Although Ribhu taught his disciple the supreme Truth of the One Brahman without a second, Nidagha, in s pite of his erudition and understanding, did not get sufficient conviction to adopt and follow the path of jnana, but settled down in his native town to lead a life devoted to the observance of ceremonial religion.
But the Sage loved his disciple as deeply as the latter venerated his Master. In spite of his age, Ribhu would himself go to his disciple in the town, just to see how far the latter had outgrown his ritualism. At times the Sage went in disguise, so that he might observe how Nidagha would act when he did not know that he was being observed by his Master.
On one such occasion Ribhu, who had put on the disguise of a village rustic, found Nidagha intently watching a royal procession. Unrecognised by the town dweller Nidagha, the village rustic enquired what the bustle was all about, and was told that the king was going in procession.
“Oh! It is the king. He goes in procession! But where is he?” asked the rustic.
“There, on the elephant”, said Nidagha.
“You say the king is on the elephant. Yes, I see the two”, said the rustic, “But which is the king and which is the elephant?”
“What!” exclaimed Nidagha, “You see the two, but do not know that the man above is the king and the animal below is the elephant? Where is the use of talking to a man like you?”
“Pray, be not impatient with an ignorant man like me”, begged the rustic. “But you said ‘above’ and ‘below’, what do they mean?”
Nidagha could stand it no more. “You see the king and the elephant, the one above and the other below. Yet you want to know what is meant by ‘above’ and ‘below’?” burst out Nidagha. “If things seen and words spoken can convey so little to you, action alone can teach you. Bend forward, and you will know it all too well”.
The rustic did as he was told. Nidagha got on his shoulders and said “Know it now. I am above as the king, you are below as the elephant. Is that clear enough?”
“No, not yet”, was the rustic’s quiet reply. “You say you are above like the king, and I am below like the elephant. The ‘king’, the ‘elephant’, ‘above’ and ‘below’, so far it is clear. But pray, tell me what you mean by ‘I’ and ‘you’?”
When Nidagha was thus confronted all of a sudden with the mighty problem of defining the ‘you’ apart from the ‘I’, light dawned on his mind. At once he jumped down and fell at his Master’s feet saying, “Who else but my venerable Master, Ribhu, could have thus drawn my mind from the superficialities of physical existence to the true Being of the Self? Oh, benign Master, I crave thy blessings”.
Therefore, while your aim is to transcend here and now these superficialities of physical existence through atma vichara, where is the scope for making the distinctions of ‘you’ and ‘I’, which pertain only to the body? When you turn the mind within, seeking the source of thought, where is the ‘you’ and where is the ‘I’?
You should seek and be the Self that includes all.
http://selfdefinition.org/ramana/Maharshi's-Gospel.pdf
Not thinking about anything is Zen.
Once you know this,
walking, sitting or lying down,
everything you do is Zen.
-Bodhidharma
No snow flake ever falls
in the wrong place.
-Zen Proverb
If you are unable to find the truth
right where you are,
where else do you expect to find it?
― Dōgen
He knows not where he's going,
For the ocean will decide,
Its not the destination,
It's the glory of the ride.
― Edward Monkton, Zen Dog
You are full of your own opinions and speculations.
How can I show you Zen unless you first empty your up?
― Nyogen Senzaki
Your Treasure House is in yourself,
it contains all you need
― Hui Hai, Zen Teaching of Instantaneous Awakening
If you wish to see the truth then hold
no opinion for or against.
The struggle of what one likes and what one dislikes
is the disease of the mind.
― Sengcan, Hsin Hsin Ming
Zen is the purest of meditations:
just sit silently, doing nothing.
― Osho
When you do something,
you should burn yourself up completely,
like a good bonfire,
leaving no trace of yourself.
– Shunryu Suzuki
One must be deeply aware of the impermanence of the world.
– Dogen
Zen has no business with ideas.
– D.T. Suzuki
When an ordinary man attains knowledge,
he is a sage;
when a sage attains understanding,
he is an ordinary man.
– Zen Proverb
Only when you can be extremely pliable and soft
can you be extremely hard and strong.
