Quotes About Meditation

We spend our lives lost in thought. The question is, what should we make of this fact? In the West, the answer has been "Not much." In the East, especially in contemplative traditions like those of Buddhism, being distracted by thought is understood to be the very wellspring of human suffering.

It soon grew to a blissful stillness that silenced my thoughts. In an instant, the sense of being a separate self—an "I" or a "me"—vanished.

Having spent years observing my mind in meditation, I find such sudden transitions from happiness to suffering both fascinating and rather funny—and merely witnessing them goes a long way toward restoring my equanimity. My mind begins to seem like a video game: I can either play it intelligently, learning more in each round, or I can be killed in the same spot by the same monster, again and again.

There is now a large literature on the psychological benefits of meditation. Different techniques produce long-lasting changes in attention, emotion, cognition, and pain perception, and these correlate with both structural and functional changes in the brain.

our failure to recognize thoughts as thoughts, as appearances in consciousness—is a primary source of human suffering.

Meditation doesn't entail the suppression of such thoughts, but it does require that we notice thoughts as they emerge and recognize them to be transitory appearances in consciousness.

The realistic goal to be attained through spiritual practice is not some permanent state of enlightenment that admits of no further efforts, but a capacity to be free in this moment, in the midst of whatever is happening. If you can do that, you have already solved most of the problems you will encounter in life.

Saint Augustine

we are all prisoners of our thoughts.

Meditation doesn't entail the suppression of such thoughts, but it does require that we notice thoughts as they emerge and recognize them to be transitory appearances in consciousness. In subjective terms, you are consciousness itself—you are not the next, evanescent image or string of words that appears in your mind. Not seeing it arise, however, the next thought will seem to become what you are.

You have a voice in your head that keeps saying things...haven't you noticed.

The first sign of progress will be noticing how distracted you are. But if you persist in your practice, you will eventually get a taste of real concentration and begin to see thoughts themselves as mere appearances arising in a wider field of consciousness.

Being mindful is not a matter of thinking more clearly about experience; it is the act of experiencing more clearly, including the arising of thoughts themselves.

Resolve to know the laws of nature. Follow them in all circumstances; let them shape you; be guided by their perfect wisdom. —Epictetus, Greek philosopher

When your mind is quiet, when your mind is in silence, then the new arrives.

To remember oneself and to relax the body is something we have to do constantly.

We must experience the Truth in a direct, practical and real way; this is only possible in the stillness and silence of the mind, and this is achieved by means of meditation.

Tea's proper use is to amuse the idle, and relax the studious, and dilute the full meals of those who cannot use exercise, and will not use abstinence. ( Essay on Tea , 1757.)

The happiest part of a man's life is what he passes lying awake in bed in the morning.

Silence propagates itself, and the longer talk has been suspended, the more difficult it is to find anything to say.

All intellectual improvement arises from leisure.

If one was to think constantly of death, the business of life would stand still.

The custom of frequent reflection will keep their minds from running adrift, and call their thoughts home from useless unattentive roving.Lockeon Education,¶ 176.

ANACHORETE  (ANA'CHORETE)  ANACHORITE  (ANA'CHORITE)  n.s.[sometimes viciously writen  anchorite;Greek] A monk, who, with the leave of his superiour, leaves the convent for a more austere and solitary life. Yet lies not love dead here, but here doth sit,Vow'd to this trench, like an  anachorite. Donne.