RAMAKRISHNA PARAMAHANSA QUOTES

The Divine Mother revealed to me: There is only One, without a second -  it is Sat-chit-ananda alone who has assumed different forms. God Himself has become the living beings and the phenomenal world - indeed everything. It is He who has become food.

The winds of grace blow all the time. All we need to do is set our sails.

As one and the same water is called by different names by different people, some calling it 'water', some 'vari', some 'Aqua', and some 'pani, so the one Sachchidananda, Existence-Intelligence-Bliss Absolute is invoked by some as God, by some as Allah, by some as Hari, and by others as Brahman.

He is born in vain, who having attained the human birth, so difficult to get, does not attempt to realize God in this very life.

Whether you accept Rādhā and Krishna, or not, please do accept their attraction for each other. Try to create that same yearning in your heart for God. Yearning is all you need in order to realize Him.

To work without attachment is to work without the expectation of reward or fear of any punishment in this world or the next. Work so done is a means to the end, and God is the end.

When the flower blooms the bees come uninvited.

“The nearer you approach to God, the less you reason and argue. When you attain Him, then all sounds—all reasoning and disputing—come to an end. Then you go into samadhi—sleep—, into communion with God in silence.”

When one has love for God, one doesn't feel any physical attraction to wife, children, relatives and friends. One retains only compassion for them

“The supreme purpose and goal for human life…is to cultivate love.”

Disease is the tax which the soul pays for the body, as the tenant pays house-rent for the use of the house.

When you are intoxicated with divine love, you  see god in all beings.


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Message of Sri Ramakrishna
The message of Sri Ramakrishna to the modern world, which he gave through his life and through his recorded conversations, may be briefly stated as follows:

The goal of human life is the realization of the Ultimate Reality which alone can give man supreme fulfilment and everlasting peace. This is the essence of all religions.

The Ultimate Reality is one; but it is personal as well as impersonal, and is indicated by different names (such as God, Ishvar, etc) in different religions.

The Ultimate Reality can be realized through various paths taught in world religions. All religions are true in so far as they lead to the same ultimate Goal.

Purity of mind is an essential condition for the attainment of the Ultimate Reality; real purity is freedom from lust and greed. External observances are only of secondary mportance.

Through spiritual practices man can overcome his evil tendencies, and divine grace can redeem even the worst sinner. Therefore one should not brood over the past mistakes, but should develop a positive outlook on life by depending on God.

God realization is possible for all. The householders need not renounce the world; but they should pray sincerely, practise discrimination between the Eternal and the temporal and remain unattached. God listens to sincere prayer. Intense longing (vyakulata) is the secret of success in spiritual life.

God dwells in all people but the manifestation of this inner Divinity varies from person to person. In saintly people there is greater manifestation of God. Women are special manifestations of Divine Mother of the Universe, and so are to be treated with respect.

Egoism, caused by ignorance, is the root-cause of all suffering.

When the divine vision is attained, all appear equal; and there remains no distinction of good and bad, or of high and low.

"So long as the mind is unsteady and fickle, it availeth nothing, even though a man has got a good Guru and the company of Holy men."

God, Himself, has provided with different forms of worship.
Repeat God's name and sing His glories, and keep holy company; and now and then visit God's devotees and holy men
To fix the mind on God is very difficult, in the beginning, unless one practises meditation in solitude.

Bondage is of the mind; freedom too is of the mind. If you say 'I am a free soul. I am a son of God who can bind me' free you shall be

One man may read the Bhagavata by the light of a lamp, and another may commit a forgery by that very light; but the lamp is unaffected. The sun sheds its light on the wicked as well as on the virtuous.

The goal of life is not the earning of money, but the service of God.

God is in all men, but all men are not in God; that is why we suffer.

God realization is possible for all. The householders need not renounce the world; but they should pray sincerely, practise discrimination between the Eternal and the temporal and remain unattached. God listens to sincere prayer. Intense longing (vyakulata) is the secret of success in spiritual life.

The naked Sage, Totâpuri, used to say, 'If a brass pot be not rubbed daily, it will get rusty. So if a man does not contemplate the Deity daily, his heart will grow impure.' To him Srî Râmakrishna replied, 'Yes, but if the vessel be of gold, it does not require daily cleaning. The man who has reached God requires prayers or penances no more.

“You speak of doing good to the world. Is the world such a small thing? And who are you, pray, to do good to the world? First realise God, see Him by means of spiritual discipline. If He imparts power you can do good to others; otherwise not.”

Who is whose Guru? God alone is the guide and Guru of the universe.

To become great one must be humble. The tree laden with fruit always bends low. So if you wish to be great, be lowly and meek.

Do not seek illumination unless you seek it as a man whose hair is on fire seeks a pond.

Pure knowledge and pure love are one and the same thing. Pure Knowledge leads to the same goal which is
reached by pure Devotion.

That knowledge which purifies the mind and heart alone is true Knowledge, all else is only a negation of Knowledge.

As long as I live, so long do I learn.

Life is an expression of the spontaneous creativity (Lila) of God. Pleasure and pain, success and failure, etc are to be borne with patience, and one should resign oneself to God’s will under all circumstances.

