Monkey Mind Quotes

The problem is to keep the monkey mind from running off into all kinds of thoughts. ~ Lee Kuan Yew

Mindfulness is by far the most supreme expression of gratefulness for being alive. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

After giving it some thought, I've decided to name my monkey mind Ricky Bobby. I was thinking about Latin names like Javier, but I don't want to make my jumping, distractable self sound mysterious and sexy. Ricky Bobby makes me laugh. A name like that seems silly, not strong. Just a goofy little thing that doesn't know what to do with its hands, likes to go fast, and loves tiny, infant, baby Jesus. ~ Anna White

God can and does use anything God chooses to get our attention.
Who's to say the hawk wasn't sent as an agent of grace to catch my wandering attention and quiet what Buddhists might call my "monkey mind," which is more often than not swinging wildly from branch to branch on intellectual and emotional trees.
On the way back down the hiking trail after my encounter with the hawk in Big Sky, I stopped thinking and started looking and listening. That's when I realized winter was turning into spring before me.
Change was happening.
Creation, and perhaps the Creator, was speaking.
I just needed to be outside to hear the voice. ~ Cathleen Falsani

Only about two percent of one percent of our thoughts deserve to be taken seriously. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

Some people are not really good listeners. They are merely good at keeping quiet for a long time, while someone is talking to them. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

Learn to express your creativity... Your monkey-mind will hate it; but your soul will dance in celebration. ~ Andrew Hyde

This is the monkey mind of which Zen speaks: the mind that worries, doubts, frets about the past, makes lists, all the time chattering like a monkey. ~ Patricia Monaghan

Monkey mind is actually a Buddhist term that refers to a mind that is restless, agitated, confused, or that is hard to control. ~ George Mumford

Never believe that body is permanent. Body is like a water bubble. Mind is like a mad monkey. ~ Sathya Sai Baba

The ego is like a clever monkey, which can co-opt anything, even the most spiritual practices, so as to expand itself. (155) ~ Jean-Yves Leloup

My yoga practice, I do it because when I get on my mat, I know I'm going to be transformed. I know that whatever stresses are in my life or whatever worries I have or whatever monkey mind is happening for me, when I get off the mat, I'm going to be transformed. ~ Michael Franti

Your emotions are the slaves to your thoughts, and you are the slave to your emotions. ~ Elizabeth Gilbert

This is why therapists go to such lengths to urge their anxious patients away from intellectualization: The first step toward peace is disarmament. ~ Daniel Smith

The mind is a sweetheart, when it is wondering; and a bitch, when it is wandering. ~ Mokokoma Mokhonoana

Don't be tossed away by your monkey mind. You say you want to do something - "I really want to be a writer" - then that little voice comes along, "but I might not make enough money as a writer." "Oh, okay, then I won't write." That's being tossed away. These little voices are constantly going to be nagging us. If you make a decision to do something, you do it. Don't be tossed away. But part of not being tossed away is understanding your mind, not believing it so much when it comes up with all these objections and then loads you with all these insecurities and reasons not to do something. ~ Natalie Goldberg

Evolution is fundamentally creative, and when we align ourselves with the evolutionary movements of consciousness, the universe itself puts wind in our sails. Quantum thinking goes beyond the thoughts we're aware of; it includes unconscious processing, which doesn't just expand our boundaries, but can also free us from the suffering that conscious processing (sometimes known as 'the monkey mind') creates. ~ Amit Goswami

The best use one can make of his mind is to distrust it. ~ Francois Fenelon

WHEN I STILL USED, I WAS ONCE WORKING IN IBIZA, HEDONISM capital of the nineties and the turn of the millennium. People swayed in sweaty swathes and stayed, pilled-up for days. I couldn't participate, because I was too shy or broken, caught on some taut barbed wire in my mind. Me and my mate Matt, high one night, lost ourselves, found ourselves in a wood and pretended to be animals. It was just us, and we prowled and circled around. We locked eyes and growled and danced. "Let's pretend we're animals" was forgotten, and we were animals. We are animals. We are free animals with a divine spark, we're not in a farm or a zoo or a theme park, we're free. We've forgotten that we're free. ~ Russell Brand

That is the trouble, everybody is giving everything in the world a piece of their minds. Whereas what we want is not a piece of somebody's mind, even the best mind, so much as an open heart and an open spirit. ~ Laurens Van Der Post

