearing. You are, but the mind is utterly empty ... ~ Rajneesh

At the beginning of every winter people are careful to install storm windows. These extra panes of glass protect their houses against the bitter winds. We do something very similar to protect our minds through the practice of meditation. ~ Eknath Easwaran

Sit, then, as if you were a mountain, with all the unshakeable, steadfast majesty of a mountain. A mountain is completely natural and at ease with itself, however strong the winds that try to bother it, however thick the dark clouds that swirl around its peak. Sitting like a mountain, let your mind rise and fly and soar ~ Sogyal Rinpoche

Bliss follows witnessing - and that is going to be your meditation. Witness your body as separate, witness your mind as separate. Remain rooted in witnessing: "I am only a watcher." That is going to transform your whole life, it is going to give you the ultimate. ~ Rajneesh

As a mighty river which when properly harnessed by dams and canals, creates a vast reservoir of water, prevents famine and provides abundant power for industry; so also the mind, when controlled, provides a reservoir of peace and generates abundant energy for the human uplift. ~ B.K.S. Iyengar

Meditation is a state of no-mind! You can not find meditation through the mind .. because mind will perpetuate itself! You can find meditation only by putting the mind aside, by being cool, indifferent, unidentified with the mind. ~ Rajneesh

At the end of the day, I can end up just totally wacky, because I've made mountains out of molehills. With meditation, I can keep them as molehills. ~ Ringo Starr

Meditation is actually a very simple exercise in resting in the natural state of your present mind, and allowing yourself to be simply and clearly present to whatever thoughts, sensations, or emotions occur. ~ Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche

With the practice of meditation you can move into other states of mind, sort of ungluing the glue that binds you to a particular perceptual mode, a way of seeing life which is an illusory one. ~ Frederick Lenz

Some people think that meditation takes time away from physical accomplishment. Taken to extremes, of course, that's true. Most people, however, find that meditation creates more time than it takes. ~ Peter McWilliams

So it is with the mind, Nandini. Allow it to be in balance. Avoid extremes: the middle way is better. Neither force the mind too hard into concentration nor let it wander aimlessly. Meditation is to pay attention, to be aware of your breathing, your posture, your feelings, your perceptions, your thoughts, and all that passes through your mind and the mind itself; whatever is going on within you and between you and the universe. Meditation is not just sitting for an hour here or an hour there; meditation is a way of life. It is practiced all the time. There is no separation between meditation and everyday living. When you have ceased to be bound by the past or by the future, when you are fully present in the here and now, then it is meditation. ~ Satish Kumar

If you learn to go beyond the jabbering of your mind, and can go to the deeper aspects of your consciousness, then body, breath, and mind will not come in your way. ~ Rama Swami

By means of personal experimentation and observation, we can discover certain simple and universal truths. The mind moves the body, and the body follows the mind. Logically then, negative thought patterns harm not only the mind but also the body. What we actually do builds up to affect the subconscious mind and in turn affects the conscious mind and all reactions. ~ H.E. Davey

The ultimate way of Being lies beyond all contradictory pairs of opposites
with which our two dimensional thinking mind operates.
As soon as we are successful in silencing the restless activity of the thinking mind
and give a chance to intuition, the pure all embracing spirit in us will manifest effortlessly. ~ Anagarika Govinda

One way to look at meditation is as a kind of intrapsychic technology that's been developed over thousands of years by traditions that know a lot about the mind/body connection. ~ Jon Kabat-Zinn

Meditation is the only magic that can help you to be free from the mind, can help you to be free from yourself, your past and all the burden of the past. ~ Rajneesh

Meditation will do you a disservice. It will confuse you more than clarify you. It will bring tremendous impurity in you - if you are allowing your mind to wander during the empowered experience. ~ Frederick Lenz

Having books standing on a shelf in a room is like having completely different worlds at the ready, waiting to be explored. ~ J.F Hermann

Imagine that your mind is like a calm, clear lake or a vast empty sky: Ripples appear on the surface of the lake and clouds pass across the sky, but they soon disappear without altering the natural stillness. ~ Kathleen McDonald

The mind is constantly talking. If the inner talk can drop even for a single moment you will be able to have a glimpse of no-mind. That's what meditation is all about. The state of no-mind is the right state. It is your state. ~ Rajneesh

Watch your thoughts as you watch the street traffic. People come and go; you register without response. It may not be easy in the beginning, but with some practice you will find that your mind can function on many levels at the same time and you can be aware of them all. ~ Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

The meditative mind sees disagreeable or agreeable things with equanimity, patience, and good-will. Transcendent knowledge is seeing reality in utter simplicity. (146) ~ Jean-Yves Leloup

