If the mind could cease measuring itself against the hero, the perfect, the glorious and all that, it would be what it is.

The first thing to realize in meditation is that there is no authority, that the mind must be completely free to examine, to observe, to learn. And so there is no following, no accepting, no obedience.

A lily or a rose never pretends, and its beauty is that it is what it is.

Religion, it seems to me, has nothing whatsoever to do with any belief, with any priest, with any church or so-called sacred book. The state of the religious mind can be understood only when we begin to understand what beauty is; and the understanding of beauty must be approached through total aloneness.

Look at that battle you are involved in; you are caught in it: you are it.

The thought is not the thing.

This is what I am, and I am going to understand this.