The fundamental factor of self-deception is this constant desire to be something in this world and in the world hereafter.

When one has an image about oneself one is surely insane, one lives in a world of illusion.

Contentment is not happiness. Contentment is stagnation and decay, whereas happiness is life and growth.

The beauty of meditation is that you never know where you are, where you are going, what the end is.

But our minds are bound to the yardstick of yesterday, today and tomorrow, and with that yardstick we try to inquire into the unknown, to measure that which is not measurable.

[on the secret to a happy, content life] Do you want to know what my secret is? I don’t mind what happens.

Silence is difficult and arduous; it is not to be played with. It isn't something that you can experience by reading a book, or by listening to a talk, or by sitting together, or by retiring into a wood or a monastery. I am afraid none of these things will bring about this silence. This silence demands intense psychological work. You have to be burningly aware - aware of your speech, aware of your snobbishness, aware of your fears, your anxieties, your sense of guilt. And when you die to all that, then out of that dying comes the beauty of silence.