As the outward man is not fit for work for any length of time unless he eats, so is with the inner man. What is the food for the inner man? Not prayer, but the Word of God-not the simple reading of the Word of God, so that it only passes through our minds, just as water runs through a pipe. No, we must consider what we read, ponder over it, and apply it to our hearts. ~ George Muller

Without thoughts the mind cannot exist only consciousness ~ Avis J. Williams

The more meditation goes deep, the more you will become master of your own thoughts. You will say, "Stop!" and the mind stops. You will say, "Move!" and the mind begins to move. Once this capacity comes to you, you will not fall down again. Unless this is achieved, if you discontinue meditation, soon every result will be washed away. ~ Rajneesh

It is more than probable that I am not understood; but I fear, indeed, that it is in no manner possible to convey to the mind of the merely general reader, an adequate idea of that nervous intensity of interest with which, in my case, the powers of meditation (not to speak technically) busied and buried themselves, in the contemplation of even the most ordinary objects of the universe. ~ Edgar Allan Poe

Meditation gives you the wherewithal to pause, observe how easily the mind can exaggerate the severity of a setback, and resist getting drawn into the abyss. ~ Richard Davidson

All that is necessary to awaken to yourself as the radiant emptiness of spirit is to stop seeking something more or better or different, and to turn your attention inward to the awake silence that you are. ~ Adyashanti

Meditation is like a lullaby to the mind. Like the body, the mind too needs rest. ~ Shivanshu K. Srivastava

In a garden you can find, quiet thoughts that calm the mind. ~ Patience Strong

Transcendental Meditation is a mental technique, so you travel to this field through subtler levels of mind, and then subtler levels of intellect, and then, at the border of intellect, you transcend and experience it. ~ David Lynch

The mental ability to concentrate is inherent to all; it is not extraordinary or mysterious. Meditation is not something that a Yogi has to teach you; you already have the ability to shut out thoughts. ~ Sivananda

No great work has ever been produced except after a long interval of still and musing meditation. ~ Walter Bagehot

Meditation is the way the mind is. That's why in Zen they call it the natural state, which means you don't have to go and do anything to meditate. ~ Frederick Lenz

In meditation, when your mind becomes perfectly still and calm, you will experience the golden light of eternity. ~ Frederick Lenz

In your life, everything revolves around your mind. ~ Saad Shah

Movement is the freedom of the body; stillness, of the mind. ~ Marty Rubin

Meditation is that exercise of the mind by which it recalls a known truth, as some kind of creatures do their food, to be ruminated upon till all the valuable parts be extracted. ~ George Horne

Meditation is unfocussed mind, you simply listen silently, not with a tension in the mind, not with an urge to know and learn, no, with total relaxedness, in a let go, in an opening of your being. You listen, not to know, you simply listen to understand. ~ Rajneesh

respond rather than react to situations, people or environment. Let go of limiting emotions such as fear, frustration and anger and start to express your emotions to others, this is essential to a healthy wellbeing. ~ Avis J. Williams

Meditation allows us to directly participate in our lives instead of living life as an afterthought. ~ Stephen Levine

I don't believe in hours and hours of meditation. The mind gets tired and starts to fold in on itself. ~ Dolores Ashcroft-Nowicki

The more your meditation goes deep, the less and less you will feel the burden of the mind. The more and more meditation goes deep, the less and less you will be a mind. Thoughts will become rare, and ultimately they cease. That doesn't mean you become unthinking; it only means that your consciousness becomes clear, transparent, without thoughts moving continuously as clouds. Whenever you need to think you can think; but now thought becomes an instrument to you, not an obsession as it is presently. Thoughts are an obsession without meditation. ~ Rajneesh

[M]ental peace is not meditation. Meditation is the flight beyond the mind. It has nothing to do with mental peace. ~ Rajneesh

Buddha says: Meditation brings two things. It brings wisdom, it brings freedom. These two flowers grow out of meditation. When you become silent, utterly silent, beyond the mind, two flowers bloom in you. One is of wisdom: you know what is and what is not. And the other is of freedom: you know now there are no more any limitations on you, either of time or of space. You become liberated. Meditation is the key to liberation, to freedom, to wisdom. ~ Rajneesh

In advanced meditation there are methods and formations of joining the mind with the various aggregate aspects of the universe, fusing it, dissolving it, sometimes thousands of times in a microsecond or outside of time. ~ Frederick Lenz

Mind only thinks, meditation lives. ~ Rajneesh

When you meditate properly you are able to take your mind and merge it with the cosmos. Essentially, this causes your IQ to increase. ~ Frederick Lenz

Meditation is a vital way to purify and quiet the mind, thus rejuvenating the body. ~ Deepak Chopra

