Quotes About Contemplation

See stars through the mind's eye. Pay attention. Catch them looking back.

First thoughts are not always the best.

Silence is golden when you can't think of a good answer

It is better in prayer to have a heart without words then words without a heart

There is more to life than simply increasing its speed.

Let everyone try and find that as a result of daily prayer he adds something new to his life, something with which nothing can be compared.

When I first accepted my own death, the world was intantly changed. It was a completely new sensation. It took something like this to finally open my eyes. Before, I had simply shut myself off so that I could not see, could not hear. What had I been doing all this time?

From 7 in the morning to 11 at night, I was reading. I don't think one can find any other time in one's life to be left alone so much to read in peace like that.

The way of Friends is to think quietly and to listen. We ask the question, we consider how the answer is made by different people, we ask again, answer again, change our minds; we reach an understanding. The Meeting evolves this way, not by shouting each other down, not by the weight of the majority, but by the capacity of individual human beings to comprehend one another.

When you move something, you discover new meanings in it, Kristina thought, watching them.

You can spread your soul over a paddy field, you can whisper to a mango tree, you can feel the earth between your toes and know that this is the place, the place where it begins and ends. But what can you tell to a pile of bricks? The bricks will not be moved (page 87).

The journey inward is what gives meaning to the life outside ourselves. Not in any static, dogmatic, once-for-all way either, but in a way that grows and develops and changes to meet different circumstances, different stages of development. Contemplation is not an optional extra -- it is, as much as action, part of the very stuff of being human." 

Bodies wear out to remind us they are temporary, and force us to spend more thought on our spirits

But my mind keeps on thinking," Connla offered hopefully. "As long as I am thinking, I must be alive."  The ant pondered this. "There are many who never think, yet are considered to be alive," it said.  "Then what is 'being alive'?

Contemplate the workings of this world, listen to the words of the wise, take all that is good as your own. With this as your base, open your won door to truth. Do not overlook the truth that is right before you. Study how water flows in a valley stream, smoothly and freely between the rocks. Also learn from holy books and wise people. Everything-even mountains, rivers, plants, and trees-should be your teacher.

True prayer has no set form

We visit others as a matter of social obligation. How long has it been since we have visited with ourselves?

You have to allow a certain amount of time in which you are doing nothing in order to have things occur to you, to let your mind think.

God speaks in the silence of the heart. Listening is the beginning of prayer.

Prayer is not asking. Prayer is putting oneself in the hands of God, at His disposition, and listening to His voice in the depth of our hearts.

In the silence of the heart God speaks. If you face God in prayer and silence, God will speak to you. Then you will know that you are nothing. It is only when you realize your nothingness, your emptiness, that God can fill you with Himself. Souls of prayer are souls of great silence.

We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature--trees, flowers, grass--grows in silence see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence...we need silence to be able to touch souls.

See how nature - trees, flowers, grass - grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence...we need silence to be able to touch souls.

The kind of ominous silence that comes while somebody quietly adjusts his view of who you are.