You thirst for magic so you can exact revenge. You want to destroy, to tear down. I see it in your eyes."
"And what's wrong with that?"
"Nothing, my dear, as long as you don't mind living in a broken world. ~ Megan Shepherd

And life is but a dream ... Things happened in life, and you felt them, but it was all in your mind, the colors, the fear and anxiety. People surrounded you and houses did, and towns, but what you saw was not so important as what you felt. Life was one thing after another, a brief insanity, a series of inexplicable transitions that seemed at the time sensible, but at second sight ridiculous, a succession of unconnected incidents, accidental relationships. ~ John Dufresne

I'd say James Dean is someone that's really inspired me. Just the fact that he did only three movies before he died at such a young age, and yet everyone knows who he is. It really blows my mind. ~ Tye Sheridan

This is the strike of the men of the mind, Miss Taggart. This is the mind on strike. ~ Ayn Rand

I was thinking of setting myself on fire tonight. Would you mind? (Callie)
What? (Sin)
Ha! I knew it. I knew I could get you to talk. Just think, a whole word, too. Who knows if I keep this up, I might have you speaking an entire sentence by week's end. (Callie) ~ Kinley MacGregor

Mon wants this transition to be as peaceable as possible. That is, of course, a noble goal. And in late nights the chancellor confided in Leia that she is wisely struck by the fear of what happened the first time the parasite of Palpatine squirmed under the skin. How easy it was for him to prey on the anxieties of the galaxy. How simple it was for him to turn system against system by stoking the fires of xenophobia, anger, selfishness. (And here Luke's voice echoes in her mind: The ways and tools of the dark side, Leia.) How do you form an Empire? By stealing a Republic. And how do you steal a Republic? By convincing its people that they cannot govern themselves - that freedom is their enemy and that fear is their ally. Palpatine ~ Chuck Wendig

I need to wake up from this state of mind. ~ The Click Five

When I saw how the European Union was developing, it was very obvious what they had in mind was not democratic. In Britain, you vote for a government so the government has to listen to you, and if you don't like it you can change it. ~ Tony Benn

It is noticed, that the consideration of the great periods and spaces of astronomy induces a dignity of mind, and an indifferenceto death. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Being called a 'bad citizen' is a compliment to a novelist, at least to my mind. That's exactly what we ought to do. ~ Don DeLillo

Only a positive mind can move the world forward. ~ Pearl Zhu

To you,
it is much easier
to not say a word.
To me,
I choke on my words
if I do not say them.

What truly hurts me
is that you know
that your silence
infects a storm in my mind
yet you choose it
oh so
easily. ~ Najwa Zebian

When you hear the phrase "rescue the financial system," translate it in your mind into "keep the debts on the books." They are trying to find a way for you (and debtor nations too) to keep paying and for the debt to keep growing. ~ Charles Eisenstein

Even in zazen you will lose yourself. When you become sleepy, or when your mind starts to wander about, you lose yourself. When your legs become painful - "Why are my legs so painful?" - you lose yourself. "
-
"You just sit in the midst of the problem; when you are a part of the problem, or when the problem is a part of you, there is no problem, because you are the problem itself. The problem is you yourself. If this is so, there is no problem."
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"When you start to wander about in some delusion which is something apart from you yourself, then your surroundings are not real anymore, and your mind is not real anymore. If you yourself are deluded, then your surroundings are also a misty, foggy delusion. Once you are in the midst of delusion, there is no end to delusion. You will be involved in deluded ideas one after another. Most people live in delusion, involved in their problem, trying to solve their problem. But just to live is actually to live in problems. And to solve the problem is to be a part of it, to be one with it. ~ Shunryu Suzuki

But stories are fragile. Like people's lives. It only takes a word out of place to change them forever. If you hear a lovely tune, and then you change it, the new tune might be lovely too, but you've lost the first one." "But if I stick to the first tune, then I've lost the second." "But someone else might discover it. It's still there to be born." "And the first tune isn't?" "No," Tallis insisted, although she was confused now. "It has already come into your mind. It's lost forever." "Nothing is lost forever," Mr. Williams said quietly. "Everything I've known I still know, only sometimes I don't know that I know it." All things are known, but most things are forgotten. It takes a special magic to remember them. "My grandfather said something like that to me," Tallis whispered. "Well there you are. Wise Old Men, one and all… ~ Robert Holdstock

