Paramahamsa Yogananda
Quotes
An influential spiritual teacher who introduced Kriya Yoga to the Western world. Known for his book, "Autobiography of a Yogi," he emphasized the unity of all religions and the potential for personal spiritual realization. His teachings blend Eastern philosophies with practical spiritual techniques aimed at achieving inner peace and self-realization. He founded the Self-Realization Fellowship to disseminate his teachings and promote a universal approach to spirituality. His legacy includes a significant impact on the Western understanding of meditation and spiritual practices.
Paramahamsa Yogananda
Quotes
An influential spiritual teacher who introduced Kriya Yoga to the Western world. Known for his book, "Autobiography of a Yogi," he emphasized the unity of all religions and the potential for personal spiritual realization. His teachings blend Eastern philosophies with practical spiritual techniques aimed at achieving inner peace and self-realization. He founded the Self-Realization Fellowship to disseminate his teachings and promote a universal approach to spirituality. His legacy includes a significant impact on the Western understanding of meditation and spiritual practices.
I could not think of being unkind, even to a mortal enemy. It would hurt me. I see so much unkindness in the world, and there is no excuse for me to add to it.
To the last day of your life, be positive; try to be cheerful. Even at the very end, don't think, "I am finished." Instead of pitying yourself, you should be thinking, "O ye who are left on this desolate shore still to mourn and deplore, it is I who pity you." Death will not give you any trouble if you have a clear conscience; and if you go with this thought: "Lord, I am in Thy hands."
When you exercise your will power you release the power of life energy - not when you merely wish passively to be able to obtain an objective.
Kindness is the light that dissolves all walls between souls, families, and nations.
The season of failure is the best time for sowing the seeds of success.
No matter what you are doing, keep the undercurrent of happiness...
You have come to earth to entertain and to be entertained.
When the mind is calm, how quickly, how smoothly, how beautifully you will perceive everything.
The scenery of mountains painted on the ever-changing azure canvas of the sky, the mysterious mechanism of the human body, the rose, the green grass carpet, the magnanimity of souls, the loftiness of minds, the depth of love - all these things remind us of a God who is beautiful and noble.
It doesn't matter if a cave has been in darkness for 10,000 years...
Love is the heartbeat of all life.
He who is persistent will realize God. So try your best to make meditation a regular experience in your life.
Be as simple as you can be; you will be astonished to see how uncomplicated and happy your life can become.
The greatest dread of ordinary man is death, with its rude imposition interrupting fortuitous plans and fondest attachments with an unknown and unwelcome change. The yogi is a conqueror of the grief associated with death. By control of mind and life force and the development of wisdom, he makes friends with the change of consciousness called death-he becomes familiar with the state of inner calmness and aloofness from identification with the mortal body.
It takes a long time-many incarnations of right action, good company, help of the guru, self-awakening, wisdom, and meditation-for man to regain his soul consciousness of immortality. To reach this state of Self-realization, each man must practice meditation to transfer his consciousness from the limited body to the unlimited sphere of joy felt in meditation.
Retire to the center of your being, which is calmness.
When a man in the process of dreaming becomes conscious that he is dreaming, he is no longer identified with the phenomena; he is not affected exultantly or dolefully. God consciously dreams His cosmic play and is unaffected by its dualities. A yogi who perceives his real self as separate from his active senses and their objects never becomes attached to anything. He is aware of the dream nature of the universe and watches it without being entangled in its complex but ephemeral nature.
If circumstances are bad and you have to bear them, do not make them a part of yourself.
What you are is much greater than anything or anyone else you have ever yearned for. God is manifest in you in a way that He is not manifest in any other human being. Your face is unlike anyone else's, your soul is unlike anyone else's, you are sufficient unto yourself; for within your soul lies the greatest treasure of all - God.
The soul's first adventure is the fight between two ideas: the wish to return to earth in a human form, and the desire to feel the freedom of having no form.
Today I forgive all those who have ever offended me. I give my love to all thirsty hearts, both to those who love me and to those who do not love me.
Sing songs that none have sung, think thoughts that ne'er in the brain have rung, Walk in paths that none have trod, weep tears as none have shed for God, Give peace to all to whom none other gave, Claim him your own who's everywhere disclaimed. Love all with love that none have felt and Brave the battle of life with strength unchained.
At physical death man loses his consciousness of the flesh and becomes conscious of his astral body in the astral world. Thus physical death is astral birth. Later, he passes from the consciousness of luminous astral birth to the consciousness of dark astral death and awakens in a new physical body. Thus astral death is physical birth. These recurrent cycles of physical and astral encasements are the ineluctable destiny of all unenlightened men.
