Quotes About Contentment

Who is rich? He who is happy with his lot. —The Talmud Most

If you let go a little, you will have a little peace. If you let go a lot, you will have a lot of peace. If you let go completely, you will have complete peace. —The Venerable Ajahn Chah, twentieth-century Buddhist monk In

To become happier we have to snap out of the trance that our happiness rests in "more and better" which we'll get "someday." No matter what we have, Happy for No Reason exists only now, not later. The

Happiness for any reason is just another form of misery. —The Upanishads One

Do not indulge in dreams of having what you have not, but reckon up the chief of the blessings you do possess, and then thankfully remember how you would crave for them if they were not yours.

Remember that very little is needed to make a happy life.

Take full account of what Excellencies you possess, and in gratitude remember how you would hanker after them, if you had them not.

That which is really beautiful has no need of anything; not more than law, not more than truth, not more than benevolence or modesty.

Adapt yourself to the life you have been given; and truly love the people with whom destiny has surrounded you

To live happily is an inward power of the soul.

Retire into thyself. The rational principle which rules has this nature, that it is content with itself when it does what is just, and so secures tranquility.

Almost nothing material is needed for a happy life, for he who has understood existence.

In this flowing stream, then, on which there is no abiding, what is there of the things which hurry by on which a man would set a high price? It would be just as if a man should fall in love with one of the sparrows which fly by, but it has already passed out of sight.

Love the art, poor as it may be, that thou hast learned, and be content with it; and pass through the rest of life like one who has intrusted to the gods with his whole soul all that he has, making thyself neither the tyrant nor the slave of any man.

The present moment is the only thing of which anyone can be deprived, at least if this is the only thing he has and he cannot lose what he has not got.

Think not so much of what you lack as of what you have: but of the things that you have, select the best, and then reflect on how eagerly you would have sought them if you did not have them.

And the things which conduce in any way to the commodity of life, and of which fortune gives an abundant supply, he [my father] used without arrogance and without excusing himself; so that when he had them, he enjoyed them without affectation, and when he had them not, he did not want them.

Don't be overheard complaining ... not even to yourself.

From my governor, to be neither of the green nor of the blue party at the games in the Circus, nor a partisan either of the Parmularius or the Scutarius at the gladiators' fights; from him too I learned endurance of labor, and to want little, and to work with my own hands, and not to meddle with other people's affairs, and not to be ready to listen to slander.

I do not regard a man as poor, if the little which remains is enough for him.

And give up your thirst for books, so that you do not die a grouch, but in true grace and heartfelt gratitude to the god

27. Treat what you don't have as nonexistent. Look at what you have, the things you value most, and think of how much you'd crave them if you didn't have them. But be careful. Don't feel such satisfaction that you start to overvalue them—that it would upset you to lose them.

As a horse when he has run, a dog when he has tracked the game, a bee when it has made the honey, so a man when he has done a good act, does not call out for others to come and see, but he goes on to another act, as a vine goes on to produce again the grapes in season.

The way to peace is to be content with yourself, honor the light of reason within, live in harmony with others, and be grateful to the gods for the universe and your role in it.