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Hi dear friend, below I’ve create a list of 50 mindfulness quotes to help you have a a happy life.
Also, I know that mindfulness might be a new subject for some, so before staring with the quotes I went ahead and answered some of the most common questions that people have regarding mindfulness.
In addition, there are some quotes where I have given my own interpretation. Of course you are free to give it your own meaning, there are some quotes that really touched me and had a really deep meaning that I wanted to share with you.
They are also organized by different mindfulness teachers.
Before reading the quotes, make sure to take a deep breath and empty any thoughts. Allow yourself to read them with a clear open mind, ready to breathe in their meaning. May these mindfulness quotes touch your heart.
What is mindfulness?
In short mindfulness is being in the present moment. What that means is that you allow things to be as they are without having to rush to the next moment or next activity.
What are the qualities of mindfulness?
- Being in the present moment.
- Not rushing to get things out of the way.
- Accepting things as they are without judging them.
- Having a sense of peace, not needing things to be any different in order to be happy.
What are some examples of mindfulness?
Mindfulness can be practice all day long in every day life.
For example, when you are washing your dishes, most people want to just get it over to move to the next activity such as going to work, having something to eat, watching tv, etc.
However, you can practice being mindful by just allowing yourself to enjoy feeling the water in your hands, smelling the dish soap, feeling the texture of the sponge and touching the dish, spoon, or cup.
When the mind rushes, you have lost your mindfulness. Mindfulness is not necessarily doing things super slow, but rather just doing one thing at a time will all of your attention without rushing or thinking about the next moment.
Another great example of mindfulness is when you pet your cat or dog, and are truly in connection with him or her without any mental dialogue. It feels so calming when I pet my cats and I look into their eyes. This can only be achieve if I’m not thinking about checking my e-mails, when I need to do laundry, etc.
The most simple way of practicing mindfulness is right now, look at your surroundings without judging them. See if you can see something new you had never seen before. Look at the different objects and really pay attention to them. You will be surprise to find new things, textures, shapes, smells, that you may not have noticed before.
How do you express your mindfulness?
You can express mindfulness by just being present in whatever you are doing. This is specially beneficial when talking with others. They will truly feel that you are really connecting with them.
You can do such things as:
- When going out to a restaurant, put your phone on silence mode. Give that person the gift of you undivided attention.
- When you are at the grocery store instead of looking at your phone, just stand there until is your turn. Give someone passing by a genuine smile. Look around without wanting the cashier to hurry up. Just stay there standing with not making a mental list of all the things you need to do after leaving the grocery store.
- When preparing a meal, look at all the ingredients, and just appreciate how they are all so unique looking. Look at a tomato as though you had never seen a tomato before, and then you will see it true beauty.
- One of my favorites mindfulness moments is when folding the laundry. I love feeling the different textures of my socks and their colors. I even take the time to thank them for keeping my feet warm in the winter.
What is a mindful person?
A mindful person is very aware of their state of mind and their thoughts. This is really important since our thoughts create our world.
If a person is thinking about all the bad things that happened in the past, they have lost their mindfulness.
Also, if someone is just daydreaming about things they want to accomplish in the future, the mindfulness is gone.
To be really mindful is to be completely here in the present moment. Not thinking about all the things that happened in the past, or worrying about the things that might happen in the future.
When you are truly mindful, you are present in this moment and have the most deep sense of peace. You are not fighting with what is. You are just here…sitting, standing or lying down.
Eckhart Tolle
I’ve been so blessed to have done retreats with Eckhart Tolle. To be in his presence is a true and rare gift. He is a genuine example of mindfulness, or as he would call it being in the present moment.
He radiates such a a strong sense of peace that is hard to describe with words. When being with him, the most powerful teaching are not what he is saying, but just being in silence with him. Those small pockets of silence are very powerful.
If he were to just sit there for a whole hour and say nothing, it would probably be the most meaningful hour of my life. He has been able to achieve such a strong profound state of inner peace, that you can feel it just by being in the same room.
If you ever get a chance, I HIGHLY recommend going to see him live.
1. “Realize deeply that the present moment is all you have. Make the NOW the primary focus of your life.”
This is very deep, since our whole life we are constantly making plans about what we are going to do next. Of course there is nothing wrong planning for a vacation or going out in the weekends. However, our minds are mostly lost in some other time, rather than enjoying this beautiful gift of the now.
2. “The past has no power over the present moment.”
No matter what happened in the past, we have to ability to choose to make this moment a very happy one. If we keep dwelling in the past, we’ll be prisoner of the things we cannot change. However, the present moment allows us to shift directions and to be focused on what we are currently doing.
3. “Accept – then act. Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it. Always work with it, not against it.”