– Zen Proverb
To follow the path,
look to the master,
follow the master,
walk with the master,
see through the master,
become the master.
– Zen Proverb
All the things that truly matter,
beauty, love, creativity, joy and inner peace
arise from beyond the mind.
– Eckhart Tolle
No thought,
no reflection,
no analysis,
no cultivation,
no intention;
let it settle itself.
– Tilopa
The whole moon and the entire sky
are reflected in one dewdrop
on the grass.
-Dogen
The meaning of life is just to be alive.
It is so plain and so obvious and so simple.
And yet, everybody rushes around in a great panic
as if it were necessary to achieve something beyond themselves.
– Alan Watts
Life isn’t as serious
as the mind makes it out to be.
– Eckhart Tolle
Every being is in search of truth,
but small fears go on preventing you.
– Osho
Truth can be reached only through
the comprehension of opposites.
― Okakura Kakuzō, The Book of Tea
The ignorant eschew phenomena but not thought;
the wise eschew thought but not phenomena.
― Huang Po
When walking, walk.
When eating, eat.
-Zen Proverb
Sound of one hand clapping.
-Zen koan
The goose is out
-Zen koan
Does a dog have Buddha-nature?
-Zen koan
Not the flag, not the wind; mind is moving
-Zen koan
I felt in need of a great pilgrimage,
so I sat still for three days and God came to me.
The essence of life is in remembering God.
You have left Your Beloved and are thinking of others:
and this is why your work is in vain.
The home is the abiding place; in the home is reality;
the home helps to attain Him Who is real.
So stay where you are, and all things shall come to you in time.
When the flower opens, the bees will come.
Be quiet in your mind,
quiet in your senses,
and also quiet in your body.
Then, when all these are quiet,
don't do anything.
In that state truth will reveal itself to you.
If you don't break your ropes while you're alive,
do you think ghosts will do it after?
As long as a human being worries about when he will die,
and what he has that is his,
all of his works are zero.
When affection for the I-creature and what it owns is dead,
then the work of the Teacher is over.
Only they are pure
who’ve completely cleansed their thinking.
Slowly slowly O mind...
Everything in own pace happens,
Gardner may water a hundred buckets...
Fruit arrives only in its season.
All know that the drop merges into the ocean
but few know that the ocean merges into the drop.
I've burned my own house down, the torch is in my hand.
Now I'll burn down the house of anyone who wants to follow me.
The stone neither speaks nor gives anything.
Therefore its service is fruitless and its worship is of no avail.
Love does not grow on trees or brought in the market,
but if one wants to be "LOVED"
one must first know how to give (unconditional) LOVE..
Listen, my friend.
He who loves understands.
He is the real Guru Who can reveal
the form of the formless before your eyes;
who teaches the simple path, without rites or ceremonies;
Who does not make you close your doors,
and hold your breath, and renounce the world;
Who makes you perceive the Supreme Spirit
whenever the mind attaches itself;
Who teaches you to be still
in the midst of all your activities.
Fearless, always immersed in bliss,
he keeps the spirit of yoga in the midst of enjoyments.
The purpose of labor is to learn;
when you know it, the labor is over.
Do what you do with another human being,
but never put them out of your heart.
A diamond was laying in the street covered with dirt.
Many fools passed by.
Someone who knew diamonds picked it up.
Wherever you are is the entry point.
My heart is so intoxicated with love
that I have no wish to speak.
Listen to your own Self.
If you listen to that Self within,
then you find the Truth.
Do not go to the garden of flowers!
O friend! go not there;
In your body is the garden of flowers.
Take your seat on the thousand petals of the lotus,
and there gaze on the infinite beauty.
He comes to the Path of the Infinite
on whom the grace of the Lord descends:
he is freed from births and deaths who attains to Him.
When you meet the true Guru, He will awaken your heart;
He will tell you the secret of love and detachment,
and then you will know indeed that He transcends this universe.
He is the Ultimate Rest unbounded:
He has spread His form of love throughout all the world.
From that Ray which is Truth,
streams of new forms are perpetually springing:
and He pervades those forms.
Hang up the swing of love today!
Hang the body and the mind between the arms of the beloved,
in the ecstasy of love’s joy.
