Thomas Merton Quotes

You'll drift apart, it's true, but you'll be out in the open, part of everything alive again.

Happiness based on reasons is actually another form of misery.

The greatest happiness you can have is knowing that you do not necessarily require happiness.

This is what I wanted. This guy. This life. This me. I was never getting my old life back, and I didn't care. I was happy. I was safe. I was right where I wanted to be.

People are never free of trying to be content.

We cannot change anything until we accept it. Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses.

Some of us think holding on makes us strong; but sometimes it is letting go.

I hope I don't get driven to the point where, to be honest, I'm never satisfied. I hope there's some part of me that can be content.

Most people ask for happiness on condition. Happiness can only be felt if you don't set any condition.

I love acting. It's my playground, it let's me explore. But my happiness in this world - my level of peace - is never going to be dictated by acting.

With all the highs and lows I've had in my life, I wouldn't change anything. So no, I don't, this is what I'm supposed to be doing.

I don't ever feel the need to escape.

Men do change, and change comes like a little wind that ruffles the curtains at dawn, and it comes like the stealthy perfume of wildflowers hidden in the grass. Change may be announced by a small ache, so that you think you're catching cold. Or you may feel a faint disgust for something you loved yesterday. It may even take the form of a hunger that peanuts won't satisfy. Isn't overeating said to be one of the strongest symptoms of discontent. And isn't discontent the lever of change?

Were there none who were discontented with what they have, the world would never reach anything better.

It was my dream that I had clenched in a fist of discontent and wouldn't release. But time had now pried every finger open. There is peace in an open and upraised hand that isn't grasping for anything.

I think of moving as a kind of saving grace.

I wake up in the morning and my heart is light, man. It's not heavy. I don't have skeletons in the closet on their way out.

I know that. I'm having a ball. I'm not slap happy. I'm just filled up with joy and with peace and with all kinds of things that have eluded me for quite a few years. And they're back and they're thriving.

I believe we are most beautiful when we are constantly shedding our old selves and moving into new light.

Just remember that if you've lost something, you will be open to something else.

I kind of got out of the spotlight and life's never been this good.

The only true happiness lies in knowing who you are ... and making peace with it.

Perhaps it's because I appreciate all I have so much that I don't worry about what I haven't got.

For many, many years, I was always whipping up things in order to keep myself busy and moving ever forward and saying, 'What's next? What's next? What's next?' I like the equanimity that comes with my age. I don't have big highs, and I don't have big lows. Even if this job goes away tomorrow, the nonstop ambition is a thing of the past for me. I've mellowed

They were satisfied with their lives which had none of the vibrance his own was taking on. And he was angry at himself, that he could not change that for them.