Chant your mantra while engaged in work. This way, the mind will be continuously focused on Him. ~ Mata Amritanandamayi

In samadhi, in the highest form of meditation, the same thing happens: the mind stops functioning ... but you are conscious. That is the only difference, but the difference that makes the difference. One is fully alert, luminous. One is there witnessing, watching, but there is no cloud of thought. The sky is utterly empty: as far as you can see you cannot see any content. ~ Rajneesh

I said to my soul
be still
and
wait
so the darkness
shall be the
light
and the stillness
the
dancing. ~ T. S. Eliot

When people say that meditation makes them calm, they are often referring to this stability of the mind. A stable mind creates the foundation for a happier and more contented person. ~ Sakyong Mipham

When the mind goes beyond the thought of 'the me,' the experiencer, the observer, the thinker, then there is a possibility of a happiness that is incorruptible. ~ Jiddu Krishnamurti

Thought ceases in meditation; even the mind's elements are quite quiet. Blood circulation stops. His breath stops, but he is not dead. ~ Swami Vivekananda

Only when there are no impressions of others clouding our mind, can we sit and practice the glorious practice of meditation. ~ Frederick Lenz

The word 'innocence' means a mind that is incapable of being hurt. ~ Jiddu Krishnamurti

The mystics ask you to take nothing on mere belief. Rather, they give you a set of experiments to test in your own awareness and experience. The laboratory is your own mind, the experiment is meditation. ~ Ken Wilber

It is of great importance, when we begin to practise prayer, not to let ourselves be frightened by our own thoughts. ~ Teresa Of Avila

Breathing is central to every aspect of meditation training. It's a wonderful place to focus in training the mind to be calm and concentrated. ~ Jon Kabat-Zinn

Freedom is when you really get your own powers which are within you. ~ Nirmala Srivastava

The mandalas were meant to be objects of contemplation, aids to meditation, their proportions magically balanced to purify and calm the mind. To stare at a mandala was to experience, if only briefly, the nothingness that is at the heart of enlightenment. ~ Douglas Preston

I start my day with a mind, body, soul practice - yoga, Pilates or meditation. ~ Donna Karan

Thinking is the natural activity of the mind. Meditation is not about stopping your thoughts. Meditation is simply a process of resting the mind in its natural state, which is open to and naturally aware of thoughts, emotions, and sensations as they occur. ~ Eric Swanson

Reading makes a full man, meditation a profound man, discourse a clear man. ~ Benjamin Franklin

The fulcrum of resistance is in your mind where you pit yourself against the weight of the external. ~ Bryant McGill

Meditation opens the mind to the greatest mystery that takes place daily and hourly; it widens the heart so that it may feel the eternity of time and infinity of space in every throb; it gives us a life within the world as if we were moving about in paradise. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

When we dance, the journey itself is the point, as when we play music the playing itself is the point. ~ Alan Watts

I like to write on airplanes ... that forced meditation time when you have nothing else to do, so your mind is allowed to go to places it wouldn't otherwise go. ~ Jon Foreman

Meditation is painful in the beginning but it bestows immortal Bliss and supreme joy in the end. ~ Swami Sivananda

By the second day, the song lyrics had faded, but in their place came darker irritations. Gradually, I started to become aware of a young man sitting just behind me and to the left. I had noticed him when he first entered the mediation hall, and had felt a flash of annoyance at the time: something about him, especially his beard, had struck me as too calculatedly dishevelled, as if he were trying to make a statement. Now his audible breathing was starting to irritate me, too. It seemed studied, unnatural, somehow theatrical. My irritation slowly intensified - a reaction that struck me as entirely reasonable and proportionate at the time. It was all beginning to feel like a personal attack. How much contempt must the bearded meditator have for me, I seethed silently, deliberately to decide to ruin the serenity of my meditation by behaving so obnoxiously? Experienced retreat-goers, it turns out, have a term for this phenomenon. The call it 'vipassana vendetta'. In the stillness tiny irritations become magnified into full-blown hate campaigns; the mind is so conditioned to attaching to storylines that it seizes upon whatever's available. Being on retreat had temporarily separated me from all the real causes of distress in my life, and so, apparently, I was inventing new ones. As I shuffled to my narrow bed that evening, I was still smarting about the loud-breathing man. I did let go of the vendetta eventually - but only because I'd fallen into an exhausted and dreamless sleep ~ Oliver Burkeman

Meditation is the process of quieting one's mind, and letting go of the worries and stress of life. ~ Tim McCarthy

If you meditate your mind will become razor sharp. Your memory and retention will be superb. New talents and abilities will begin to unfold. You will become younger each day, yet wiser. ~ Frederick Lenz