If people but knew their own religion, how tolerant they would become, and how free from any grudge against the religion of others.

The reason why worry kills more people than work is that more people worry than work. - Robert Frost Now that all your worry has proved such an unattractive business - why not find a better job?

People of this world are deluded. They're always longing for something—always, in a word, seeking.

Load the ship and set out. No one knows for certain whether the vessel will sink or reach the harbor. Cautious people say, 'I'll do nothing until I can be sure.' Merchants know better. If you do nothing, you lose. Don't be one of those merchants who won't risk the ocean.

I think that a lot of people are making a lot of money spreading anxiety. Anxiety sells.

Many people think the mind can be controlled. That is not a useful idea. Like the monkey, the mind can never actually be controlled; it can only be directed. If you want to try to control your mind, you will regret the results. Forget the word "control" and learn to direct your mind and energy on all levels.

Some people, in order to discover God, read books. But there is a great book: the very appearance of created things. Look above you! Look below you! Read it. God, whom you want to discover, never wrote that book with ink. Instead, He set before your eyes the things that He had made. Can you ask for a louder voice than that?

It never helps to draw a line and dismiss some people as enemies, even those who act violently. We have to approach them with love in our hearts and do our best to help them move in a direction of nonviolence. If we work for peace out of anger, we will never succeed. Peace is not an end. It can never come about through non-peaceful means.

I played the vina until my heart turned into the same instrument. Then I offered this instrument to the Divine Musician, the only musician existing. Since then I have become His flute, and when He chooses, He plays His music. The people give me credit for this music which, in reality, is not due to me, but to the Musician who plays His own instrument.

Nowadays, we are confronted by a huge gap between rich and poor. This is not only morally wrong, but practically a mistake. It leads to the rich living in anxiety and the poor living in frustration, which has the potential to lead to more violence. We have to work to reduce this gap. It's truly unfair that some people should have so much while others go hungry.

You can understand other people only as much as you understand yourself and only on the level of your own being. This means you can judge other people's knowledge but you cannot judge their being. You can see in them only as much as you have in yourself. But people always make the mistake of thinking they can judge other people's being. In reality, if they wish to meet and understand people of a higher development than themselves they must work with the aim of changing their being.

Swamiji, please come forward. He said, Sir, I want to ask you a question privately. So I asked the others present to please wait outside. He said, I want to know the secret of your success. I said, I am not aware that I am successful. In what way do you think I am successful? He said, Without asking for money, you get money. This cottage is at your disposal. Drivers come for you. Many people come and sit with you. Why? I replied, You know, when I wanted such things, they never came to me. But the day I determined I didn’t want them, I began getting them.

I am embarrassed to admit what drew me to psychology. I didn't want to go to medical school. I was getting good grades in psychology and I was charismatic and people in the psychology department liked me. It was as low a level as that.

The reason we have poverty is that we have no imagination. There are a great many people accumulating what they think is vast wealth, but it's only money... they don't know how to enjoy it, because they have no imagination.

These people, as far as I can see, do not congregate in the notorious centers of the movement, like the North Beach in San Francisco or Greenwich Village, or Venice, California.

Let us remind ourselves that it is ordinary people - men and women, boys and girls - that make the world a special place.

As we grow in our consciousness.. there will be more compassion and more love. And then... the barriers between people.. between religions.. and between nations will begin to fall.

Would people know that nothing can happen unless the entire universe makes it happen, they would achieve much more with less expenditure of energy.

Buddha himself taught different teachings to different people under different circumstances. For some people, there are beliefs based on a Creator. For others, no Creator. The only "definitive truth" for Buddhism is the absolute negation of any one truth as the Definitive Truth.

Most people don't know how to listen because the major part of their attention is taken up by thinking.

I'm a Bhakti, meaning I practice devotional yoga and the heart and love, so I say to people, start with your ego and go down to your heart.

The place that I love most is the stillness. It's not that the stillness is lost when I talk or when I teach because the words arise out of the stillness. But when people leave me, there is only the stillness left. And I love that so much.

I repeat that the poor, the sufferers from leprosy, the rejected, the alcoholics, whom we serve, are beautiful people. Many of them have wonderful personalities. The experience which we have by serving them, we must pass on to people who have not had that wonderful experience.