He had become the writers' equivalent of a goldfish after years of writing 500 word articles and wondered whether mind-expanding drugs would help him hold a full-length plot in his head, because he was having problems with continuity. ~ Owen Jones

The process of a book's coming to life is not fully complete until your imagination meets mine on the page. The words evoke pictures and something altogether new is created, something different from the limits of my own skills and imagination. Something that is a marriage between your heart, mind, and body - and mine. ~ Rebecca Wells

Please!" Edward hissed. "Do you mind?"
"What?" Jacob whispered back, his tone surprised.
"Do you think you could at least attempt to control you thoughts?" Edward's low whisper was furious.
"No one said you had to listen," Jacob muttered, defiant, yet still embarrassed. "Get out of my head. ~ Stephenie Meyer

Not because he was a decent block, mind you. He was an arse. But he was a shirt arse, like meself. (Napoleon) ~ Stephanie Perkins

I'm not the number-one guy here ... if it translates to winning, I don't mind taking a step back as far as roles. ~ Pau Gasol

We nurture the candle flames that show the way ahead. We are guerrillas of the word, unsung heroes breathing softly on the embers of the human mind, so that they might re-ignite the hearths around which we once found safe haven. The book is the Light and the Life. ~ Mark Cantrell

Within you lies the sun, the moon, the sky and all the wonders of this universe. The intelligence that created these wonders is the same force that created you. All things around you come from the same source. We are all one.
Every being on this Earth, every object on this Earth has a
soul. All souls flow into one, this is the Soul of the Universe.
You see, John, when you nourish your own mind and your own spirit, you are really feeding the Soul of the Universe. When you improve yourself, you are improving the lives of all those around you. And when you have the courage to advance confidently in the direction of your dreams, you begin to draw upon the power of the universe. As I told you earlier, life gives you what you ask of it. It is always listening. ~ Robin S. Sharma

Simplicio: Are you really trying to claim that mathematics offers no useful or practical applications to society?
Salviati: Of course not. I'm merely suggesting that just because something happens to have practical consequences, doesn't mean that's what it is about. Music can lead armies into battle, but that's not why people write symphonies. Michelangelo decorated a ceiling, but I'm sure he had loftier things on his mind. ~ Paul Lockhart

Once he makes up his mind, he's full of indecision. - On Dwight D. Eisenhower ~ Oscar Levant

Where faith commences, science ends. Both these arts of the human mind must be strictly kept apart from each other. Faith has its origin in the poetic imagination; knowledge, on the other hand, originates in the reasoning intelligence of man. Science has to pluck the blessed fruits from the tree of knowledge, unconcerned whether these conquests trench upon the poetical imaginings of faith or not. ~ Ernst Haeckel

The mind cannot be securely anchored. If we do not advance, we go backward. If we do not grow, we decay. If we do not develop, we shrink and shrivel. ~ Robert Green Ingersoll

Edie Sedgwick (1943-1971)

I don't know how she did it. Fire
She was shaking all over. It took
her hours to put her make-up on.
But she did it. Even the false eye-lashes.
She ordered gin with triple
limes. Then a limosine. Everyone
knew she was the real heroine of
Blonde on Blonde.
oh it isn't fair
oh it isn't fair
how her ermine hair
turned men around
she was white on white
so blonde on blonde
and her long long legs
how I used to beg
to dance with her
but I never had
a chance with her
oh it isn't fair
how her ermine hair
used to swing so nice
used to cut the air
how all the men
used to dance with her
I never got a chance with her
though I really asked her
down deep
where you do
really dream
in the mind
reading love
I'd get
inside
her move
and we'd
turn around
and she'd
turn around
and turn the head
of everyone in town
her shaking shaking
glittering bones
second blonde child
after brian jones
oh it isn't fair

how I dreamed of her
and she slept
and she slept
forever
and I'll never dance
with her no never
she broke down
like a baby
like a baby girl
like a lady
with ermine hair
oh it isn't fair
and I'd like to see
her rise again
her white white bones
with baby bri ~ Patti Smith

An original mind is rarely understood, until it has been reflected from some half-dozen congenial with it, so averse are men to admitting the true in an unusual form; whilst any novelty, however fantastic, however false, is greedily swallowed. ~ Washington Allston