They See Enormous Things

I am so small I can barely be seen.
How can this great love be inside me?
Look at your eyes. They are small,
but they see enormous things.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

Please Take Messages

My ego is stubborn, often drunk, impolite.
My loving: Finely sensitive, impatient, confused.
Please take messages from one to the other,
reply and counter-reply.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

Love's Confusing Joy

If you want what visible reality
can give, you're an employee.
If you want the unseen world,
you're not living your truth.
Both wishes are foolish,
but you'll be forgiven for forgetting
that what you really want is
love's confusing joy.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

Let's Buy It

I would love to kiss you.
The price of kissing is your life.
Now my loving is running toward my life shouting,
What a bargain, let's buy it.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

Knocking on a Door

I have lived on the lip of insanity,
wanting to know reasons,
knocking on a door. It opens.
I've been knocking from the inside.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

In the Garden of Mystic Lovers

I, you, he, she, we.
I, you, he, she, we.
In the garden of mystic lovers,
I, you, he, she, we.
In the garden of mystic lovers,
these are not true distinctions.
I, you, he, she, we.

Shams of Tabriz

The Lame Goat

You've seen a herd of goats
going down to the river.

The lame and dreamy goat

brings up the rear.

There are worried faces about that one,

but now they're laughing,

because look, as they return,

that goat is leading!

There are many different kinds of knowing.

The lame goat's kind is a branch

that traces back to the roots of presence.

Learn from the lame goat,

and lead the herd home.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

I Wouldn't Deny

I wouldn't deny this experience
to the One Mind.

Thaddeus Golas

This Needs to Be Said

The awakened perspective is just another perspective

on life. No more valuable, no more significant,

no more extraordinary than any other.

Shiv Sengupta

Whoever Brought Me Here

I didn't come here of my own accord,
and I can't leave that way.
Whoever brought me here
will have to take me home.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

We're In the Midst of It

The mystical poet believes, or knows, that
we're in the midst of some enormous creative energy
that makes three hundred billion galaxies and
these flowers and the people in a restaurant,
the unbelievable variety and energy going on
all the time. We're in the midst of it.

Coleman Hawks

Rumi: Mind and Desire Are Not Enough

The mind cannot understand Rumi's poetry.
Neither can desire. Mind and desire are not enough.
There's something else, some other way of knowing,
some deeper part of our being that knows
we're not in grief, that knows we're in eternity,
that sings out of that. That's the mystery, I think,
that cannot be said.

Coleman Hawks

Who Makes These Changes?

Who makes these changes?
I shoot an arrow right.
It lands left.
I ride after a deer and find myself
Chased by a hog.

I plot to get what I want

And end up in prison.

I dig pits to trap others

And fall in.

I should be suspicious

Of what I want.

Jalāl al-Dīn Rumi

Just As It Is

Seeking is the movement away from the awareness
that your life is already complete, just as it is.

Byron Katie

Invisible to You

Because you think you know

what love looks like,
what it should or shouldn't be,

it becomes invisible to you.

Byron Katie

Spared From the Desire for Love

If I still believed my thoughts, I would pray for one thing first: to be spared from the desire for love. This desire causes nothing but confusion and misery. It shuts down the awareness of what you already have in reality. It's painful to seek what you can never have outside yourself.

Byron Katie

A Thousand Names for Joy

Living in harmony with
the way things are.

Byron Katie

Nothing More

Nothing more is required of a human being
than to simply be exactly as they are,
in any given moment.

Shiv Sengupta

It Does Not Exist

You have your way. I have my way.
As for the right way, the correct way,
and the only way, it does not exist.

Friedrich Nietzche

The Primary Task of Spiritual Teaching

Many people think that it is the function
of a spiritual teaching to provide answers
to life's biggest questions, but actually
the opposite is true. The primary task
of any good spiritual teaching is not
to answer your questions,
but to question your answers.

Adyashanti

What Could Be More Practical?

Suppose somebody showed how we could
truly love one another and be at peace. 
What could be more practical than that?

Anthony de Mello

And Also More

Clients are able to integrate
the vastness of consciousness
with the limitations of personality,
and to reconcile expansion
with contraction. They are themselves
and also ... more.

