Neale Donald Walsch Quotes

It is not what happens that is success or failure, but what it does to the heart of man.

The door to my heart opens inward. I move through forgiveness to love.

What matters in life is not so much what happens to us, but what happens in us

Problems are not my problem. It's not what happens to me but what happens in me that matters.

I surround people in unconditional acceptance and love to such a degree that everything that is unloving about them rises to the surface.

You may not seem able to change some outer circumstances but you can start by changing your inner experience of life and yourself.

I was trying to change things on the outside and you can't. You've got to feel it on the inside and everything else will change.

These years in silence and reflection made me stronger and reminded me that acceptance has to come from within and that this kind of truth gives me the power to conquer emotions I didn't even know existed.

The quality of my life has changed dramatically - not the events - but the way I handle them and my priorities and my sense of drama.

If you begin to understand what you are without trying to change it, then what you are undergoes a transformation.

As a human being, it's in your nature, when somebody says something about you negatively, to defend yourself and lash back. That's what we all have to learn not to do. You have to forgive a person. And when you forgive a person, you have to forgive yourself.

Freedom is not overcoming what you think stands in your way. It is understanding that what is in your way is part of the way.

True change is within; leave the outside as it is.

If you really want to escape the things that harass you, what you're needing is not to be in a different place but to be a different person.

Your emotional reactions to the evil you encounter and your judgments of it show you what you need to change in yourself. Changing those parts of your personality that judge, react in fear, and cannot love into acceptance, fearlessness, and love is the journey you were born to make.

It is within your hands to be frustrated in life or not. Just your expectations should become smaller, smaller, smaller, and in the same proportion the frustration will become smaller. A day will come when there will be no expectation; then you will never come across any frustration.

The emotional wisdom of the heart is simple. When we accept our human feelings, a remarkable transformation occurs. Tenderness and wisdom arise naturally and spontaneously. Where we once sought strength over others, now our strength becomes our own; where we once sought to defend ourselves, we laugh.

No amount of meditation, yoga, diet, and reflection will make all of our problems go away, but we can transform our difficulties into our practice until little by little they guide us on our way.

I've spent a lot of time in my life dedicating myself to love or the pursuit of love or the understanding of love... I’ve stopped believing in happy endings. I’ve started believing in good days.

When you squeeze an orange, you'll always get orange juice to come out. What comes out is what's inside. The same logic applies to you: when someone squeezes you, puts pressure on you, or says something unflattering or critical, and out of you comes anger, hatred, bitterness, tension, depression, or anxiety, that is what's inside. If love and joy are what you want to give and receive, change your life by changing what's inside

In deep self-acceptance grows a compassionate understanding. As one Zen master said when I asked if he ever gets angry, 'Of course I get angry, but then a few minutes later I say to myself, 'What's the use of this,' and I let it go.'

The next time you lose heart and you can’t bear to experience what you’re feeling, you might recall this instruction: change the way you see it and lean in. Instead of blaming our discomfort on outer circumstances or on our own weakness, we can choose to stay present and awake to our experience, not rejecting it, not grasping it, not buying the stories that we relentlessly tell ourselves. This is priceless advice that addresses the true cause of suffering—yours, mine, and that of all living beings.

The right attitude toward any negative state begins with understanding that its only authority over you is a direct reflection of your attitude towards it.

You've achieved cheerfulness the day you realize that no matter what's happening around you, being anything other than cheerful will not make it better.

The quickest way to change your attitude toward pain is to accept the fact that everything that happens to us has been designed for our spiritual growth.