Quotes About Meditation

While the primary function of formal Buddhist meditation is to create the possibility of the experience of "being," my work as a therapist has shown me that the demands of intimate life can be just as useful as meditation in moving people toward this capacity. Just as in formal meditation, intimate relationships teach us that the more we relate to each other as objects, the greater our disappointment. The trick, as in meditation, is to use this disappointment to change the way we relate.

If you were only to listen, it becomes meditation. Without meditation you cannot hear. What is the meaning of meditation? Meditation exists only where mind is not; where the internal dialogue is gone.

The greatest help to spiritual life is meditation. In meditation we divest ourselves of all material conditions and feel our divine nature. We do not depend upon any external help in meditation. The touch of the soul can paint the brightest color even in the dingiest places; it can cast a fragrance over the vilest thing; it can make the wicked divine-and all enmity, all selfishness is effaced.

If you want to do Vipassana, or any silent meditation, Dynamic Meditation becomes absolutely essential, because Christianity having poisoned your mind, that poison has to be thrown out. You have to go completely crazy to throw it out; otherwise that craziness remains inside you, and won't allow you to get into a silent, watching, witnessing meditation.

Meditation begins with a call that awakes us out of the coma of self-preoccupation. We are called, we are chosen. Meditation is our response to that call from the deepest center of our awakened consciousness...by letting to in meditation we learn how to love.

Mind is knowledge, meditation is non-knowledge. Mind knows, meditation experiences. Mind can only give you a certain acquaintance but not the taste. If you want the taste of the Tao you have to move to no-mind, to Meditation.

There is no meditation without wisdom, and there is no wisdom without meditation. When a man has both meditation and wisdom, he is indeed close to nirvana.

I have been challenged by the concept of meditation ... I decided recently to accept the invitation of a friend to experience the sheer silence of meditation-undirected prayer. ... I had before only sensed intellectually ... But by going deep into prayer I could almost feel it.

In the practice of sitting meditation you relate to your daily life all the time. Meditation practice brings our neuroses to the surface rather than hiding them at the bottom of our minds. It enables us to relate to our lives as something workable.

Nature has come to a point where now, unless you take individual responsibility, you cannot grow. More than this nature cannot do. It has done enough. It has given you life, it has given you opportunity; now how to use it, it has left up to you. Meditation is your freedom, not a biological necessity. You can learn in a certain period of time every day to strengthen meditation, to make it stronger - but carry the flavor of it the whole day.

There is no greater magic than meditation. To transform the negative into the positive. To transform darkness into light-that is the miracle of meditation.

In the beginning of my twenties, I started transcendental meditation. For years, I did nothing else. Every holiday, I went to courses. Meditation is a real simple instrument. You don't need a long beard or a sari. It's meant to bring you to yourself. It's as easy as that.

I never really wanted to have a Guru, I was more interested in Buddhist philosophy and meditation, and had a psychological background in college, but he had so much love. To be with him, there was nowhere else to be and nothing else to do. Nothing he taught, philosophy or meditation, are the things I went to India to look for, or was interested in, but he sort of jumped into my heart and then pulled, he pried it open.

Meditation is a deliberate attempt to pierce into the higher states of consciousness and finally go beyond it. The art of meditation is the art of shifting the focus of attention to ever subtler levels, without losing one's grip on the levels left behind. (...) Save all your energies and time for breaking the wall your mind had built around you. Believe me, you will not regret.

Meditation in action is endlessly more important than meditation in stillness.

Meditation is not the construction of something foreign, it is not an effort to attain and then hold on to a particular experience. We may have a secret desire that through meditation we will accumulate a stockpile of magical experiences, or at least a mystical trophy or two, and then we will be able to proudly display them for others to see.

Millions of people miss meditation because meditation has taken on a wrong connotation. It looks very serious, looks gloomy, has something of the church in it, looks as if it is only for people who are dead, or almost dead, who are gloomy, serious, have long faces, who have lost festivity, fun, playfulness, celebration.... A really meditative person is playful: life is fun for him.... He enjoys it tremendously. He is not serious. He is relaxed.

For dignity of character, consciousness is needed, not conscience and that's the function of meditation. Meditation does not give you any character directly. It does not say what to do and what not to do. It never gives you any commandments. It simply gives you a technique for becoming more aware, for being more alert, watchful, witnessing.

I am totally amazed at the spread of interest in meditation. When I first came back from studying in India in 1974, I would be asked in social situations what I did. When I replied, "I teach meditation" they would frequently look at me as though to say "That is weird," and sort of sidle away.

Meditation is to be aware of what is going on - in our bodies, in our feelings, in our minds, and in the world. Each day...children die of hunger.... Yet the sunrise is beautiful, and the rose that bloomed this morning along the wall is a miracle. Life is both dreadful and wonderful. To practice meditation is to be in touch with both aspects. Please do not think we must be solemn in order to meditate. In fact, to meditate well, we have to smile a lot.

Meditation is like taking a little milk and honey bath on your psyche. "Just let that go, no, you don't need that." Then you're like, "Oh, I didn't need that," and it's really just a perception shift. I think what happens in meditation is that you drop into the oneness, and you have this little reminder that that's the truth, and what we're doing here is this game ... this life experience gift.