When we don’t accept what is truly going on, and we fight it we suffer. For example if we are stuck in traffic, the real suffering is not being there not able to drive away, but rather our ideas that this should not be happening. When we really let go of wanting to control things and accept them as they are, real freedom appears.
Then the second step, is that once we have accepted it, we do things to make it better. So going back to the same example, we accept we are stuck in traffic and there is nothing we can do about it. Then we can change our route and chose to drive on a different street. We can also decide to leave early the next time or to not even drive that same path again.
Basically, we first accept what is going on if it can’t be changed at that moment, but we still act to correct the situation afterwards.
4. “You find peace not by rearranging the circumstances of your life, but by realizing who you are at the deepest level.”
When we are rooted in who we truly are, there is no more searching that needs to be done. We spend so much time trying to find the perfect partner, job, house etc. No external things is ever going to bring us joy, this can only be found within.
5. “The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation but your thoughts about it.”
No matter what happens, what causes our unhappiness is not the situation, but our whole narrative in our mind thinking about what it means.
You can go to the grocery store and buy your favorite flavor ice cream, and they might be out of it. So you can go and think how the store manager doesn’t’ know how to order products properly, how the people who did buy the ice cream are out there to get you, how life is so unfair, you never get a break etc.
Or you can just say, well what other flavor can I pick?
6. “You can only lose something that you have, but you cannot lose something that you are.”
Material things, people, pets, jobs, houses, businesses, etc, can be gone in a second. However, when we are truly in touch of our eternal self, the one that never perishes even after death, then we can never lose.
7. “Life isn’t as serious as the mind makes it out to be.”
Life is very simple, but our thoughts make a HUGE drama out of it.
8. “If you get the inside right, the outside will fall into place. Primary reality is within; secondary reality without.”
If we go deep within ourselves, and are in peace inside, then what ever happens outside of our selves doesn’t matter. We accept it as it is, not fighting it.
9. “Worry pretends to be necessary but serves no useful purpose”
When we worry, we have lost our mindfulness because we are focusing in different potentials that might happen in the future. It steals our peace of mind, and the crazy thing is that most of the things that we worry about never happen.
Thich Nhat Hanh
10. “In mindfulness one is not only restful and happy, but alert and awake. Meditation is not evasion; it is a serene encounter with reality.”
11. “The present moment is filled with joy and happiness. If you are attentive, you will see it.”
12. “Breathing in, I calm body and mind. Breathing out, I smile. Dwelling in the present moment I know this is the only moment.”
13. “I clean this teapot with the kind of attention I would have were I giving the baby Buddha or Jesus a bath.”
14. “Mindfulness helps you to touch the wonders of life for self-nourishment and healing.”
15. “Don’t do any task in order to get it over with. Resolve to do each job in a relaxed way, with all your attention. Enjoy and be one with your work.”
16. “Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor.”
Our breath helps us get back into the present moment. Therefore we are able to perform any activity with mindfulness.
17. “While washing the dishes, you might be thinking about the tea afterwards, and so try to get them out of the way as quickly as possible in order to sit and drink tea. But that means that you are incapable of living during the time you are washing the dishes.”
Discover how to nourish the seeds of happiness and liberation within you with Thich Nhat Hanh’s eight week online course – Body and Mind Are One.
Jon Kabat-Zinn
18. “Breathe and let be.”
19. “You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf.”
Don’t fight with what is. Accept it and see how you can apply it to your current situation.
20. “Meditation is the only intentional, systematic human activity which at bottom is about not trying to improve yourself or get anywhere else, but simply to realize where you already are.”
21. “Wherever you go, there you are.”
22. “Mindfulness practice means that we commit fully in each moment to be present; inviting ourselves to interface with this moment in full awareness, with the intention to embody as best we can an orientation of calmness, mindfulness, and equanimity right here and right now.”
Jack Kornfield
23. “To see the preciousness of all things, we must bring our full attention to life.”
24. “Everything that has a beginning has an ending. Make your peace with that and all will be well.”
25. “Let go of the battle. Breathe quietly and let it be. Let your body relax and your heart soften. Open to whatever you experience without fighting.”
26. “The trouble is that you think you have time.”
This is a a very profound quote since we think we have all the time in the world to practice spirituality. However, we live in a very busy world and different things take our energy and time.
We may think I’ll do meditation or mindfulness later when I have more time. However, the only thing that can truly prepare us for death is our spiritual practice. We waste most of our times in meaningless things that only bring temporary (if any) joy.
This present moment is when we need to start our spiritual practice, or we’ll regret it when we are old in our dying bed.
27. “To let go does not mean to get rid of. To let go means to let be. When we let be with compassion, things come and go on their own.”
Learn how to how to work with difficulty in your life and break the patterns of reactivity with The Power of Awareness – and Online Mindfulness Training program with Tara Brach and Jack Kornfield.