Judy Cohen

All the World's a Stage

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts.

William Shakespeare, "As You Like It"

Before You Judge

There's a story behind every person.
There's a reason why they're the way they are.
Think about that before you judge someone.

Unknown

A Process of Subtraction

God is not attained
by a process of addition
to anything in the soul, but
by a process of subtraction.

Meister Eckhart

A Great Stripping Process

Aging and dying share much in common

with spiritual awakening. Both involve a

dissolving of old identities, the disappearance

of future time, the end of the known, and

letting go of absolutely everything.

Aging and dying, like awakening,

are a great stripping process,

a process of subtraction.

Joan Tollifson

Enlightenment vs. Delusion

When the ten thousand things

advance and meet you,

that's called enlightenment.

When you advance and

meet the ten thousand things,

that's called delusion.

Zen Saying

The Expanding Man

This brother is free.
I'll be what I want to be.

Steely Dan

Nothing More Beautiful

There's nothing more beautiful in life
than a failed story. Ah!

Eckhart Tolle

Ways to Be Unhappy

There are two ways of being unhappy:
not getting what you want
and getting what you want.

Eckhart Tolle

Embracing the Difficulty

Practice is not about overcoming human problems. It's not about becoming serene and transcendent. It's about embracing our lives as they really are, and understanding at every point how deep and profound and gorgeous everything is - even the suffering, even the difficulty. So we forgive ourselves for our limitations, and we forgive this world for its pain. We don't say, "That's not pain." It is pain. You don't say, "It's not difficulty." It is difficult. But when we embrace the difficulty we see this is exactly the difficulty we need, and this difficulty is the most beautiful and poignant thing in this world.

Norman Fischer

Just Feel the Time

Sometimes with meditation
we just feel the time,
stop reaching out
to grab for things,
and we're just here.

John Tarrant

Man Refuses

Man is the only creature who
refuses to be what he is.

Albert Camus

All Paths Lead Away From the Truth

"All paths lead to the truth" is a saying often used to validate different spiritual approaches. I see it differently: "all paths lead away from the truth," because they draw us away from whatever it is we are experiencing in the moment towards something that we feel, or are told, we ought to be experiencing.

Shiv Sengupta

I Am Not Only the Body

I never resonated with the statement,
"I am not the body."
I mean I do resonate with,
"I am not only the body."

Joan Tollifson

Subtraction, Not Addition

God is not attained
by a process of addition
to anything in the soul,
but by a process of subtraction.

Meiser Eckhart

The Whole Point

The whole point is not to transcend what this is
but to exist in harmony with what is and what is
includes all of it. To be a completely aligned and
harmonious being, you have to be OK with
all of it within you.

Shiv Sengupta

We Hate the New

We hate the new, and the sooner we face up to that fact, the better. We don't want new things, particularly when they're disturbing, particularly when they involve change. Most particularly, if they involve saying, "I was wrong."

Anthony de Mello

What Is My Next Step?

No matter what the dilemma in life,
no matter what the challenge - there is
only ONE reality we are ever truly facing.
And that is the reality of the NEXT STEP.
The one we are in the process of taking.

Shiv Sengupta

Nothing is Truly Final

There is always a next step that is relevant and appropriate to whatever situation you are in. Yet, often we are more obsessed with the "final step" and somehow arriving there without realizing that that final step is just another NEXT STEP in a series of next steps. And that there are always steps beyond that final step - for nothing is ever truly final.

Shiv Sengupta

You Never WILL Figure It Out

Nothing is going to happen.
No grand solution is going to arrive
that settles your mind and resolves
your fears once and for all.
You are seeking a solution 
to a problem that doesn't exist.

Shiv Sengupta

Whereon Can the Dust Fall?

Since in reality all is void,
whereon can the dust fall?

Hui Neng

Real Never is Not

That which is unreal never is,
and that which is real never is not.

Krishna

What You Think You Know

You can only be afraid of
what you think you know.

Jiddu Krishnamurti

There Are No Spiritual Paths

Happiness is your nature. The awareness of being as

it is, that is before it is qualified by experience, is

the experience of happiness. You cannot take a journey

to it. You can only take a journey away from it.

In other words, there are no true spiritual paths.

