Quotes About Contemplation

Randy felt relieved. He looked out over the river, contemplating his ignorance of women and the peace of evening.

Nothing in all creation is so like God as silence.

Every morning put your mind into your heart and stand in the presence of God all the day long.

It is the power to focus the consciousness on a given spot, and hold it there Attention is the first and indispensable step in all knowledge.

Yoga is the cessation of the movements of the mind. Then there is abiding in the Seer's own form.

Everything is sorrow for the wise.

He could think no longer; he leaned against his shadow. The silence within the slab of ancient stone eased through him; his thoughts, worn meaningless, became quiet again.

He had, she realized slowly, a gift for silence. When he chose, it seemed to ebb out of him, the word silence of old trees or stones lying motionless for years. It was measured to his breathing, in his motionless, scarred hands. He moved abruptly, soundlessly, and it flowed with him as he turned...

Perhaps' could be spun endlessly into different tales; even telling herself all of them, she would still be none the wiser.

Where did you go?" "To Mirkon Forest. I sat tossing a stone in my hand and learned nothing at all from it. Wine?

Then she dropped her hands in her lap and stared out the window at the restless water that ran beyond the edge of the world, and pulled the sun and the moon and the stars every night down into its secret country.

I stared at the changing patterns on the back of his white shirt as he moved under the trees.

Solitude provides the illusion—or is it the reality?—of a self. If I'm alone I can think dark thoughts, be real, be phony, try this, try that. Erase, contradict, forge ahead, double back.

what is the foundation of contemplative life? 'Oh, she said, without a pause -- leisure, it's based on leisure.

To be alone is to be free

We must learn to be alone in the midst of whatever denies us useful solitude.

This is what I like, sitting at a table and watching people go by. It does something to your outlook on life. The Anglo-Saxons make a great mistake not staring at people from a sidewalk table.

Therese could not think of a single question that would be proper to ask, because all her questions were so enormous.

It was the seventh or eighth floor, she couldn't remember which. A streetcar crawled past the front of the hotel, and people on the sidewalk moved in every direction, with legs on either side of them, and it crossed her mind to jump.

Look at it, like a rat,' she said. 'A portrait of Harge.

A terrible silence fell in the room. Bill Ireton looked suddenly sober as a trout.

Not that I am conservative, but did you know that one drink has the kick of three when you are alone?

brooding only feeds the strange pleasure of melancholy...

Brood over your topic until it becomes mellow and expansive...then put all these ideas down in writing, just a few words, enough to fix the idea...put them down on scraps of paper—you will find it easier to arrange and organize these loose bits when you come to set your material in order.