I went looking for Him
And lost myself;
The drop merged with the Sea --
Who can find it now?
Looking and looking for Him
I lost myself;
The Sea merged with the drop --
Who can find it now?
When you really look for me you will see me instantly.
Look at you, you madman!
Screaming you are thirsty and dying in a desert,
when all around you there is nothing but water!
Many have died; you also will die.
The drum of death is being beaten.
The world has fallen in love with a dream.
Only sayings of the wise will remain.
I laugh when I hear that the fish in the water is thirsty.
You don't grasp the fact that
what is most alive of all is inside your own house;
and so you walk from one holy city to the next with a confused look!
Are you looking for the Holy One? I am in the next seat. My shoulder is against yours.
Admire the diamond that can bear the hits of a hammer.
Many deceptive preachers, when critically examined, turn out to be false.
Listen to me, my Friend! My beloved Lord is within.
When the Guest is being searched for,
it is the intensity of the longing for the Guest
that does all the work.
The flute of the infinite is played without ceasing,
and its sound is love.
The Beloved is inside you and also inside me.
You know the tree is hidden inside the seed.
Let your arrogance go. None of us has gone far.
Inside love there is more power than we realize.
It will never be possible by pure reason
to arrive at some absolute truth.
Revere those things beyond science which really matter
and about which it is so difficult to speak.
The reality we can put into words is never reality itself.
Every word or concept, clear as it may seem to be,
has only a limited range of applicability.
The problems of language here are really serious.
We wish to speak in some way about the structure of the atoms.
But we cannot speak about atoms in ordinary language.
Whether we like it or not, modern ways are going to alter
and in part destroy traditional customs and values.
Light and matter are both single entities,
and the apparent duality arises in the limitations of our language.
Looking at something changes it.
The 'path' comes into existence only when we observe it.
The very act of observing disturbs the system.
...separation of the observer from the phenomenon to be observed
is no longer possible.
There is a fundamental error in separating the parts from the whole,
the mistake of atomizing what should not be atomized.
Unity and complementarity constitute reality.
My mind was formed by studying philosophy,
Plato and that sort of thing.
What we observe is not nature itself,
but nature exposed to our method of questioning.
Whenever we proceed from the known into the unknown we may hope to understand,
but we may have to learn at the same time a new meaning of the word "understanding."
The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences
will turn you into an atheist,
but at the bottom of the glass
God is waiting for you.
The atoms or elementary particles themselves are not real;
they form a world of potentialities or possibilities
rather than one of things or facts.
In classical physics, science started from the belief –
or should one say, from the illusion? –
that we could describe the world, or least parts of the world,
without any reference to ourselves.
The existing scientific concepts cover always only a very limited part of reality,
and the other part that has not yet been understood is infinite.
Not only is the Universe stranger than we think,
it is stranger than we can think.
There are things that are so serious
that you can only joke about them.
The conception of objective reality … has thus evaporated …
into the transparent clarity of mathematics
that represents no longer the behavior of particles
but rather our knowledge of this behavior.
It was about three o’clock at night when the final result of the calculation
[which gave birth to quantum mechanics] lay before me ...
At first I was deeply shaken ...
I was so excited that I could not think of sleep.
So I left the house ... and awaited the sunrise on top of a rock.
I had always looked upon the search for the absolute
as the noblest and most worth while task of science.
I regard consciousness as fundamental.
I regard matter as derivative from consciousness.
We cannot get behind consciousness.
Everything that we talk about,
everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness.
It was not by any accident that
the greatest thinkers of all ages were deeply religious souls.
There is a real world independent of our senses;
the laws of nature were not invented by man,
but forced on him by the natural world.
They are the expression of a natural world order.
It is not the possession of truth,
but the success which attends the seeking after it,
that enriches the seeker and brings happiness to him.
Science cannot solve the ultimate mystery of nature.
And that is because, in the last analysis,
we ourselves are a part of the mystery that we are trying to solve.
Whence come I and whither go I?
That is the great unfathomable question,
the same for every one of us.
Science has no answer to it.
Both religion and science require a belief in God.
