Book detail: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment is presented as a focused source page for quotations connected with this book, collection, transcript, or source record.
This book delves into the concepts of mindfulness and the importance of living in the present moment. It offers insights on achieving spiritual enlightenment and personal growth through self-awareness and understanding of one's thoughts and emotions.
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“The beginning of freedom is the realization that you are not “the thinker.” The moment you start watching the thinker, a higher level of consciousness becomes activated. You then begin to realize that there is a vast realm of intelligence beyond thought, that thought is only a tiny aspect of that intelligence. You also realize that all the things that truly matter – beauty, love, creativity, joy, inner peace – arise from beyond the mind. You begin to awaken.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“It is not uncommon for people to spend their whole life waiting to start living.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Nothing has happened in the past; it happened in the Now. Nothing will ever happen in the future; it will happen in the Now.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Your outer journey may contain a million steps; your inner journey only has one: the step you are taking right now.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Pain can only feed on pain. Pain cannot feed on joy. It finds it quite indigestible.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Suffering needs time. It cannot survive in the now.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“If there isn't an emanation of love and joy, complete presence and openness toward all beings, then it is not enlightenment.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“If your mind carries a heavy burden of past, you will experience more of the same. The past perpetuates itself through lack of presence. The quality of your consciousness at this moment is what shapes the future.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Watch any plant or animal and let it teach you acceptance of what is, surrender to the Now. Let it teach you Being. Let it teach you integrity — which means to be one, to be yourself, to be real. Let it teach you how to live and how to die, and how not to make living and dying into a problem.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“I have lived with several Zen masters -- all of them cats.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Once you have identified with some form of negativity, you do not want to let it go, and on a deeply unconscious level, you do not want positive change. It would threaten your identity as a depressed, angry or hard-done by person. You will then ignore, deny or sabotage the positive in your life. This is a common phenomenon. It is also insane.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Form is emptiness, emptiness is form" states the Heart Sutra, one of the best known ancient Buddhist texts. The essence of all things is emptiness.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Space and silence are two aspects of the same thing. The same no-thing. They are externalization of inner space and inner silence, which is stillness: the infinitely creative womb of all existence.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“All negativity is caused by an accumulation of psychological time and denial of the present. Unease, anxiety, tension, stress, worry - all forms of fear - are caused by too much future, and not enough presence. Guilt, regret, resentment, grievances, sadness, bitterness, and all forms of nonforgiveness are caused by too much past, and not enough presence.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“The best indicator of your level of consciousness is how you deal with life's challenges when they come. Through those challenges, an already unconscious person tends to become more deeply unconscious, and a conscious person more intensely conscious. You can use a challenge to awaken you, or you can allow it to pull you into even deeper sleep. The dream of ordinary unconsciousness then turns into a nightmare.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Die to the past every moment. You don't need it. Only refer to it when it is absolutely relevant to the present. Feel the power of this moment and the fullness of Being. Feel your presence.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Being an outsider to some extent, someone who does not "fit in" with others or is rejected by them for whatever reason, makes life difficult, but it also places you at an advantage as far as enlightenment is concerned. It takes you out of unconsciousness almost by force.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Thinking is only a small aspect of consciousness. Thought cannot exist without consciousness, but consciousness does not need thought”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Where there is anger, there is always pain underneath.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Time isn't precious at all, because it is an illusion.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Life is now. There was never a time
when your life was not now, nor will there ever be.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Be at least as interested in what goes on inside you as what happens outside. If you get the inside right, the outside will fall into place.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“See if you can catch yourself complaining in either speech or thought, about a situation you find yourself in, what other people do or say, your surroundings, your life situation, even the weather. To complain is always nonacceptance of what is. It invariably carries an unconscious negative charge. When you complain, you make yourself a victim. Leave the situation or accept it. All else is madness.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“To be conscious of Being, you need to reclaim consciousness from the mind. This is one of the most essential tasks on your spiritual journey.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Enlightenment means rising above thought, not falling back to a level below thought, the level of an animal or a plant. In the enlightened state, you still use your thinking mind when needed, but in a much more focused and effective way than before.