Quotes About Mindfulness

As if you had died and your life had extended only to this present moment, use the surplus that is left to you to live from this time onward according to nature.

Consider that everything is opinion, and opinion is in your power. Take away then, when you choose, your opinion, and like a mariner who has rounded the headland, you will find calm, everything stable, and a waveless bay.

Death and pain are not frightening, it's the fear of pain and death we need to fear. Which is why we praise the poet who wrote, 'Death is not fearful, but dying like a coward is.'

Either you're going to be depressed when your wish is not realized or foolishly pleased with yourself if it is, overjoyed for the wrong reasons.

Every day as it comes should be welcomed and reduced forthwith into our own possession as if it were the finest day imaginable. What flies past has to be seized at.

Here is a rule to remember in future, when anything tempts you to feel bitter: not "This is misfortune," but "To bear this worthily is good fortune".

Live not as though there were a thousand years ahead of you. Fate is at your elbow; make yourself good while life and power are still yours.

Nothing is burdensome if taken lightly, and how nothing need arouse one's irritation so long as one doesn't make it bigger than it is by getting irritated.

Nowhere can a man find a quieter or more untroubled retreat than in his own soul.

Remind yourself that it is not the future or what has passed that afflicts you, but always the present.

Set yourself in motion, if it is in your power, and do not look about you to see if anyone will observe it; nor yet expect Plato's Republic: but be content if the smallest thing goes on well, and consider such an event to be no small matter.

Start praying like this and you'll see. Not "some way to sleep with her" - but a way to stop wanting to. Not "some way to get rid of him" - but a way to stop trying. Not "some way to save my child" - but a way to lose fear. Redirect your prayers like that, and watch what happens.

The best answer to anger is silence.

The present is the only thing of which a man can be deprived, if it is true that this is the only thing which he has, and that a man cannot lose something he does not already possess.

Think of all the years passed by in which you said to yourself "I'll do it tomorrow," and how the gods have again and again granted you periods of grace of which you have not availed yourself. It is time to realize that you are a member of the Universe, that you are born of Nature itself, and to know that a limit has been set to your time. Use every moment wisely, to perceive your inner refulgence, or 'twill be gone and nevermore within your reach.

You can pass your life in an equable flow of happiness if you can follow the right way and think and act in the right way.

You will give yourself relief, if you do every act of your life as if it were the last.

You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.

If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.

When you arise in the morning think of what a privilege it is to be alive, to think, to enjoy, to love ...

Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.

Whenever you are about to find fault with someone, ask yourself the following question: What fault of mine most nearly resembles the one I am about to criticize?

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.

When another blames you or hates you, or people voice similar criticisms, go to their souls, penetrate inside and see what sort of people they are. You will realize that there is no need to be racked with anxiety that they should hold any particular opinion about you.