For believers, God is in the beginning,
and for physicists He is at the end of all considerations…
To the former He is the foundation,
to the latter, the crown of the edifice of every generalized world view.
The pioneer scientist must have a vivid intuitive imagination,
for new ideas are not generated by deduction,
but by artistically creative imagination.
Recourse to Him produces an increased feeling of safety and happiness
in the human being thirsting for solace.
That God existed before there were human beings on Earth,
that He holds the entire world, believers and non-believers,
in His omnipotent hand for eternity, and that He will remain enthroned
on a level inaccessible to human comprehension
long after the Earth and everything that is on it has gone to ruins;
those who profess this faith and who, inspired by it,
in veneration and complete confidence,
feel secure from the dangers of life under protection of the Almighty,
only those may number themselves among the truly religious.
When you change the way you look at things,
the things you look at change.
The man who cannot occasionally imagine events and conditions of existence
that are contrary to the causal principle
as he knows it will never enrich his science
by the addition of a new idea.
Science enhances the moral value of life,
because it furthers a love of truth and reverence—love of truth displaying itself
in the constant endeavor to arrive at a more exact knowledge
of the world of mind and matter around us,
and reverence, because every advance in knowledge brings us
face to face with the mystery of our own being.
There is no matter as such. All matter originates
and exists only by virtue of a force
which brings the particle of an atom to vibration
and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together.
We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind.
This mind is the matrix of all matter.
Scientific discovery and scientific knowledge have been achieved
only by those who have gone in pursuit of it
without any practical purpose whatsoever in view.
What seems today inconceivable will appear one day,
from a higher stand point,
quite simple and harmonious.
Those [scientists] who dislike entertaining contradictory thoughts
are unlikely to enrich their science with new ideas.
We have no right to assume that any physical laws exist,
or if they have existed up until now,
that they will continue to exist in a similar manner in the future.
Anybody who has been seriously engaged in scientific work of any kind realizes that
over the entrance to the gates of the temple of science are written the words: Ye must have faith.
It is a quality which the scientist cannot dispense with.
New scientific ideas never spring from a communal body,
however organized, but rather from the head of an individually inspired researcher
who struggles with his problems in lonely thought
and unites all his thought on one single point which is his whole world for the moment.
Science…means unresting endeavor and continually progressing development
toward an aim which the poetic intuition may apprehend,
but the intellect can never fully grasp.
Modern physics has taught us that the nature of any system
cannot be discovered by dividing it into its component parts
and studying each part by itself...
We must keep our attention fixed on the whole
and on the interconnection between the parts.
The same is true of our intellectual life.
It is impossible to make a clear cut between science, religion, and art.
The whole is never equal simply to the sum of its various parts.
We cannot rest and sit down lest we rust and decay.
Health is maintained only through work.
And as it is with all life so it is with science.
We are always struggling from the relative to the absolute.
Most persons are so absorbed
in the contemplation of the outside world
that they are wholly oblivious to
what is passing on within themselves.
If you want to find the secrets of the universe,
think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration.
But instinct is something which transcends knowledge.
We have, undoubtedly, certain finer fibers
that enable us to perceive truths when logical deduction,
or any other willful effort of the brain, is futile.
Everyone should consider his body as a priceless gift
from one whom he loves above all,
a marvelous work of art,
of indescribable beauty, and
mystery beyond human conception,
and so delicate that a word, a breath, a look,
nay, a thought may injure it.
My brain is only a receiver,
in the Universe there is a core
from which we obtain knowledge, strength and inspiration.
I have not penetrated into the secrets of this core,
but I know that it exists.
As I review the events of my past life
I realize how subtle are the influences
that shape our destinies.
I do not think there is any thrill
that can go through the human heart
like that felt by the inventor as
he sees some creation of the brain unfolding to success…
such emotions make a man forget food, sleep, friends, love, everything.
Invention is the most important product of man’s creative brain.
The ultimate purpose is
the complete mastery of mind over the material world,
the harnessing of human nature to human needs.
The desire that guides me in all I do is
the desire to harness the forces of nature to the service of mankind.
If your hate could be turned into electricity,
it would light up the whole world.
The day science begins to study non-physical phenomena,
it will make more progress in one decade
than in all the previous centuries of its existence.