Rupert Spira

No Real Deal?

Most people can't deal with the idea
that there may not be a real deal.

Shiv Sengupta

No Reason

A student, filled with emotion and crying,
implores, "Why is there so much suffering?"

Suzuki Roshi replied, "No reason."

Your Last Moment

Treat every moment as your last.
It is not preparation for something else.

Shunryu Suzuki

Like a Parachute

A mind is like

a parachute.
It doesn't work
if it is not open.

Frank Zappa

The Further One Gets

The closer one comes to truth,
the further one gets from mind.

James Pierce

The One Thing

Really there's only one way to get some space
between yourself and feelings you don't want,
yourself and tormenting thoughts, your self and
enlightenment (whatever that might be for you).
And that's an open mind. Yet oddly, Don't Know
might be the one thing you haven't tried.

Judy Cohen

Where Wisdom Lives

The mind usually says, "I know, I know, I know."
But the "don't-know mind" is where wisdom lives.

Byron Katie

You Can Learn

You can learn only
if you do not know.

Jiddu Krishnamurti

Let Go of the Cliff

In the end, nobody can let go of the cliff for us.
We have to do it for ourselves.

Gary Tzu

Where You'll End Up

Start with "I don't know."
Why not start where you'll
end up anyway?

Adyashanti

The Most Rare

Those who recognize problems as a human condition
and don't measure happiness by an absence of problems
are the most intelligent kind of humans we know; also,
the most rare.

Wayne Dyer

Truly Intelligent

You can begin to think of yourself as truly intelligent

on the basis of how you choose to feel in the face of

trying circumstances.

Wayne Dyer

Better Off

The more I know
I don't know
the better off I am.

Patty Oneal

All is Well

All mystics - 

no matter what the theology 
and no matter what the religion -
are unanimous on one thing:
All is well.

Anthony de Mello

Namely You

The whole theory of the universe
is directed unerringly to one single
individual - namely you.

Walt Whitman

Happiness Unapproachable

Nothing renders happiness

less approachable than
trying to find it.

June Callwood

Here It Is

Can you imagine how liberating it is to never be
disillusioned again, to never be disappointed again?
You'll never feel let down again. Never feel rejected.
Want to wake up? You want happiness?
You want freedom? Here it is: Drop your false ideas.

Anthony de Mello

All We Have to Do

All we have to do is to be aware of our reactions - 
positive and negative - and let grace do the work of
restoring us to the experience we were born to have.

Don Joseph Goewey

Cause of All Suffering

All suffering is caused by my
identifying myself with something,
whether that something is within me
or outside of me.

Anthony de Mello

What Will Save the World

What will save the world
is not goodwill and tolerance
but clear thinking.

Anthony de Mello

Truth is Essentially Mystery

True tolerance only arises from a keen awareness
of the abysmal ignorance of everyone as far as truth
is concerned. For truth is essentially mystery.
The mind can sense but cannot grasp it,
much less formulate it.

Anthony de Mello

Does This Path Have a Heart?

Any path is only a path, and there is no affront,
to oneself or to others, in dropping it if that is
what your heart tells you. Look at every path
closely and deliberately. Try it as many times
as you think necessary. Then ask yourself, and
yourself alone, one question.
Does this path have a heart?
If it does, the path is good;
if it doesn't, it is of no use.

Carlos Castaneda's Don Juan

One Moment at a Time

The final disappearance of insecurity feelings will only come when you have attained that blessed ability of the birds of the air and the flowers of the field to live fully in the present, one moment at a time. The present moment, no matter how painful, is never unbearable.

Anthony de Mello

Enjoy the Present Moment

If there is anything I can do about the future, right now, I shall do it. Then I'm going to just leave it alone and settle down to enjoy the present moment because all the experience of my life has shown me that I can only cope with things when they are present, not before they occur. And that the present always gives me the resources and the energy I need to deal with them.

Anthony de Mello

A Seed of Growth and Liberation

Every painful event contains in itself
a seed of growth and liberation.

Anthony de Mello

Nothing Can Make You Happy

Contrary to what your culture and

religion have taught you, nothing, but

absolutely nothing can make you happy.