God dwells in all beings. But you may be intimate only with good people; you must keep away from the evil-minded.
God undoubtedly dwells in the hearts of all—holy and unholy, righteous and unrighteous;
From time to time he should live in the company of holy men, and from time to time go into solitude to meditate on God.

Practice love, develop love, spread love and all the hatreds and jealousies will disappear.

"If you must be mad, be it not for the things of the world. Be mad with the love of God."

God is everywhere but He is most manifest in man. So serve man as God. That is as good as worshipping God.

Many are the names of God, and infinite the forms that lead us to know Him. In whatsoever name or form you desire to call Him, in that very form and name you will see Him.

Meditate upon the Knowledge and Bliss Eternal, and you will also have bliss. The Bliss indeed is eternal, only it is covered and obscured by ignorance. The less your attachment is towards the senses, the more will be your love towards God.

Why should you renounce everything? You are all right as you are, following the middle path.

Do all your duties, but keep your mind on God.
If you enter the world without first cultivating love for God, you will be entangled more and more.
One must go into solitude to attain...divine love.

Non-attachment born out of wisdom and fostered by the Grace of the Lord, that is the precious capital for spiritual advance.

First tie the nondual knowledge in the corner of your cloth; then do whatever you like.

A man can reach the roof of a house by stone stairs or a ladder or a rope-ladder or a rope or even by a bamboo pole. But he cannot reach the roof if he sets foot now on one and now on another. He should firmly follow one path. Likewise, in order to realize God a man must follow one path with all his strength. But you must regard other views as so many paths leading to God. You should not feel that your path is the only right path and that other paths are wrong. You mustn’t bear malice toward others

The goal of human life is the realization of the Ultimate Reality which alone can give man supreme fulfilment and everlasting peace. This is the essence of all religions.

Q. Where is God? How can we reach Him?
A. There are pearls in the sea; but you must dive again and again, until you find them. So God is in the world, but you will have to persevere, to see Him.

Pray to God that your attachment to such transitory things as wealth, name, and creature comforts may become less and less every day.

“If you feel proud, let it be in the thought that you are the servant of God, the son of God. Great men have the nature of a child. They are always a child before Him; so they are free from pride. All their strength is of God and not their own. It belongs to Him and comes from Him.”

Purity of mind is an essential condition for the attainment of the Ultimate Reality; real purity is freedom from lust and greed. External observances are only of secondary importance.

One must establish a relationship with God to attain Him – either the attitude of a hero, or of a female lover of the Lord, or of a handmaid, or of a child.

“Common men talk bagfuls of religion but do not practise even a grain of it. The wise man speaks a little, even though his whole life is religion expressed in action.”

When the goal of spiritual life is reached, there remains only compassion in the heart.

If you meditate on an ideal you will acquire its nature.If you think of god day & night you will acquire the nature of god. A salt doll went into the ocean to measure its depth. it became ONE with the ocean.

“In the scriptures you will find the way to realize God. But after getting all the information about the path, you must begin to work, Only then can you attain your goal.”

Many people think they cannot have knowledge or understanding of God without reading books. But hearing is better than reading, and seeing is better than hearing. Hearing about Benares is different from reading about it; but seeing Benares is different from either hearing or reading.

One cannot be spiritual as long as one has shame, hatred, or fear.

God can be felt and experienced only in the deepest silence. All noise must subside; then, His. Voice can be heard clearly.

If you say 'I am a sinner', eternally, you will remain asinner to all eternity. You ought rather to repeat, 'I am not bound, I am the son of God, the King of Kings'.

Unless one always speaks the truth, one cannot find God Who is the soul of truth.

This world is like a stage, where men perform many parts under various disguises. They do not like to take off the mask, unless they have played for some time. Let them play for a while, and then they will leave off the mask of their own accord.

You see many stars in the sky at night, but not when the sun rises. Can you therefore say that there are no stars in the heavens during the day? O man, because you cannot find God in the days of your ignorance, say not that there is no God.

If you are in right earnest to be good and pure, God will send you the sat-guru, the right Teacher . Earnestness is the one thing necessary.

Travel in all the four quarters of the earth, yet you will find nothing anywhere. Whatever there is, is only here.

“Only two kinds of people can attain self-knowledge: those who are not encumbered at all with learning, that is to say, whose minds are not over-crowded with thoughts borrowed from others; and those who, after studying all the scriptures and sciences, have come to realise that they know nothing.”

"Unalloyed love of God is the essential thing. All else is unreal."

“Knowledge leads to unity, but Ignorance to diversity.
So long as God seems to be outside and far away, there is ignorance. But when God is realised within, that is true knowledge.”

Longing is like the rosy dawn. After the dawn out comes the sun. Longing is followed by the vision of God.

When will you lie down happily between your wives, Purity and Defilement? When you see no difference between these two, then shall you see the Divine Mother Kali.

If you first fortify yourself with the true knowledge of the Universal Self, and then live in the midst of wealth and worldliness, surely they will in no way affect you.

“The young bamboo can be easily bent, but the full grown bamboo breaks when it is bent with force. It is easy to bend the young heart towards God, but the untrained heart of the old escapes the hold whenever it is so drawn”