Spiritual Quotes

Meditation

The one who takes sufficient time in the quiet mentally to form his ideals, sufficient time to make and to keep continually his conscious connection with the Infinite, with the Divine life and forces, is the one who is best adapted to the strenuous life. He it is who can go out and deal, with sagacity and power, with whatever issues may arise in the affairs of everyday life. He it is who is building not for the years but for the centuries; not for time, but for the eternities. And he can go out knowing not whither he goes, knowing that the Divine life within him will never fail him, but will lead him on until he beholds the Father face to face. —Ralph Waldo Trine, Character-Building Thought Power

If we in the Occident would take more time from the rush and activity of life for contemplation, for meditation, for idealization, for becoming acquainted with our real selves, and then go about our work manifesting the powers of our real selves, we would be far better off, because we would be living a more natural, a more normal life. To find one's centre, to become centred in the Infinite, is the first great essential of every satisfactory life; and then to go out, thinking, speaking, working, loving, living, from this centre. —Ralph Waldo Trine, Character-Building Thought Power

[Meditation exercise:] Be sure to relax. Let go, both mentally and physically; always do this; never try to do any mental work under pressure; see that there are no tense muscles or nerves, that you are entirely comfortable. Now realize your unity with omnipotence; get into touch with this power, come into a deep and vital understanding, appreciation, and realization of the fact that your ability to think is your ability to act upon the Universal Mind and bring it into manifestation. Realize that it will meet any and every requirement; that you have exactly the same potential ability which any individual ever did have or ever will have, because each is but an expression or manifestation of the One. All are parts of the whole. There is no difference in kind or quality—the only difference being one of degree. —Charles Haanel, The Master Key System

Consider the significance of silence: it is boundless, never by meditating to be exhausted, unspeakably profitable to thee! Cease that chaotic hubbub, wherein thy own soul runs to waste, to confused suicidal dislocation and stupor; out of silence comes thy strength. Speech is silvern, silence is golden; speech is human, silence is divine. —Carlyle, quoted by Charles Fillmore in Teach Us to Pray

In the silence when his mind is fixed steadily on God and is functioning in the consciousness of infinite love, the activities of man’s brain cells synchronize with those of the very brain cells of the Master. Even the intelligent principle of the love center responds, and thus man becomes a spiritual radio with power to receive radiations from Divine Mind as well as power to broadcast them throughout his whole organism. He even is able to broadcast them throughout his environment near and far, an ability that is limited only by the spiritual power he has developed. —Charles Fillmore, Teach Us to Pray

Man came out of God, is of the same mind elements, and exists within the mind of God always. Yet by thinking that he is separate from omnipresent Spirit he has set up a mental state of apartness from his source and he dwells in ignorance of that which is nearer to him than hands and feet. A few moments of thought daily directed toward God in acknowledgment of His presence will convince anyone that there is an intelligence always with us that responds to our thought when we direct our attention to it. —Charles Fillmore, Teach Us to Pray

Everyone must take time daily for quiet and meditation. In daily meditation lies the secret of power. No one can grow in either spiritual knowledge or power without it. Practice the presence of God just as you would practice music. No one would ever dream of becoming a master in music except by spending some time daily alone with music. Daily meditation alone with God focuses the divine presence within us and brings it to our consciousness. —H. Emilie Cady, Lessons in Truth

You may be so busy with the doing, the outgoing of love to help others (which is unselfish and Godlike as far as it goes), that you find no time to go apart. But the command, or rather the invitation, is "Come ye yourselves apart...and rest a while" (Mk. 6:31). And it is the only way in which you will ever gain definite knowledge, true wisdom, newness of experience, steadiness of purpose, or power to meet the unknown, which must come in all daily life. Doing is secondary to being. When we are consciously the Truth, it will radiate from us and accomplish the works without our ever running to and fro. If you have no time for this quiet meditation, make time, take time. Watch carefully, and you will find that there are some things, even in the active unselfish doing, which would better be left undone than that you should neglect regular meditation. —H. Emilie Cady, Lessons in Truth

When you withdraw from the world for meditation, let it not be to think of yourself or your failures, but invariably to get all your thoughts centered on God and on your relation to the Creator and Upholder of the universe. Let all the little annoying cares and anxieties go for a while, and by effort, if need be, turn your thoughts away from them to some of the simple words of the Nazarene, or of the Psalmist. Think of some Truth statement, be it ever so simple. —H. Emilie Cady, Lessons in Truth