Tara Brach
28. “There is something wonderfully bold and liberating about saying yes to our entire imperfect and messy life.”
29. “Suffering is our call to attention, our call to investigate the truth of our beliefs.”
30. “You have a unique body and mind, with a particular history and conditioning. No one can offer you a formula for navigating all situations and all states of mind. Only by listening inwardly in a fresh and open way will you discern at any given time what most serves your healing and freedom.”
31. “Nothing is wrong—whatever is happening is just “real life.”
32. “The only way to live is by accepting each minute as an unrepeatable miracle.”
We were very lucky to wake up and be alive. Thousands of people around the world died in their sleep. Each minute is truly a gift, and when we live mindfully we able to enjoy each moment.
Rumi
33. “Let go of your mind and then be mindful. Close your ears and listen!”
Go within, here is were you can find all the answer to your problems. There is an inner wisdom guiding our lives. However, we don’t listen to it since we are so busy in the world. Take the time to meditate and listen to what the universe is trying to tell you.
34. “Look past your thoughts, so you may drink the pure nectar of This Moment.”
The present moment is all that we truly have, everything else is just an illusion. Once we taste being right here, right now, then we can truly be at peace.
35. “When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy.”
When we do thing coming out from out heart and not from our head, which contain all the ideas of the world, we listen to our true self. We are connected to something higher than ourselves and are able to be in real joy
36. “Wherever you are, and whatever you do, be in love.”
Love is the most powerful source of the universe. It’s the energy that connects all of us. When we are rooted in love, we are practicing mindfulness since in love there is judgement over things that happened in the past, or worries about things in the future.
37. “You wander from room to room hunting for the diamond necklace that is already around your neck!”
We go our whole life looking for happiness on external things such as our careers, children, spouses, material possessions and more. It’s this searching of not enough, maybe the next thing will make me happy, more clothes will make it better, and so on, that makes us unhappy.
It’s like a horse chasing the carrot sticking. The more we look for it outside of ourselves, the more we search, the harder the disappointment.
Go within my dear friend, it is all inside, it has always been there.
Byron Katie
38. “Being present means living without control and always having your needs met.”
39. “What you’re believing in the moment creates your suffering or your happiness.”
Our negative thoughts create an internal prison in our heads. When we let go of all the negativity and are truly present, the thoughts subside and we are able to be happy in this precious moment.
40. “Pay close attention to the particular thoughts you use to deprive yourself of happiness.”
No unhappiness ever comes from the outside, it’s all the perceptions of our mind. When we are mindful and we are aware of our negative thoughts, we can brush them aside and be calm.
41. “Every mind deserves to be free. When the mind is free, that’s the end of suffering.”
When we liberate the mind from all the crazy, negative, limiting thoughts, then we have true freedom.
42. “When the creative mind is unleashed and understands its true nature, it’s unlimited. There’s nothing you cannot do.”
Buddha
43. “We are what we think. All that we are arises with our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make the world.”
44. “Do not dwell in the past, do not dream of the future, concentrate the mind on the present moment.”
45. “We are shaped by our thoughts; we become what we think. When the mind is pure, joy follows like a shadow that never leaves.”
46. “Meditate … do not delay, lest you later regret it.”
I wished I had learned to meditate since I was little girl. This would have helped me tremendously to be happy. Make meditation a priority in your life, it’s like food for your soul. How would your body be if you did not feed it? Our soul needs to be nourished, and this can be done with a daily meditation practice.
47. “All that we are is the result of what we have thought.”
48. “Nothing can harm you as much as your own thoughts unguarded.”
It was a deep realization when I saw how I was always thinking. I was so used to it that I did not even realize it. Just like a fish does not realize that it’s in water because it’s always been in water.
With practice then you can start to see when you have negative thoughts. This is the time to act fast, and let go of that thought immediately. Otherwise that thought unguarded has the potential to make you very miserable.
49. “If you propose to speak always ask yourself, is it true, is it necessary, is it kind”
50. “Praise and blame, gain and loss, pleasure and sorrow come and go like the wind. To be happy, rest like a giant tree in the midst of them all.”
Conclusion
It left me very peaceful reading these mindfulness quotes. I hope it had the same effect for you.
Right now is the perfect moment to practice mindfulness. You can begin by being aware of your thoughts. It takes practice to dot this. But you can get better the more you do it.
If you see a thought that is making you unhappy, ask yourself “is this really true?”. Investigate your thoughts, don’t let them control your life.
After reading this take a short break, maybe a few seconds to a minute and just look at your hands. Observe your fingers, nails, veins, skin, knuckles, palms. Just look, don’t judge.
This simple mindfulness exercise can help you be present. Do it as often as you need.
Alright friends, it has been a pleasure making this post for you. I hope you were able to get some good gems out of it.
Until next time, take care. May you have a peaceful and happy mind.
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