What we now want is closer contact and better understanding
between individuals and communities all over the earth,
and the elimination of egoism and pride
which is always prone to plunge the world
into primeval barbarism and strife...
Peace can only come as a natural
consequence of universal enlightenment.
Be alone, that is the secret of invention;
be alone, that is when ideas are born.
The scientists of today
think deeply instead of clearly.
One must be sane to think clearly,
but one can think deeply and be quite insane.
There is no memory or retentive faculty
based on lasting impression.
What we designate as memory
is but increased responsiveness to repeated stimuli.
We crave for new sensations
but soon become indifferent to them.
The wonders of yesterday are
today common occurrences.
The gift of mental power comes from God, Divine Being,
and if we concentrate our minds on that truth,
we become in tune with this great power.
Its not the love you make.
It's the love you give.
I never made one of my discoveries
through the process of rational thinking.
Three great forces rule the world:
stupidity, fear and greed.
Life is a Mystery,
not a problem waiting to be solved.
The significant problems we have cannot be solved
at the same level of thinking with which we created them.
Time is an illusion.
The separation between past, present and future
is only an illusion, although a convincing one.
Our separation from each other is an optical illusion.
Once we accept our limits,
we go beyond them.
It is a wonderful feeling to recognize the unifying features
of a complex of phenomena
which present themselves as quite unconnected
to the direct experience of the senses.
Two things are infinite:
the universe and human stupidity;
and I'm not sure about the universe.
Morality is of the highest importance
-- but for us, not for God.
There is nothing divine about morality,
it is a purely human affair.
Don't do anything that goes against your conscience,
even if your country says so.
It is humankind's duty to respect all life,
not only animals have feelings but even also trees and plants.
The fear of death is the most unjustified of all fears,
for there's no risk of accident for someone who's dead.
The only real valuable thing is intuition.
That which is impenetrable to us really exists.
Behind the secrets of nature remains something subtle, intangible, and inexplicable.
Veneration for this force beyond anything that we can comprehend is my religion.
Creativity is contagious. Pass it on.
Intelligence is not the ability to store information,
but to know where to find it.
Past is dead
Future is uncertain;
Present is all you have,
So eat, drink and live merry.
True genius never says he know what he is doing.
The world we have created is a product of our thinking.
It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.
When we change the way we look at things,
the things we look at change.
Learn from yesterday,
live for today,
hope for tomorrow.
Nothing truly valuable can be achieved except
by the unselfish cooperation of many individuals.
Energy cannot be created or destroyed,
it can only be changed from one form to another.
A ship is always safe at the shore -
but that is NOT what it is built for.
If you want to live a happy life,
tie it to a goal, not to people or things.
Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile.
If I had an hour to solve a problem
I'd spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem
and 5 minutes thinking about solutions.
Anyone who has never made a mistake
has never tried anything new.
Love is a better teacher than duty.
Anger dwells only in the bossom of fools.
I never think of the future -
it comes soon enough.
Solitude is painful when one is young, but delightful when one is more mature.
The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil,
but by those who watch them without doing anything
The important thing is not to stop questioning.
Curiosity has its own reason for existing.
Try not to become a man of success,
but rather try to become a man of value.
Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile.
Look deep into nature,
and then you will understand everything better.
Peace cannot be kept by force;
it can only be achieved by understanding.
When you are courting a nice girl an hour seems like a second.
When you sit on a red-hot cinder a second seems like an hour. That's relativity.
The only source of knowledge is experience.
As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality.
If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.
There are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle; you can live as if everything is a miracle.
I am not a genius, I am just curious. I ask many questions. and when the answer is simple, then God is answering.
I have no special talent. I am only passionately curious.
Those who have the privilege to know have the duty to act.
The value of a college education is not the learning of many facts
but the training of the mind to think.
Three Rules of Work:
Out of clutter find simplicity.
From discord find harmony.
In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.
There comes a time when the mind
takes a higher plane of knowledge
but can never prove how it got there.
Be a loner. That gives you time to wonder,
to search for the truth.
Have holy curiosity.
Make your life worth living.