Anthony de Mello

Finding the Kingdom

To find the kingdom is the easiest thing

in the world but also the most difficult.
Easy because it is all around you and within you, and
all you have to do is reach out and take possession of it.
Difficult because if you wish to possess the kingdom
you may possess nothing else.

Anthony de Mello

Something Within Yourself

What you are enjoying on the occasion of each thing
and person is something within yourself. The orchestra is

within you and you carry it with you wherever you go.
The things and people outside you merely determine
what particular melody the orchestra will play. And

when there is no one or nothing that has your attention
the orchestra will play a music of its own;
it needs no outside stimulation.

Anthony de Mello

Love Itself

Who would you be in people's presence without
the story that anyone should care about you, ever?
You would be love itself.

Byron Katie

What Does It Mean to Love?

It means to see a person, a thing, a situation,
as it really is and not as you imagine it to be,
and to give it the response it deserves.

Anthony de Mello

The Only One Possible

I wish you a wonderful relationship with yourself.
That is the only one possible, dearest.

Byron Katie

The Finest Act of Love

It is a sobering thought that the finest act of love you can perform is not an act of service but an act of contemplation, of seeing. When you serve people you help, support, comfort, alleviate pain. When you see them in their inner beauty and goodness you transform and create.

Anthony de Mello

Can You Imagine?

Can you imagine a life in which you refuse to enjoy a single word of approval and appreciation, or to lean on someone's arm; in which you depend on no one emotionally, so no one has the power to make you happy or miserable anymore; you refuse to need any particular person or to be special to anyone or to call anyone your own?

Anthony de Mello

Barrier to Seeing Reality

If you wish to get in touch with the reality of a thing,
the first thing you must understand is that every idea
distorts reality and is a barrier to seeing reality.

Anthony De Mello

Twisted Tree

The twisted tree lives its life, while

the right tree ends up in planks.

Chinese Proverb

Fully Receptive

For love and freedom are only found
when one enjoys each note as it arises,
then allows it to go, so as to be fully receptive
to the notes that follow.

Anthony de Mello

Cure for Loneliness

Loneliness is not cured by human contact,
by contact with human beings. It is cured
by contact with reality. Then you don't miss people,
you enjoy them and you don't miss them.

Anthony de Mello

The Innocent Adult

The child, like the innocent animal, surrenders to its nature to be and become quite simply what it is. Adults who have preserved their innocence also surrender like the child to the impulse of Nature or Destiny without a thought to become somebody or to impress others; but, unlike the child, they rely, not on instinct, but on ceaseless awareness of everything in them and around them; that awareness shields them from evil and brings about the growth that was intended for them by Nature.

Anthony de Mello

Like the Rest of Nature

The first quality that strikes one when one looks into the eyes of a child is its innocence: its lovely inability to lie or wear a mask or pretend to bay anything other than what it is. In this, the child is exactly like the rest of Nature.

Anthony de Mello

See Things for Yourself

Put your books and formulas aside;
dare to abandon your teacher whoever
your teacher may be and see things for yourself.
Dare to look at everything around you without fear
and without formula and it won't be long before you see.

Anthony de Mello

What an Awesome Solitude!

That solitude, that aloneness is Silence.
It is only this Silence that you will see.
And the moment you see you will
abandon every book and guide and guru.

What is it that you will see?

Anything, everything.

Anthony de Mello

What Can Teachers Do?

They can bring to your notice what is unreal,
they cannot show you Reality;
they can destroy your formulas,
they cannot make you see what the formula is pointing to;
they can indicate your error,
they cannot put you in possession of the Truth.

Anthony de Mello

Notice

Other than what you

are thinking and believing,
are you OK? Notice.

Byron Katie

How Are Things Going?

Outside of your own thoughts,
how are things going?

Dan Metevier (paraphrasing Byron Katie)

A Shift in Perception

The simplest thing one can say about the experiential knowledge of awakening is that it is a shift in one's perception. This is the heart of awakening. There is a shift of perception from seeing oneself as an isolated individual to seeing oneself, if we have a sense of self at all after this shift, as something much more universal - everything and everyone and everywhere at the same time.

Adyashanti

Beyond All Imagination

In truth, we are not capable of imagining what it is that
we are. Our nature is literally beyond all imagination.
What we are is that which is watching - that consciousness
that is watching us pretending to be a separate person.

