Swami Sivananda Quotes

Alas, Siddhartha, I see you suffering, but you're suffering a pain at which one would like to laugh, at which you'll soon laugh for yourself.

This place is a dream. Only a sleeper considers it real. Then death comes like dawn, and you wake up laughing at what you thought was your grief.

Since we are already Buddhas, happy and suffering Buddhas, wise and confused Buddhas, we are already Buddha.

Lord, spit on our eyes that we may see, how to wake up from this tragedy.

Most spiritual experiences begin with suffering. They begin with groundlessness. They begin when the rug has been pulled out from under us.

The real power of the Buddha was that he had so much love. He saw people trapped in their notions of small separate self, feeling guilty or proud of that self, and he offered revolutionary teachings that resounded like a lion's roar, like a great rising tide, helping people to wake up and break free from the prison of ignorance.

Not suffering another existence is reaching the Way.

There is no fundamental difference between the preparation for death and the practice of dying, and spiritual practice leading to enlightenment.

And as long as you're subject to birth and death, you'll never attain enlightenment.

In Gnosticism, the physical world did not ultimately matter - which meant physical suffering did not matter either. Seeking 'enlightenment' meant cultivating an attitude of detachment, even indifference.

One has to pay dearly for immortality; one has to die several times while one is still alive.

As the body fades - which it will inevitably do as we stay here on the planet - it really behooves us to wake up to who we really are. You can either go along willingly or be dragged, because it will happen.

Why since I am myself subject to birth, ageing, disease, death, sorrows and defilement, do I seek after what is also subject to these things? Suppose, being myself subject these things, seeking danger in them, I were to seek the unborn, unageing, und.

Die before you die and find that there is no death.

When there is firm conquest over covetousness, they who have conquered it wake up to the how and why of life.

When great loss happens - deaths close to you or your own approaching death - this is an opportunity for stepping completely out of identification with form and realizing the essence of who you are, or that the essence of anyone who is suffering or dying is beyond death.

He felt for a moment uncreated. Another kind of awake.

The dream is already ended and we're already awake in the golden eternity.

Our true buddha-nature has no shape. And the dust of affliction has no form.

Once the awakening happens, with it comes the realization that suffering is unnecessary now. You have reached the end of suffering because you have transcended the world. It is the place that is free of suffering. This seems to be everybody's path. Perhaps it is not everybody's path in this lifetime, but it seems to be a universal path. Even without a spiritual teaching or a spiritual teacher, I believe that everybody would get there eventually. But that could take time.

Yoga is the journey from just eating and sleeping to becoming an ecstatic being. This is the aspiration of life itself.

A brahmin once asked The Blessed One: "Are you a God?" "No, brahmin" said The Blessed One. "Are you a saint?" "No, brahmin" said The Blessed One. "Are you a magician?" "No, brahmin" said The Blessed One. "What are you then?" "I am awake."

The gift of the Truth beats all other gifts. The flavour of the Truth beats all other tastes. The joy of the Truth beats all other joys, and the cessation of desire conquers all suffering

He hath awakened from the dream of life.

Disabused of our illusions by much travel and travail, we awaken one day to find that the sacred center is here and now - in every moment of the journey, everywhere in the world around us, and deep within our own hearts.