Thomas Merton Quotes

I know if I'm lost in the moment or not.

The simple act of paying attention can take you a long way.

If you're really in the process of photographing, you are absolutely aware. You are looking.

Correct meditation means correctly understanding your situation moment by moment - what are you doing now? Only do it! Then, each action is complete; each action is enough. Then no thinking, so each moment I can perceive everything just like this.

The best thing anybody ever told me about acting - and I think it's probably true for life, generally - is listen. You've really got to watch, and you've really got to listen. Not see and hear.

When you're playing, every ball seems like the biggest event. When you're sitting back, you can see the overall picture better.

When we turn on our observation capabilities, we become much more in the moment and much more powerful. Psychic powers have been known to develop from consistent practice of paying attention. It's available to us all. It's all in what we choose to practice.

Look at what's in front of you, not what you've been told or what you expect or what you want to see.

I have learned how to observe, far better than most people observe. I am not blinded by the past or motivated by the future. I focus on the present, because that is where I am destined to live.

Besides learning to see, there is another art to be learned - not to see what is not.

Watchfulness is experiencing a sudden glimpse of something without any qualifications - just the sudden glimpse itself.

There is an art of seeing things as they are: without naming, without being caught in a network of words, without thinking interfering with perception.

You don't always have to look in the distance for what's going on over there, when you actually see what's right in front of you.

Meditation teaches us to focus and to pay clear attention to our experiences and responses as they arise, and to observe them without judging them.

When someone seeks," said Siddhartha, "then it easily happens that his eyes see only the thing that he seeks, and he is able to find nothing, to take in nothing because he always thinks only about the thing he is seeking, because he has one goal, because he is obsessed with his goal. Seeking means: having a goal. But finding means: being free, being open, having no goal.

When I walk with a camera, I walk from shot to shot, reading the light on a calibrated meter. When I walk without a camera, my own shutter opens, and the moment's light prints on my own silver gut. When I see this second way I am above all an unscrupulous observer.

Observe what is with undivided awareness.

Go around with your eyes like a camera. Don't lose it by talking. Go and listen. And work!

Be awake to the details around you, but don't be self-conscious.

The capacity for delight is the gift of paying attention.

When we shift back to feeling the sensations in our body and connect to what's in front of us, the creative channel opens up.

To increase our objectivity, we must learn to switch off the mini-movies. Objectivity requires us to be mindful, present in the moment, and experiencing what is happening without judgment.

Being fully present is the best guarantee for a bright future.

A nose that can see is worth two that sniff.

Do you, and the rest is background noise.