A man should look for what is,
and not for what he thinks should be.
Any man who reads too much
and uses his own brain too little
falls into lazy habits of thinking.
The value of a man should be seen
in what he gives and
not in what he is able to receive.
The pursuit of truth and beauty is a sphere of activity
in which we are permitted to remain children all our lives.
Great spirits have always encountered
violent opposition from mediocre minds.
Our task must be to free ourselves
by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures
and the whole of nature and its beauty.
God always takes the simplest way.
The best way to cheer yourself is to cheer somebody else up.
Men marry women with the hope they will never change.
Women marry men with the hope they will change.
Invariably they are both disappointed.
The woman who follows the crowd
will usually go no further than the crowd.
The woman who walks alone
is likely to find herself in places
no one has ever been before.
Everything is energy and that's all there is.
Match the frequency of the reality you want
and you cannot help but get that reality.
It can be no other way.
This is not philosophy. This is physics.
The Reality of The Other Person Lies
Not In What He Reveals To You,
But What He Cannot Reveal To You.
Therefore, If You Would Understand Him,
Listen Not To What He Says,
But Rather To What He Does Not Say.
― Kahlil Gibran
Friendship is always a sweet responsibility,
never an opportunity.
-Khalil Gibran
When you love you should not think
you can direct the course of love,
for love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.
― Kahlil Gibran
Love descends upon our souls by the will of God
and not by the demand or the plea of the individual.
― Kahlil Gibran, Spirits Rebellious
He who seeks ecstasy in love should not complain of suffering.
― Kahlil Gibran, Visions of the Prophet
Love gives naught but itself and takes naught but from itself,
Love possesses not nor would it be possessed:
For love is sufficient unto love.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
It is wrong to think that love comes from
long companionship and persevering courtship.
Love is the offspring of spiritual affinity
and unless that affinity is created in a moment,
it will not be created for years or even generations.
― Kahlil Gibran
It takes a minute to have a crush on someone,
an hour to like someone, and a day to love someone...
but it takes a lifetime to forget someone.
― Kahlil Gibran
You may forget with whom you laughed,
but you will never forget with whom you wept.
― Kahlil Gibran, Sand and Foam
In one drop of water are found all the secrets of all the oceans;
in one aspect of You are found all the aspects of existence.
― Kahlil Gibran
Only love and death, are capable of changing everything.
― Kahlil Gibran
You give but little when you give of your possessions.
It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
You were born together, and together you shall be for evermore.
You shall be together when the white wings of death scatter your days.
Aye, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God.
But let there be spaces in your togetherness.
And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.
Love one another, but make not a bond of love:
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.
Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.
Sing and dance together and be joyous,
but let each one of you be alone,
Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.
Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping.
For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.
And stand together yet not too near together:
For the pillars of the temple stand apart,
And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
Hearts united in pain and sorrow
will not be separated by joy and happiness.
Bonds that are woven in sadness
are stronger than the ties of joy and pleasure.
Love that is washed by tears
will remain eternally pure and faithful.
― Kahlil Gibran, Love Letters in the Sand: The Love Poems of Khalil Gibran
When you are joyous,
look deep into your heart and you shall find it
is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.
When you are sorrowful,
look again in your heart, and you shall see that
in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
Tenderness and kindness are not signs of weakness and despair,
but manifestations of strength and resolution.
― Kahlil Gibran
If you love somebody, let them go,
for if they return, they were always yours.
And if they don't, they never were.
- Khalil Gibran
My friend, I am not what I seem.
Seeming is but a garment I wear —
a care-woven garment that protects me from thy questionings
and thee from my negligence.
The "I" in me, my friend, dwells in the house of silence,
and therein it shall remain for ever more, unperceived, unapproachable.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Madman
The feelings we live through
in love and in loneliness
are simply, for us,
what high tide
and low tide are to the sea.
― Kahlil Gibran, Love Letters in the Sand: The Love Poems of Khalil Gibran
If the other person injures you,
you may forget the injury;
but if you injure him you will always remember
― Kahlil Gibran
Between what is said and not meant,
and what is meant and not said,
most of love is lost.
― Kahlil Gibran
One day you will ask me which is more important?
