Anders > Anders's Quotes

“Man is a machine, but a very peculiar machine. He is a machine which, in right circumstances, and with right treatment, can know that he is a machine, and having fully realized this, he may find the ways to cease to be a machine.
First of all, what man must know is that he is not one; he is many. He has not one permanent and unchangeable “I” or Ego. He is always different. One moment he is one, another moment he is another, the third moment he is a third, and so on, almost without end.”
― P.D. Ouspensky

“There is something in us that keeps us where we find ourselves. I think this is the most awful thing of all.”
― P.D. Ouspensky, Strange Life of Ivan Osokin

“A religion contradicting science and a science contradicting religion are equally false.”
― P.D. Ouspensky

“When one realises one is asleep, at that moment one is already half-awake.”
― P.D. Ouspensky

“Attaining consciousness is connected with the gradual liberation from mechanicalness, for man is fully and completely under mechanical laws.”
― P.D. Ouspensky, The Fourth Way: An Arrangement by Subject of Verbatim Extracts from the Records of Ouspensky's Meetings in London and New York, 1921-46

“Q. But it seems to me there are circumstances that simply induce one to have negative emotions!

A. This is one of the worst illusions we have. We think that negative emotions are produced by circumstances, whereas all negative emotions are in us, inside us. This is a very important point. We always think our negative emotions are produced by the fault of other people or by the fault of circumstances. We always think that. Our negative emotions are in ourselves and are produced by ourselves. There is absolutely not a single unavoidable reason why somebody else's action or some circumstance should produce a negative emotion in me. It is only my weakness. No negative emotion can be produced by external causes if we do not want it. We have negative emotions because we permit them, justify them, explain them by external causes, and in this way we do not struggle with them.”
― P.D. Ouspensky, The Fourth Way: An Arrangement by Subject of Verbatim Extracts from the Records of Ouspensky's Meetings in London and New York, 1921-46

“Enlightenment is a destructive process. It
has nothing to do with becoming better or being happier. Enlightenment is the
crumbling away of untruth. It's seeing
through the facade of pretence. It's the
complete eradication of everything we
imagined to be true.”
― Adyashanti

“The truth is that you already are what you are seeking.”
― Adyashanti

“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

“My speaking is meant to shake you awake, not to tell you how to dream better.”
― Adyashanti, Emptiness Dancing

“Love is a flame that burns everything other than itself. It is the destruction of all that is false and the fulfillment of all that is true.”
― Adyashanti

“Enlightenment is nothing more than the complete absence of resistance to what is. End of story.”
― Adyashanti, Emptiness Dancing

“In the end it’s all very simple. Either we give ourselves to Silence or we don’t.”
― Adyashanti

“Enlightenment is a destructive process. It has nothing to do with becoming better or being happier. Enlightenment is the crumbling away of untruth. It’s seeing through the facade of pretense. It’s the complete eradication of everything we imagined to be true.”
― Adyashanti

“Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing
and rightdoing there is a field.
I'll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass
the world is too full to talk about.”
― Rumi

“Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh, Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life

“It is your show.

It is your universe.
There is no one else here, just you,
and nothing is being withheld from you.
You are completely on your own.
Everything is available for direct knowing.
No one else has anything you need.
No one else can lead you, pull you, push you or carry you.”
― Jed McKenna

“Suffering just means you’re having a bad dream. Happiness means you’re having a good dream. Enlightenment means getting out of the dream altogether.”
― Jed McKenna

“The point is to wake up, not to earn a Ph.D. In waking up.”
― Jed McKenna

“Actually the best way to relieve your mental suffering is to sit in zazen, even in such a confused state of mind and bad posture.”
― Shunryu Suzuki

“But the way of practice is just to be concentrated on your breathing with the right posture and with great, pure effort.”
― Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice

“So even though you have some difficulty in your practice, even though you have some waves while you are sitting, those waves themselves will help you.”
― Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice

“To take this posture itself is the purpose of our practice.”
― Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice

“To live in the realm of Buddha nature means to die as a small being, moment after moment.”
― Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice

“To die is more important than trying to be alive. When we try to be alive, we have trouble. Rather than trying to be alive or active, if we can be calm and die or fade away into emptiness, then naturally we will be all right.”
― Shunryu Suzuki, Not Always So: Practicing the True Spirit of Zen – The Final Teachings of Shunryu Suzuki to Empower Your Freedom

“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. ”
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“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

“If you think you will get something from practicing zazen, already you are involved in impure practice.”
― Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice

“When you are practicing zazen, do not try to stop your thinking. Let it stop by itself. If something comes into your mind, let it come in, and let it go out. It will not stay long. When you try to stop your thinking, it means you are bothered by it. Do not be bothered by anything... if you are not bothered by the waves, gradually they will become calmer and calmer.”
― Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice

“When you understand one thing through and through, you understand everything. When you try to understand everything, you will not understand anything. The”
― Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind

“The trying to do something is in itself enlightenment. When we are in difficulty or distress, there we have enlightenment.”
― Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice