Thomas Merton Quotes

Find joy and solace in the simple, and cultivate your utopia by feeling the Tao in every cubic inch of space.

Ultimately when I gave up the use of motorized vehicles, I walked everywhere, from town to town, across states and two continents. When I stopped talking, I mean literally I stopped speaking. I took a complete vow of silence.

I have created a life style that supports contemplation, service to words.

Pray God, keep us simple.

A simple life is its own reward.

Everybody prays whether [you think] of it as praying or not. The odd silence you fall into when something very beautiful is happening or something very good or very bad. The ah-h-h-h! that sometimes floats up out of you as out of a Fourth of July crowd when the sky-rocket bursts over the water. The stammer of pain at somebody else s pain. The stammer of joy at somebody else's joy. Whatever words or sounds you use for sighing with over your own life. These are all prayers in their way.

Prayer is sitting in the silence until it silences us, choosing gratitude until we are grateful, and praising God until we ourselves are an act of praise.

If we have a simple existence, we shall feel how happy and how fortunate we are. There are some people who are of the opinion that simplicity is almost tantamount to stupidity. But simplicity and stupidity are like the North Pole and the South Pole. One can be as simple as a child and, at the same time, one can have boundless knowledge, light and wisdom.

I don't know exactly what a prayer is. I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass, how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields, which is what I have been doing all day. Tell me, what else should I have done? Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon? Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

My meditation is simple. It does not require any complex practices. It is simple. It is singing. It is dancing. It is sitting silently

Life is sometimes very complicated, but we can purposely learn to enjoy the simple yet powerful and beautiful things God has created!

Find joy in simplicity, self-respect, and indifference to what lies between virtue and vice. Love the human race. Follow the divine.

No writing on the solitary, meditative dimensions of life can say anything that has not already been said better by the wind in the pine trees.

When you suffer, you can look deeply at your situation and find the many blessings that are already surrounding you. It is wonderful to sit with a pen and paper and write down all the conditions for happiness that are already there, already available to you right in this moment.

Not thinking about anything is Zen. Once you know this, walking, sitting, or lying down, everything you do is Zen.

The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less.

Enjoy everything. Need nothing.

Act in the moment, live in the present, slowly slowly don't allow the past to interfere And you will be surprised that life is such an eternal wonder, such a mysterious phenomenon and such a great gift that one simply feels constantly in gratitude. So this is my message for you: live in the moment, herenow. That's why I call it divine purity

With coarse rice to eat, with water to drink, and my bent arm for a pillow - I have still joy in the midst of all these things.

Friends, do not be afraid of silence or stillness. Listen to God. Adore Him in the Eucharist.

The fruit of Silence is Prayer.

Praying It doesn’t have to be the blue iris, it could be weeds in a vacant lot, or a few small stones; just pay attention, then patch a few words together and don’t try to make them elaborate, this isn’t a contest but the doorway into thanks, and a silence in which another voice may speak.

We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence.

Contentment comes not so much from great wealth as from few wants.

Just as we need the courage to be happy, we also need the courage to live simply.