My life or yours?
I will say mine and you will walk away
not knowing that you are my life.
― Kahlil Gibran
Men who do not forgive women their little faults
will never enjoy their great virtues.
― Kahlil Gibran, Sand and Foam
Beauty is eternity gazing at itself in a mirror.
But you are eternity and you are the mirror.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
To understand the heart and mind of a person,
look not at what he has already achieved,
but at what he aspires to.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Madman
You are far, far greater than you know -
and all is well.
― Kahlil Gibran
Your daily life is your temple and your religion.
When you enter into it take with you your all.
― Kahlil Gibran
And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter,
and sharing of pleasures.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
Listen to the women when she looks at you,
not when she talks to you.
― Kahlil Gibran
That deepest thing, that recognition, that knowledge, that sense of kinship
began the first time I saw you,and it is the same now -
only a thousand times deeper and tenderer.
I shall love you to eternity.
I loved you long before we met in this flesh.
I knew that when I first saw you.
It was destiny.
We are together like this and nothing can shake us apart.
― Kahlil Gibran
Trust in dreams,
for in them is the hidden gate to eternity.
― Kahlil Gibran
When you reach the end of what you should know,
you will be at the beginning of what you should sense.
― Kahlil Gibran, Sand and Foam
It is well to give when asked,
but it is better to give unasked, through understanding;
and to the open-handed the search for
one who shall receive is joy greater than giving.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
And God said Love Your Enemy,
and I obeyed him and loved myself.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Broken Wings
Truth is a deep kindness that teaches us
to be content in our everyday life
and share with the people the same happiness.
― Kahlil Gibran
Life unfolds itself in mysteries ways.
― Kahlil Gibran
God has created several doors which open onto truth.
He opens them to all those who knock on them with the hand of faith.
― Kahlil Gibran
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
There are those who give with joy,
and that joy is their reward.
― Kahlil Gibran
A man's true wealth is
the good he does in the world.
― Kahlil Gibran
But you who walk facing the sun,
what images drawn on the earth can hold you?
― Kahlil Gibran
I came here to be for all and with all,
and what I do today in my solitude
will be echoed tomorrow by the multitude.
What I say now with one heart
will be said tomorrow by thousands of hearts...
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet and Other Writings
I abstain from the people who consider
insolence bravery and tenderness cowardice.
And I abstain from those who consider
chatter wisdom and silence ignorance.
― Kahlil Gibran, Mirrors of the Soul
Love gives nothing but itself,
and takes nothing but from itself.
Love does not possess, nor would it be possessed.
And do not think that you can direct the course of love, for love,
if it finds you worthy, directs your course.
Love has no other desire but to fulfill itself.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
Your friend is your needs answered.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
There is a desire deep within the soul
which drives man from the seen to the unseen,
to philosophy and to the divine.
― Kahlil Gibran
What is it to work with love?
It is to weave the cloth with threads drawn from your heart,
even as if your beloved were to wear that cloth.
It is to build a house with affection,
even as if your beloved were to dwell in that house.
It is to sow seeds with tenderness and reap the harvest with joy,
even as if your beloved were to eat the fruit.
Work is love made visible.
― Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet
Ever has it been that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation.
-Kahlil Gibran
Women opened the windows of my eyes and the doors of my spirit. Had it not been for the woman-mother, the woman-sister, and the woman-friend, I would have been sleeping among those who seek the tranquility of the world with their snoring.
-Khalil Gibran
The mother is everything-she is our consolation in sorrow, our hope in misery, and our strength in weakness. She is the source of love, mercy, sympathy, and forgiveness. He who loses his mother loses a pure soul who blesses and guards him constantly.
-Khalil Gibran
The teacher who walks in the shadow of the temple, among his followers, gives not of his wisdom but rather of his faith and his lovingness. If he is indeed wise he does not bid you enter the house of his wisdom, but rather leads you to the threshold of your own mind.
-Khalil Gibran
Perplexity is the beginning of knowledge.
-Khalil Gibran
Time is the cruelest teacher; first she gives the test, then teaches the lesson.
-Khalil Gibran
Your daily life is your temple and your religion.
-Khalil Gibran
