Anthony De Mello quotes: wise famous quotes, sayings and quotations by Anthony De Mello

Anthony De Mello Famous Quotes & Sayings

Discover top inspirational quotes from Anthony De Mello on Wise Famous Quotes.

I wish to become a teacher of the Truth.

Suffering is given to you that you might open your eyes to the truth.

Thought can organize the world so well that you are no longer able to see it.

My commitment is not to consistency but to the Truth .

Live your life as you see fit. That's not selfish. Selfish is to demand that others live their lives as you see fit.

Extend
your arms
in welcome
to the future.
The best
is yet to come!

Every word, every image used for God is a distortion more than a description.

You do not have to change for God to love you.

In many ways we were drugged when we were young. We were brought up to need people. For what? For acceptance, approval, appreciation, applause.

You don't have to add anything in order to be happy; you've got to drop something.

Life is easy, life is delightful. It's only hard on your illusions, your ambitions, your greed, your cravings.

Obedience keeps the rules. Love knows when to break them.

Say goodbye to golden yesterdays: or your heart will never learn to love the present.

Certainty is the culprit. The spiritual person knows uncertainty - a state of mind unknown to the religious fanatic.

You have to understand, my dears, that the shortest distance between truth and a human being is a story.

People who want a cure, provided they can have it without pain, are like those who favour progress, provided they can have it without change.

Concepts are always frozen. Reality flows.

If the heart is unobstructed, the result is love.

May the peace of God disturb you always.

Both what you run from-
and what you yearn for -
are within you.

Nothing has changed but my attitude, therefore, everything has changed.

The greatest learning of the ages lies in accepting life exactly as it comes to us.

One year of life is worth more than twenty years of hibernation.

People who want to rise above a well-cooked meal and a well-tailored garment, are out of their spiritual minds.

"That of the person who sees other human beings as sinners," said the Master.

If you find me charming, it means that right now you're in a good mood, nothing more.

What you are aware of you are in control of; what you are not aware of is in control of you.

The poor think they will be happy when they become rich. The rich think they will be happy when they are rid of their ulcers.

To relate is to react. To react is to understand oneself. To understand oneself is to be enlightened. Relationships are schools for enlightenment.

You see persons and things not as they are but as you are.

Wisdom comes to those who learn nothing, unlearn everything.

A thought is a screen, not a mirror; that is why you live in a thought envelope, untouched by Reality.

The human mind makes foolish divisions in what love sees as one.

Look for competence not claims.

Before enlightenment, I used to be depressed; after enlightenment, I continue to be depressed.

All I did was sit on the riverbank handing out river water. After I'm gone, I trust you will notice the river.

True tolerance only arises from a keen awareness of the abysmal ignorance of everyone as far as truth is concerned.

One always treads with a joyful step when one has dropped the burden called the ego.

Wisdom can be learned . But it cannot be taught .

The only way that someone can be of help to you is by challenging your ideas.

To fight evil with activity is like fighting darkness with one's hands. So what you need is light, not fit.

As the Arabs say, The nature of rain is the same, but it makes thorns grow in the marshes and flowers in the gardens.

Has it ever occurred to you that you can only love when
you are alone?

Because everyone is the same distance from the sun. Does it really lessen the distance if you live on top of a skyscraper?

Doesn't everyone see Reality as it is?

You sanctify whatever you are grateful for.

The Rose does not preen herself to catch my eye. She blooms because she blooms. A saint is a saint until he knows he is one.

Are you your clothes? Are you your name? Are you your profession? Stop identifying with them. They come and go

As the Japanese Zen masters say, "Don't seek the truth; just drop your opinions". Drop your theories; don't seek the truth.

Wisdom tends to grow in proportion to one's awareness of one's ignorance.

A good teacher offers practice , a bad one offers theories .

This truth I firmly hold, all evidence to the contrary notwithstanding;
my life has been a gift, a blessing to the world.

What is love?"; "The total absence of fear," said the Master; "What is it we fear?"; "Love," said the Master.

We do not have a fear of the unknown. What we fear is giving up the known.

We're crazy, We're living on crazy ideas about love, about relationships, about happiness, about joy, about everything.

Rare indeed, is the relationship in which the other is not cultivated for what one can get for oneself.

You keep insisting, I feel good because the world is right! Wrong! The world is right because I feel good. That's what all the mystics are saying.

You can never be free
as long as you have an ego to defend.

So love the thought of death, love it.

How sad if we pass through life and never see it with the eyes of a child.

Enlightenment is: absolute cooperation with the inevitable.

Don't ask the world to change....you change first.

When you come to see you are not as wise today as you thought you were yesterday, you are wiser today.

The one who would be constant in happiness must frequently change.

Religion is the finger pointing to God. People are too busy licking the finger to notice where it's pointing.

The Master would insist that the final barrier to our attaining God was the word and concept God.

I lack the Lord's own gentleness of heart, for I see deliberate malice where he sees ignorance and weakness.

Pleasant experiences make life delightful. Painful experiences lead to growth.

Problems only exist in the human mind.

Ordinarily, everything we do is in our self-interest. Everything.

To those who seek to protect their ego true Peace brings only disturbance.

People kill for money or for power. But the most ruthless murderers are those who kill for their ideas.

Loneliness is not cured by human company. Loneliness is cured by contact with reality.

The world is right because I feel good.
p. 83, Awareness, copyright 1990

If you never condemned you would never need to forgive.

When I speak, you must not listen to the words, my dear. Listen to the Silence.

The butterfly in a caterpillar: the eagle in an egg; the saint in a selfish human being.

The best things in life cannot be willed into being.

When you fight something, you're tied to it forever. As long as you're fighting it, you're giving it power.

To be properly wicked, you do not have to break the Law. Just observe it to the letter.

You can will an act of service but you cannot will love.

You're so ashamed of your past; drop it! You're so proud of your past; drop it!

The feigning sleeper can delude others he cannot delude himself. The false mystic, unfortunately, can delude both others and himself.

All is well, all is well. Though everything is a mess, all is well.

A newly married couple said, "What shall we do to make our love endure?" Said the Master, "Love other things together" ...

Spirituality practiced in the state of activity is incomparably superior to that practiced in a state of withdrawel.

You are so proud of your intelligence," said the master. "You are like a like a condemned man, proud of the vastness of his prison cell.

If you don't look at things through your concepts, you'll never be bored. Every single thing is unique.

The only way to change is by changing your understanding.

Nobody is afraid of the unknown, what you really fear is the loss of the known.

A lost coin is found by means of a candle; the deepest truth is found by means of a simple story.

Sin is a refusal to grow, a refusal to love, a refusal to get committed, to be concerned, and to take risks.

You are never in love with anyone. You're only in love with your prejudiced and hopeful idea of that person.

We see people and things not as they are, but as we are.

Those who make no mistakes are making the biggest mistakes of all - they are attempting nothing new.

This is what is ultimate in our human knowledge of God, to know that we do not know.

Whatever is truly alive must die. Look at the flowers; only plastic flowers never die.

The sun and its light, the ocean and the wave, the singer and his song - not one. Not two.

Sinners often speak the truth. And saints have led people astray. Examine what is said, not the one who says it.

If what you said was true, where was the need to shout?