I think meditation became truly a means to a deeper connection as I was searching for a deeper truth within myself. Meditation became almost more spiritual than material in nature over the last two or three years and it has deepened a lot as a result of that.

Start with meditation, and things will go on growing in you—silence, serenity, blissfulness, sensitivity. And whatever comes out of meditation, try to bring it out in life. Share it, because everything shared grows fast.

You give up not meditating. It's called meditation action. There's no way out of it. Meditation means to be constantly extricating yourself from the clinging of mind.

Meditation did not relieve me of my anxiety so much as flesh it out. It took my anxious response to the world, about which I felt a lot of confusion and shame, and let me understand it more completely. Perhaps the best way to phrase it is to say that meditation showed me that the other side of anxiety is desire. They exist in relationship to each other, not independently.

In real meditation you forget the body. You may be cut to pieces and not feel it at all. You feel such pleasure in it. You become so light. This perfect rest we will get in meditation.

Do you think that you can clear your mind by sitting constantly in silent meditation? This makes your mind narrow, not clear. Integral awareness is fluid and adaptable, present in all places and at all times. That is true meditation. ... The Tao is clear and simple, and it doesn't avoid the world.

Meditation simplifies our outer life and energizes our inner life. Meditation gives us a natural and spontaneous life, a life that becomes so natural and spontaneous that we cannot breathe without being conscious of our own divinity.

Meditation brings wisdom; lack of meditation leaves ignorance. Know well what leads you forward and what holds you back, and choose the path that leads to wisdom.

In the beginning of my twenties, I started transcendental meditation. For years I did nothing else. Every holiday I went to courses. Meditation is a real simple instrument. You don't need a long beard or a sari. It's meant to bring you to yourself. It's as easy as that. And that's what it's all about, being alone with yourself every day, for 20 minutes in the morning and 20 minutes in the evening.

The ending of sorrow is the beginning of wisdom. Knowledge is always within the shadow of ignorance. Meditation is freedom from thought and a movement in the ecstasy of truth. Meditation is explosion of intelligence.

Meditation is the life of the soul: Action, the soul of meditation; and honor the reward of action.

Meditation is simply about being yourself and knowing something about who that is. It is about coming to realize that you are on a path whether you like it or not, namely, the path that is your life. Meditation may help us see that this path we call our life has direction; that it is always unfolding, moment by moment; and that what happens now, in this moment, influences what happens next.

At the beginning of meditation training thoughts will arrive one on top of another, uninterrupted, like a steep mountain waterfall. Gradually, as you perfect meditation, thoughts become like the water in a deep, narrow gorge, then a great river slowly winding its way down to the sea; finally the mind becomes like a still and placid ocean, ruffled by only the occasional ripple or wave.

You cannot force meditation, you can only create the situation. And if the situation is created rightly, then meditation happens automatically.

The future is just your hope, expectation. And when this life is not fulfilling you start looking further, beyond death. All these are fictions just for you to survive somehow. But this survival is not how you are supposed to be. Existence has not given you birth just to live in hopes. You can be really ecstatic this moment, and there is no other moment. Meditation is, Zen is living now and here.

Meditation is the direct means of enjoying the greatest happiness and is the only means to quench the thirst for happiness on earth.

The ability to handle stress increases with the practice of meditation. In a culture like ours in which inner, spiritual growth is totally neglected in favor of materialistic pursuits, we might have something to learn from the Hare Krishna devotees' meditational practices.

During meditation, if we can concentrate all our attention on one point, and put all problems in front of it, then they can be solved immediately. Our power is great, but we never use it. If we do not use our power by concentrating on it, then it seems we do not have any power at all.

If we dedicate a certain amount of time each day to cultivating compassion or any other positive quality, we are likely to attain results, just like when we train the body... Meditation consists of familiarizing ourselves with a new way of being, of managing our thoughts and the way we perceive the world. Through the recent advances in neuroscience it is now possible to evaluate these methods and to verify their impact on the brain and body.

You are transmitters. Everywhere you are sitting in meditation you are transmitting vibrations, do you know that ? At that time if you are thinking say of your jobs and your other things which you have been thinking before, the transmission is poorer. Think of love. Think of the whole country, think of the whole world at that time. You are transmitters of these waves of love, and love will flow from you.

I think maintenance comes from a daily spiritual growth practice of some kind: prayer, meditation, affirmations. Something that keeps you in the consciousness of higher thoughts and energy. That's also how you make sure you don't do it again.

Bow and offer your meditation to Eternity, as you would offer a Flower to your lover.

If you want to experience the unalloyed ecstasy of life, you can accomplish this through the twin Buddhist practices of meditation and mindfulness.

I think meditation helps greatly with creativity. If it's a pure expression of yourself no matter what it is or what medium, it's going to shine. It's going to resonate.

The true practice to meditation is to sit as if you where drinking water when you are thirsty.

Through the years, I have combined meditation, action, and the Iron into a single strength. I believe that when the body is strong, the mind thinks strong thoughts. Time spent away from the Iron makes my mind degenerate. I wallow in a thick depression. My body shuts down my mind.

For many in the modern world, carving out time for both traditional seated meditation and exercise has become close to impossible.