Ales Balcar > Ales's Quotes

“If you are busy thinking that you should be kind, you might miss the reality that kindness is already present, in you.”
― John Tarrant, Bring Me the Rhinoceros: And Other Zen Koans That Will Save Your Life

“When a problem is intractable and you cannot conceive of a solution to it, you will just have to live through it without a neat story about how it is to be solved.”
― John Tarrant, Bring Me the Rhinoceros: And Other Zen Koans That Will Save Your Life

“Often what you might think of as yourself is a list of problems and achievements, particularly problems. Without a problem, you wouldn’t need anything. You could lose your citizenship in the society of people who need things. If you have a problem, you need closure, or revenge, or to understand your mother, or to have your partner meet your needs. Yet most of these things are extremely unlikely to occur. And not one of these things would bring happiness if it did occur.”
― John Tarrant, Bring Me the Rhinoceros: And Other Zen Koans That Will Save Your Life

“For a long time I felt cut off from the world, a billiard ball in a Cartesian space, and a gulf separated me from the fish, animals, trees, and people—my mind was not content or whole. There were symptoms, such as having more thoughts than I could possibly use at any given moment, and clumsiness with people, but probably the main symptom was of being shut out of the magic in things. I worried at the problem, studying animals and plants and noticing that all the steps I took did not help. Then one day the gap wasn’t there anymore. After the gap disappeared, I could let a situation tell me what it was about, let people reveal themselves to me, without finding a problem. Sometimes wholeness is just given. It has to be given actually, because effort leads to effort, not to wholeness.”
― John Tarrant, Bring Me the Rhinoceros: And Other Zen Koans That Will Save Your Life

“We might believe that we are our thoughts and feelings, but our thoughts and feelings are objects in the world, just like tables and mirrors. We might have to negotiate with them at any time.”
― John Tarrant, Bring Me the Rhinoceros: And Other Zen Koans That Will Save Your Life

“There is absolutely nothing that voice can say that is more you than anything else it says. Suppose you were looking at three objects—a flowerpot, a photograph, and a book—and were then asked, “Which of these objects is you?” You’d say, “None of them!”
― Michael A. Singer, The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself

“There is nothing more important to true growth than realizing that you are not the voice of the mind—you are the one who hears it.”
― Michael A. Singer, The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself

“Reality is just too real for most of us, so we temper it with the mind.”
― Michael A. Singer, The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself

“begin to notice who is experiencing the experience. Eventually, you will get to a point within yourself where you realize that you, the experiencer, have a certain quality. And that quality is awareness, consciousness, an intuitive sense of existence. You know that you’re in there. You don’t have to think about it; you just know. You can think about it if you want to, but you will know that you’re thinking about it. You exist regardless, thoughts or no thoughts.”
― Michael A. Singer, The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself

“So now if I ask you, “Who are you?” you answer, “I am the one who sees. From back in here somewhere, I look out, and I am aware of the events, thoughts, and emotions that pass before me.”
― Michael A. Singer, The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself

“Hence two kinds of experiences can occur that block the heart. You are either trying to push energies away because they bother you, or you are trying to keep energies close because you like them. In both cases, you are not letting them pass, and you are wasting precious energy by blocking the flow through resisting and clinging.”
― Michael A. Singer, The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself

“Set your eyes on the highest state you can imagine and don’t take them off. If you slip, just get back up. It doesn’t matter. The very fact that you even want to go through this process of freeing the energy flow means you are great. You will get there. Just keep letting go.”
― Michael A. Singer, The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself

“Just stop for a moment and see what you have given your mind to do. You said to your mind, “I want everyone to like me. I don’t want anyone to speak badly of me. I want everything I say and do to be acceptable and pleasing to everyone. I don’t want anyone to hurt me. I don’t want anything to happen that I don’t like. And I want everything to happen that I do like.” Then you said, “Now, mind, figure out how to make every one of these things a reality, even if you have to think about it day and night.” And of course your mind said, “I’m on the job. I will work on it constantly.”
― Michael A. Singer, The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself

“Your mind has very little control over this world. It is neither omniscient nor omnipotent. It cannot control the weather and other natural forces. Nor can it control all people, places, and things around you. You have given your mind an impossible task by asking it to manipulate the world in order to fix your personal inner problems. If you want to achieve a healthy state of being, stop asking your mind to do this.”
― Michael A. Singer, The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself

“everything will be okay as soon as you are okay with everything. And that’s the only time everything will be okay.”
― Michael A. Singer, The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself

“Since most of us only feel good when things are going our way, we are constantly attempting to control everything in our lives. The question is, does it have to be this way? There is so much evidence that life does quite well on its own.”
― Mickey A. Singer, The Surrender Experiment: My Journey into Life's Perfection

“Could it really be so hard to just let it rain when it rains and be sunny when it’s sunny without complaining about it? Apparently the mind can’t do it: Why did it have to rain today? It always rains when I don’t want it to. It had all week to rain; it’s just not fair.”
― Mickey A. Singer, The Surrender Experiment: My Journey into Life's Perfection

“the practice of surrender was actually done in two, very distinct steps: first, you let go of the personal reactions of like and dislike that form inside your mind and heart; and second, with the resultant sense of clarity, you simply look to see what is being asked of you by the situation unfolding in front of you.”
― Mickey A. Singer, The Surrender Experiment: My Journey into Life's Perfection

“Perhaps change only takes place when there is sufficient reason to overcome the inertia of everyday life. Challenging situations create the force needed to bring about change. The problem is that we generally use all the stirred-up energy intended to bring about change, to resist change.”
― Mickey A. Singer, The Surrender Experiment: My Journey into Life's Perfection