Adyashanti

A Remembering

Spiritual awakening is a remembering.
It is not becoming something that we are not.
It is not about transforming ourselves.
It is not about changing ourselves.
It is a remembering of what we are, as if
we'd known it long ago and had simply forgotten.

Adyashanti

Thou Art That

Neti, Neti, Tat Twam Asi
Not This, Not That, Thou Art That

Hindu Saying

The Obstacle is the Way

The impediment to action advances action.
What stands in the way becomes the way.

Marcus Aurelius

The Rose Has a Gift

The rose has a gift that you lack:
It is perfectly content to be itself.
It has not been programmed from birth,
as you have been, to be dissatisfied
with itself, so it has not the slightest urge
to be anything other than what it is.

Anthony de Mello

The Royal Road

The royal road to mysticism and to Reality does not pass
through the world of people. It passes through the world
of actions that are engaged in for themselves without
an eye to success or to gain.

Anthony de Mello

You're You

You're neither OK
nor not OK.
You're you.

Anthony de Mello

The Root of Suffering

The resistance to the unpleasant situation
is the root of suffering.

Ram Dass

Seek to Understand

Wise men don't judge - 
they seek to understand.

Wei Wu Wei

Seek Nothing

To seek is to suffer.
To seek nothing is bliss.

Bodhidharma

If You Are at Peace

If you are depressed, you are living in the past.
If you are anxious, you are living in the future.
If you are at peace, you are living in the present.

Lao Tzu

Reality As It Is

To think in terms of either pessimism

or optimism oversimplifies the truth.

The problem is to see reality as it is.

Thich Nhat Hanh

No Nuisance

The feeling that any task is a nuisance
will soon disappear if it is done in mindfulness.

Thich Nhat Hanh

You Will Be Freed

It is only when you drop your beliefs, your fears,
and the attachments that breed them that you
will be freed from the insensitivity that makes you
so deaf and blind to yourself and to the world.

Anthony de Mello

Not Both

You must choose between
your attachment and happiness.
You cannot have both.

Anthony de Mello

Peace is a Gift

Peace is a gift.
We cannot produce it.
We cannot create it.
We dispose our hearts
to receive it.

Anthony de Mello

This Too

This too will

pass away.

Anthony de Mello

Our Peace

In His will
is our peace.

Dante Alighieri

Peace is Found

Peace is found
in yes.

Anthony de Mello 

Serenity Prayer

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference, living one day at a time; enjoying one moment at a time; taking this world as it is and not as I would have it; trusting that You will make all things right if I surrender to Your will; so that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with You forever in the next. Amen.

Reinhold Niebuhr

Where the Work Is

If there is anything - any person, any behavior,
any circumstance, any situation, any place,
anything that you do not see as God,
that's where the work is.

Byron Katie

Where is God Found?

God is found
in life.

Anthony de Mello

We Cannot Know

Because we cannot know what God is,
but only what He is not, we cannot consider
how He is but only how He is not.

Thomas Aquinas

Silence: Way to God

Any way to God has to be
a way through silence.

Anthony de Mello

The Shortest Distance

A story is the shortest distance
between a human being and truth.

Anthony de Mello

What is Prayer?

Transformation that comes about
from seeing one's illusions and
dropping them.

Anthony de Mello

True Happiness

True happiness is uncaused. When nothing can hurt you, 

no event, no person, no thing, you're happy. What do you

do to be happy? Nothing. You don't do anything, you drop

something. You drop an illusion. You drop a wrong idea.

How do you drop it? By seeing that it is wrong.

Anthony de Mello

The Person's Own Heart

In all the universe there is nothing so cruel as nature.
There is no escape from it and yet it isn't nature that
does the damage but the person's own heart.

Chinese Saying (per Anthony de Mello)

Unobstructed

When the eye is unobstructed, the result is sight.

When the ear is unobstructed, the result is hearing.

When the palate is unobstructed, the result is taste.

When the mind is unobstructed, the result is wisdom and happiness.

When the heart is unobstructed, the result is joy and love.

Chinese Saying (per Anthony de Mello)

Are You Enlightened?