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Those who have not found their true wealth, which is the radiant joy of Being and the deep, unshakable peace that comes with it, are beggars, even if they have great material wealth. They are looking outside for scraps of pleasure or fulfillment, for validation, security, or love, while they have a treasure within that not only includes all those things but is infinitely greater than anything the world can offer.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“To be identified with your mind is to be trapped in time: the compulsion to live almost exclusively through memory and anticipation.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“The pain-body wants to survive, just like every other entity in existence, and it can only survive if it gets you to unconsciously identify with it.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Please open your eyes now, but keep attention in the inner energy field of the body as you look around the room. The inner body lies at the threshold between your form identity and your essence identity, your true nature. Never lose touch with it.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“There are two levels to your pain: the pain that you create now, and the pain from the past that still lives on in your mind and body. Ceasing to create pain in the present and dissolving past pain - this is what I want to talk about now.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“All cravings are the mind seeking salvation or fulfillment in external things and in the future as a substitute for the joy of Being. As long as I am my mind, I am those cravings, those needs, wants, attachments, and aversions, and apart from them there is no "I" except as a mere possibility, an unfulfilled potential, a seed that has not yet sprouted.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Stress is caused by being 'here' but wanting to be 'there'.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Space has no "existence." "To exist" literally means "to stand out." You cannot understand space because it doesn't stand out. Although in itself it has no existence, it enables everything else to exist. Silence has no existence either, nor does the unmanifested.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“The word enlightenment conjures up the idea of some superhuman accomplishment, and the ego likes to keep it that way, but it is simply your natural state of felt oneness with Being.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Life is your deepest inner Being. It is already whole, complete, perfect.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“When you are present, you can allow the mind to be as it is without getting entangled in it. The mind itself is a wonderful tool. Dysfunction sets in when you seek your self in it and mistake it for who you are.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“The eternal present is the space within which your whole life unfolds, the one factor that remains constant. Life is now. There was never a time when your life was not now, nor will there ever be.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Neither failure nor success has the power to change your inner state of Being.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“To stay present in everyday life, it helps to be deeply rooted within yourself; otherwise, the mind, which has incredible momentum, will drag you along like a wild river.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“The mind left to itself creates monstrosities, and not only in art galleries. Look at our urban landscapes and industrial wastelands. No civilization has ever produced so much ugliness.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“When you surrender to what is and so become fully present, the past ceases to have any power. You do not need it anymore. Presence is the key. Now is the key.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Hope is what keeps you going, but hope keeps you focused on the future, and this continued focus perpetuates your denial of the Now and therefore your unhappiness.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“All cravings are the mind seeking salvation or fulfillment in external things and in the future as a substitute for the joy of Being.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Stress is caused by being here but wanting to be there, or being in the present but wanting to be in the future. It's a split that tears you apart inside.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Compassion is the awareness of a deep bond between yourself and all creatures.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“Don't look for any other state than the one you are in now; otherwise, you will set up inner conflict and unconscious resistance. Forgive yourself for not being at peace. The moment you completely accept your non-peace, your non-peace becomes transmuted into peace. Anything you accept fully will get you there, will take you into peace. This is the miracle of surrender.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“What is God? The eternal one life underneath all the forms of life. What is love? To feel the presence of the one life deep within yourself and all creatures; to be it! Therefore, all love is the love of God.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“You cannot be both unhappy, and fully present in the Now.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“The reason why the romantic love relationship is such an intense and universally sought-after experience is that it seems to offer liberation from a deep-seated state of fear, need, lack, and incompleteness that is part of the human condition in its unredeemed and unenlightened state.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
“The psychological condition of fear is divorced from any concrete and true immediate danger. It comes in many forms: unease, worry, anxiety, nervousness, tension, dread, phobia, and so on. This kind of psychological fear is always of something that might happen, not of something that is happening now.”
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment