Wendell Berry Quotes

I love being outside with trees and water, lying down somewhere or walking. I do transcendental meditation, which keeps me calm and steady.

I go among trees and sit still. All my stirring becomes quiet around me like circles on water.

No more words. In the name of this place we drink in with our breathing, stay quiet like a flower. So the nightbirds will start singing.

Experiencing the silence of meditation doesn't have to be complicated. You can lie on the floor with arms and legs outspread, paying attention to the sensations in your body. You can observe the outflow and inflow of your breath. You can also go to a park and let the impressions of nature calm your brain.

I am learning peacefulness, lying by myself quietly, as the light lies on these white walls, this bed, these hands. I am nobody; I have nothing to do with explosions.

Allow nature to teach you stillness.

Remember: if you can cease all restless activity, your integral nature will appear.

If your mind is still... You can sense the peace that emanates from the earth.

Hopefully there will come a time when I have no words, when I can honor and hold that kind of stillness that I so need, crave, and desire in the natural world.

Stillness is the altar of spirit.

The dream of my life is to lie down by a slow river and stare at the light in the trees - to learn something by being nothing

Having plants and flowers in my space makes me feel very calm and Zen. For me, it's important to meditate every morning to be very clear in the head, and nature really helps me do the same thing.

When was the last time you spent a quiet moment just doing nothing - just sitting and looking at the sea, or watching the wind blowing the tree limbs, or waves rippling on a pond, a flickering candle or children playing in the park?

The temple bell stops but I still hear the sound coming out of the flowers.

Fishing provides that connection with the whole living world. It gives you the opportunity of being totally immersed, turning back into yourself in a good way. A form of meditation, some form of communion with levels of yourself that are deeper than the ordinary self.

Nothing in all creation is so like God as stillness.

There is so much noise in the world! May we learn to be silent in our hearts and before God.

Seek out a tree and let it teach you stillness.

Prayer is the peace of our spirit, the stillness of our thoughts, the evenness of recollection, the seat of meditation, the rest of our cares and the calm of our tempest; prayer is the issue of a quiet mind, of untroubled thoughts, it is the daughter of charity, and the sister of meekness.

We try to abolish intervals by our manic insistence on keeping busy, on doing something. And as a result, all we succeed in doing is destroying all hope of tranquility. ... . You have to learn to immerse yourself in the silences between.

But it's peculiar, as soon as I am in the midst of nature and by myself, everything that is base and trivial vanishes without trace. On such days nothing scares me; and this helps me again and again.

Attain utmost emptiness. Abide in steadfast stillness.

Stillness is your essential nature.