Ram Dass Quotes

Meditation is not a means to an end. It is both the means and the end.

Meditation means a state of unconditioned mind. Meditation is the process of undoing the harm that every society goes on doing to every individual - communist or Catholic, Jaina or Jew, it does not matter. I am not talking about any particular conditioning that is wrong; I am saying conditioning AS SUCH is wrong.

Meditation is, first of all, a tool for surveying our territory so we can know what is going on. With the energy of mindfulness, we can calm things down, understand them, and bring harmony back to the conflicting elements inside us.

Meditation may also be thought of as a technique by which we diminish the force of old thought habits and develop new ones.

Meditation does not mean just sitting quietly for five or ten minutes. It requires conscious effort. The mind has to be made calm and quiet; at the same time, it has to be vigilant so as not to allow any distracting thoughts or desires to enter.

Meditation is not of the body, not of the mind, not of the soul. Meditation simply means your body, your mind, your soul, all functioning in such a harmony, in such wholeness, humming so beautifully... that they are in a melody, they are one. Your whole being - body, mind, soul - is involved in meditation.

One way to look at meditation is as a kind of intrapsychic technology that's been developed over thousands of years by traditions that know a lot about the mind/body connection.

If you meditate, meditation is so beautiful, who bothers about the result? And if you bother about the result, meditation is not possible. This result oriented mind is the only barrier, the only block. There are not many blocks, the only block is that of the result oriented mind: never here-now, always somewhere else thinking of the result; while making love, thinking about the result.

Mindfulness, as defined by the Buddha, means awareness of incessant change, of arising and vanishing, inside of your own body, which is the ultimate reality of your own life.

You cannot force meditation, you can only create the situation. And if the situation is created rightly, then meditation happens automatically.

Meditation is not something you do in the morning and you are finished with it, meditation is something that you have to go on living every moment of your life. Walking, sleeping, sitting, talking, listening - it has to become a kind of climate. A relaxed person remains in it. A person who goes on dropping the past remains meditative.

In Tibetan, authentic presence is wangthang, which literally means, 'field of power'... The cause or the virtue that brings about authentic presence is emptying out and letting go. You have to be without clinging.

Meditation does not mean you have to grin every moment of your life, but to learn to let your bones smile.

Meditation is not to get out of society, to escape from society, but to prepare for a reentery into society.

Meditation is the direct means of eradicating the very cause of the majority of diseases, both mental and physical.

Meditation means learning how to get out of this current, sit by its bank and listen to it, learn from it, and then use its energies to guide us.

Mindfulness practice means that we commit fully in each moment to be present; inviting ourselves to interface with this moment in full awareness, with the intention to embody as best we can an orientation of calmness, mindfulness, and equanimity right here and right now.

The practice of Transcendental Meditation creates a natural situation in the mind so that the mind entertains right thoughts, useful thoughts, thoughts that are cherished by nature and whose fulfillment is worked out by all the laws of nature.

Meditation depends upon the strength of mind. It must be unceasing even when one is engaged in work. Particular time for it is meant for novices.

Mindfulness is a way to rebalance ourselves. Instead of being lost in thought, or caught up in emotional upheaval, we can tip the scale in the direction of greater equanimity, clarity, wisdom, and self-compassion by actually learning how to inhabit that other dimension of our being.

Mindfulness is like that—it is the miracle which can call back in a flash our dispersed mind and restore it to wholeness so that we can live each minute of life.

Meditation is nothing but a way to learn how to do a thing totally - once you have learnt, make your whole life a meditation, forget all about meditations, let the life be the only law, let the life be the only meditation. And then time disappears.

Meditation is a powerful and full study as can effectually taste and employ themselves.

Meditation is the means through which the Soul dictates and guides the mind for all good.