No person, unless he has practiced it, can know how [meditation] quiets all physical nervousness, all fear, all oversensitiveness, all the little raspings of everyday life—just this hour of calm, quiet waiting alone with God. —H. Emilie Cady, Lessons in Truth

We all can learn how to turn the conscious mind toward universal Mind, or Spirit, within us. We can, by practice, learn how to make this everyday, topsy-turvy, "mind of the flesh" be still and let the mind that is in God (all-wisdom, all-love) think in us and out through us. —H. Emilie Cady, Lessons in Truth

A period of quiet and rest each day is your opportunity to establish yourself at the center of your being, the one place where the supply of life and substance is inexhaustible. God is this eternal life that we make into living. Each day you should have a period of stillness when the soul may gather sustaining power and restoring life. God gives freely; it is for us to keep the receiving channels open, to keep attuned to the realities so that our intellect does not take us out among the limited ideas of the world. The manifest man must have the sustenance that can come only from within. —Myrtle Fillmore, Healing Letters

You owe God attention. You owe God the full measure of your faith, of your thought, of your service. God abides in your mind as the wisdom that will reveal the way to you if you will quiet your thoughts from their ceaseless outer searching for ways and means. God not only gives you wisdom, God is the wisdom that can direct you into paths of peace and plenty. You cannot listen to God while your ear is given to your affairs. You can gain nothing by incessantly milling around in negative thought. You can gain all by quietly letting go of these outer appearances and laying hold of God. —Myrtle Fillmore, Healing Letters

"When you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret" (Mt. 6:6). The inner chamber is that quiet place within the heart. We are taught to center our thoughts within, and then to shut the door; that is, to close our minds to all other thinking and think about God and His goodness and love; to pray to God in secret, in the secret place of the Most High, and all things needful will be added. —Myrtle Fillmore, Healing Letters

Intensify your thought by meditating upon the fact that there is that in you which finds the way, which is the Truth and is the Life. You are affirming this fact, believing that since you are thinking this, it is already yours. Having lifted up your feeling to the central idea of this meditation, you examine your own consciousness and see if there is aught which is unlike God. If there is any feeling of fear, worry, malice, envy, hatred, or jealousy turn back in your meditation to cleanse your thought through the affirmation that God’s love and purity fills all space, including your heart and soul. Reconcile your thought with the love of God, always remembering that: You are made in the Image and Likeness of Love. Keep this cleansing thought in mind until you feel that you have freed your consciousness entirely of all thoughts and feelings other than: Love and Unity with all Humanity. —Genevieve Behrend, Your Invisible Power

Man, as a spiritual being, cannot be maintained in strength, uprightness, and peace except he periodically withdraw himself from the outer world of perishable things and reach inwardly towards the abiding and imperishable realities. —James Allen, Byways of Blessedness

While a man is absorbed in the contemplation of inward realities he is receiving knowledge and power; he opens himself, like a flower, to the universal light of Truth, and receives and drinks in its life-imparting rays; he also goes to the eternal foundation of knowledge and quenches his thirst in its inspiring waters. Such a man gains, in one hour of concentrated thought, more essential knowledge than a whole year’s reading could impart. Being is infinite and knowledge is illimitable and its source inexhaustible, and he who draws upon the innermost depths of his being drinks from the spring of divine wisdom which can never run dry, and quaffs the waters of immortality. —James Allen, Byways of Blessedness

The greatest help to spiritual life is meditation (Dhyana). In meditation we divest ourselves of all material conditions and feel our divine nature. We do not depend upon any external help in meditation. The touch of the soul can paint the brightest color even in the dingiest places; it can cast a fragrance over the vilest thing; it can make the wicked divine—and all enmity, all selfishness is effaced. The less the thought of the body, the better. For it is the body that drags us down. It is attachment, identification, which makes us miserable. That is the secret: To think that I am the spirit and not the body, and that the whole of this universe with all its relations, with all its good and all its evil, is but as a series of paintings—scenes on a canvas—of which I am the witness. —Swami Vivekananda, The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda (8 Vol. set), Volume 2

Meditation centered upon divine realities is the very essence and soul of prayer. It is the silent reaching upward of the soul toward the Eternal. Meditation is the intense dwelling, in thought, upon an idea or theme with the object of thoroughly comprehending it; and whatsoever you constantly meditate upon, you will not only come to understand, but will grow more and more into its likeness, for it will become incorporated with your very being, will become, in fact, your very self. —James Allen, Morning and Evening Thoughts