Krishna Das Quotes

I didn't know what I was looking for, but I knew whatever it was that I was looking for was real.

The ultimate act of power is surrender.

I mope around less. It is horrible. I miss it.

Don't give up on your dreams. You can become the person you know you really are.

When we start to talk about gurus, we're talking about beings who actually know what this is all about. They know who we were, where we came from, and where we're going. They are not imprisoned in a selfish or self-centered view of the universe.

Even if somebody tells us something, the hit, the light goes on inside of us, not out there. We learn and understand everything within ourselves.

Letting go does not mean pushing away or negating thoughts or feelings that come to us - but instead being with the feeling. We start to feel that we are no longer victims of the stuff that happens to us. There is something we can do about it... if we just take a look at it.

I'm reconnecting, I'm deepening, I'm opening, I'm releasing negativity and negative thoughts and all the limitations I carry around with me - again and again and again and again and again and again. And again! And that's the only thing that keeps me alive.

You cannot think your way out of a box made of thought.

It takes two to tango! I need everybody to sing with me.

Grace surrounds us and holds us like the sky holds everything in it … and as soon as I find a way to let go of my story, I keep seeing over and over again that grace is always here and it includes the forgetting and the remembering. The practice is the opening of the hand to catch the raindrops, which are always falling. If you don't open your hand, you get wet, but you don't get much to drink.

To love somebody is to let them be who they are and do what they have to do.

The heart in us is deeper than any emotion or psychological issue.

I knew that if I did not start chanting with people, that I would never be able to clean out the dark corners of my own heart. I knew it with every cell in my body and mind.

Can you imagine what it would be like to all of a sudden see another color that nobody else sees?

Grace removes obstacles that we don’t even know are there. Grace is what arranges our lives so we are forced to look within.

I chant to save my miserable ass. That's what I do.

If I had been born in Germany with family of Nazis and if I had been raised with those beliefs, there was very little chance that I wouldn't be exactly like all those guards and all those people who tortured everybody.

You can never really know what a guru is as long as you are imprisoned by your own thoughts and circular ego.

This is what I do to keep my head screwed on semi-straight and keep my heart open. Whenever I sing, that's why I sing. Whether it's at the Grammys, whether it's in the bathroom, whether it's in front of 10,000 people or three people, by my guru's grace, my head stays in that place.

We instantly believe everything we think. Isn't that insane? It's good for us to explore the depravity of our minds, so we know we are just as crazy as everyone else!

If we know anything about a path at all, it's only because of the Great ones that have gone before us. Out of their love and kindness, they have left some footprints for us to follow. So, in the same way that they wish for us, we wish that all beings everywhere, including ourselves, be safe, be happy, have good health, and enough to eat. And may we all live at ease of heart with whatever comes to us in life.

I chant to save my heart. Every time I sit down, that's what I'm doing.

Don't wait for a Guru. Your life is your Guru.

The heart is like a mirror. When we dust it off, we are able to see ourselves. The dust is all our stuff - guilt, anger - this stuff is reflected back to us. Practice removes the dust from the mirror of our hearts.

Devotion is a way of being, it's not something you do. It's dedication to finding awareness and Love. Chanting is like asanas for the mind and the heart.

There is love in this world, and it lives within us as who we really are, not who we think we are.

When our desires are fulfilled, and we still feel unhappy - this is the moment we begin the process of letting go.

You can't manipulate a heart open. You can only allow it to open in the right circumstances.

Bliss is easy, just take a drug. What is hard is feeling good about our real selves.

We have to learn to love people even if they are not giving you what you want... and then not take it personally. If you feel hurt, you have to recognize that they are not hurting you because you are you, but because they are them. You have to try not to be so hard on yourself.

It's within your world that things will unfold and intuitive understandings will open up.

When you meet your guru or a being who knows, who is no longer loving, but has become love, a being who is sitting in truth, and in compassion and kindness for all beings - you know. When I met my guru, I knew. And it was before I met him physically, actually.

Compassion is a college education. It's a doctorate.

Just the slightest turn toward the inside is a very big thing.

Practice is not about how you feel while you are doing it. You are planting seeds.

We are not separate. So if one being hurts, I also hurt.

If you stub your toe, you don't need to dialog yourself to be good to your foot, do you? When you see things that clearly, there's no dialogue or emotional manipulation that you need to do to extend compassion to that being, because that being is a part of you, and if that being hurts, you hurt.

Hanuman not only gives liberation, he also fulfills our beneficial desires.

The Presence is our own presence. We are not getting anything from the outside. We already have all we need inside.

On the Path, it’s impossible to know how you are doing because it’s the judger who is disappearing.

Love is what we are; we don't get it from somebody, we can't give it to anybody, we can't fall in it or fall out of it. Love is our true Being.

It's inexplicable why somebody can lose a leg and it doesn't effect them at all emotionally; and another person can lose a foot and be destroyed for the rest of their lives.

Bhakti yoga isn't something you join, it's love. It means falling in love.

There is an eighth color that we don't have the sense apparatus to see or experience.

One of your biggest lessons so far in life has been to learn to forgive myself over and over again and not to be so harsh with myself.

All we can know is our own subjective version of reality. That's the way we go through our lives. Everybody.

You can’t think yourself out of a box that’s made of your thoughts.