How would I know?
How would you know?
What does it matter?

Anthony de Mello

Life Becomes Beautiful

When you're ready to exchange your delusions for reality,

when you're ready to exchange your dreams for facts,

that's the way you find it all. That's where life finally

becomes meaningful. Life becomes beautiful.

Anthony de Mello

Absolute Cooperation

Enlightenment is absolute cooperation
with the inevitable.

Anthony de Mello

All by Themselves

When we listen with an open mind,
things have a way of becoming clear
all by themselves.

Anthony de Mello

Not By Your Ego, But By Reality

Awareness releases reality to change you,
but you have to experience it. Step by step,
let whatever happens happen. Real change
will come when it is brought about -
not by your ego, but by reality.

Anthony de Mello

How Do I Do This?

Here's how. Answer the questions that arise for you, yourself.

Is there a self? Are you everything, or nothing? Do you die? What is consciousness? What are you? Do you have free will? What cares about any of that? What cares if you have free will? What wants to know?

Ask yourself. Answer yourself.

Judy Cohen

Carry On

All those teachings are for those
who think they are something.
Know you are nothing and carry on.

Anonymous

I vs. Me

I can only think seriously of trying to live up to an ideal if I am split into two pieces. There must be a good "I" who is going to improve the bad "me." "I," who has the best intentions, will go to work on wayward "me," and the tussle between the two will very much stress the difference between them. Consequently "I" will feel more separate than ever, and so merely increase the lonely and cut-off feelings which make "me" behave so badly.

Alan Watts

The Real Being

The real being, with no status,
is always going in and out
through the doors of your face.

Lin Chi (Linji)

What is His Name?

And God said unto Moses,
I Am That I Am.

Exodus 3:14

Nothing Happens Next

Nothing happens next.
This is it.

Zen Saying

Never Anything

There is never anything but the present,
and if one cannot live there,
one cannot live anywhere.

Alan Watts

Selfing

If hurting is happening,
there's "selfing" going on.

Judy Cohen

Dissolve into the Observing

The observer spends a lifetime
in conflict with the observed.
This is resolved when
the observer is also the observed and
the two dissolve into the observing.

wu'hsin

Entirely Undefinable Something

Only words and conventions
can isolate us from the entirely
undefinable something
which is everything.

Alan Watts

A Great Doorway

There may be a surprising freedom in acknowledging that dependence on reflection and so-called other people's so-called thoughts is the only thing that proves us. There may be a surprising freedom in seeing that no image, thought, or persona can make nothing into something. Noticing how you try to control other people's thoughts could turn out to be a great doorway into discovering what's real and what isn't.

Judy Cohen

Unlikely You Would Care

If you were the last human on earth,
it's unlikely you would care if
your underwear was folded.

Judy Cohen

A Flower Blooms

From the withered tree,
a flower blooms.

Shoyo Roku (The Book of Serenity)

My Dog Doesn't Worry

My dog doesn't worry
about the meaning of life.

Charlotte Joko Beck

Enlightenment Won't Either

Most people who come to the Zen Center
don't think that a Cadillac will do it, but
they think enlightenment will.

Charlotte Joko Beck

Not Outside Ourselves

Our lives are so unnatural that to do a practice

like Zen is, in the beginning, extremely difficult.

But once we begin to get a glimmer that

the problem in life is not outside ourselves,

we have begun to walk down this path.

Charlotte Joko Beck

Dropping All That

Enlightenment is not something you achieve.

It is the absence of something.

All your life you have been going forward

after something, pursuing some goal.

Enlightenment is dropping all that.

Charlotte Joko Beck

The Only Obstacle

The only obstacle to your enlightenment
is the belief that you are not enlightened.

Ramana Maharshi

No More Pain

I have found the builder,
and I will not build
the house of pain again.

The Buddha

A Question the Buddha Asked Himself

Are you afraid of this happiness?

The Buddha

Looks Like Love

When the beliefs fall away,
what is left really does
look like love.

John Tarrant

Without a Problem

Without a problem, you wouldn't need anything.
You could lose your citizenship in the society
of people who need things.

John Tarrant

Without a Neat Story

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

Start Living

When we stop wishing
we can start living.

Cindy Lora-Renard