“Take up one idea. Make that one idea your life; dream of it; think of it; live on that idea. Let the brain, the body, muscles, nerves, every part of your body be full of that idea, and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success, and this is the way great spiritual giants are produced.”
― Swami Vivekananda, Vedanta Philosophy: Lectures by the Swami Vivekananda on Raja Yoga Also Pantanjali's Yoga Aphorisms, with Commentaries, and Glossary of Sa
“Dare to be free, dare to go as far as your thought leads, and dare to carry that out in your life. ”
― Swami Vivekananda
“We are responsible for what we are, and whatever we wish ourselves to be, we have the power to make ourselves. If what we are now has been the result of our own past actions, it certainly follows that whatever we wish to be in the future can be produced by our present actions; so we have to know how to act.”
― Swami Vivekananda
“You cannot believe in God until you believe in yourself.”
― Swami Vivekananda
“The whole life is a succession of dreams. My ambition is to be a conscious dreamer, that is all.”
― Swami Vivekananda
“The powers of the mind are like the rays of the sun when they are concentrated they illumine.”
― Swami Vivekananda
"I am the thread that runs through all these pearls," and each pearl is a religion or even a sect thereof. Such are the different pearls, and God is the thread that runs through all of them; most people, however, are entirely unconscious of it.
― Swami Vivekananda
"I do not want to get material life, do not want the sense-life, but something higher." That is renunciation. Then, by the power of meditation, undo the mischief that has been done.
― Swami Vivekananda
"Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and everything shall be added unto you." This is the one great duty, this is renunciation. Live for an ideal, and leave no place in the mind for anything else. Let us put forth all our energies to acquire that which never fails--our spiritual perfection. If we have true yearning for realization, we must struggle, and through struggle growth will come. We shall make mistakes, but they may be angels unawares.
― Swami Vivekananda
“Comfort” is no test of truth; on the contrary, truth is often far from being “comfortable.”
― Swami Vivekananda
“Face the brutes.” That is a lesson for all life—face the terrible, face it boldly. Like the monkeys, the hardships of life fall back when we cease to flee before them.
― Swami Vivekananda
“I do not want to get material life. I do not want sense-life but something higher.” That is renunciation.
Then, by the power of meditation, undo the mischief that has been done.
― Swami Vivekananda
“Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and everything else shall be added unto you.” This is the one great duty, this is renunciation. Live for an ideal, and leave no place in the mind for anything else.
― Swami Vivekananda
“The earth is enjoyed by heroes”—this is the unfailing truth. Be a hero. Always say, “I have no fear.”
― Swami Vivekananda
A few heart-whole, sincere, and energetic men and women can do more in a year than a mob in a century.
― Swami Vivekananda
A tremendous stream is flowing toward the ocean, carrying us all along with it; and though like straws and scraps of paper we may at times float aimlessly about, in the long run we are sure to join the Ocean of Life and Bliss.
― Swami Vivekananda
Above all, beware of compromises. Hold on to your own principles in weal or woe and never adjust them to others’ “fads” through the greed of getting supporters. Your Atman is the support of the universe—whose support do you stand in need of?
― Swami Vivekananda
Above all, beware of compromises. I do not mean that you are to get into antagonism with anybody, but you have to hold on to your own principles in weal or woe and never adjust them to others “fads” thought the greed of getting supporters.
― Swami Vivekananda
After every happiness comes misery; they may be far apart or near. The more advanced the soul, the more quickly does one follow the other. What we want is neither happiness nor misery. Both make us forget our true nature; both are chains--one iron, one gold; behind both is the Atman, who knows neither happiness nor misery. These are states, and states must ever change; but the nature of the Atman is bliss, peace, unchanging. We have not to get it, we have it; only wash away the dross and see it.
― Swami Vivekananda
All is the Self or Brahman. The saint, the sinner, the lamb, the tiger, even the murderer, as far as they have any reality, can be nothing else, because there is nothing else.
― Swami Vivekananda
All knowledge that the world has ever received comes from the mind; the infinite library of the universe is in our own mind.
― Swami Vivekananda
All power is within you. You can do anything and everything. Believe in that. Do not believe that you are weak; do not believe that you are half-crazy lunatics, as most of us do nowadays. Stand up and express the divinity within you.
― Swami Vivekananda
All that is real in me is God; all that is real in God is I. The gulf between God and human beings is thus bridged. Thus we find how, by knowing God, we find the kingdom of heaven within us.
― Swami Vivekananda
All that is real in me is God; all that is real in God is I. The gulf between God and me is thus bridged. Thus by knowing God, we find that the kingdom of heaven is within us.
― Swami Vivekananda
All truth is eternal. Truth is nobody’s property; no race, no individual can lay any exclusive claim to it. Truth is the nature of all souls.
― Swami Vivekananda
All who have actually attained any real religious experience never wrangle over the form in which the different religions are expressed. They know that the soul of all religions is the same and so they have no quarrel with anybody just because he or she does not speak in the same tongue.
― Swami Vivekananda
Always discriminate--your body, your house, the people and the world are all absolutely unreal like a dream. Always think that the body is only an inert instrument. And the Atman within is your real nature.
Always discriminate—your body, your house, the people around, and the world are all unreal like a dream. Always think that this body is only an inert instrument. And the Atman within is your real nature.
― Swami Vivekananda
Anything that brings spiritual, mental, or physical weakness, touch it not with the toes of your feet.
Anything that is secret and mysterious in these systems of yoga should be at once rejected. The best guide in life is strength. In religion, as in all other matters, discard everything that weakens you, have nothing to do with it.
― Swami Vivekananda
Are great things ever done smoothly? Time, patience, and indomitable will must show.
― Swami Vivekananda
Are you unselfish? That is the question. If you are, you will be perfect without reading a single religious book, without going into a single church or temple.
― Swami Vivekananda
As body, mind, or soul, you are a dream; you really are Being, Consciousness, Bliss (satchidananda). You are the God of this universe.
― Swami Vivekananda
As long as we believe ourselves to be even the least different from God, fear remains with us; but when we know ourselves to be the One, fear goes; of what can we be afraid?
― Swami Vivekananda
As soon as I think that I am a little body, I want to preserve it, to protect it, to keep it nice, at the expense of other bodies; then you and I become separate.
― Swami Vivekananda
As soon as you know the voice and understand what it is, the whole scene changes. The same world which was the ghastly battlefield of maya is now changed into something good and beautiful.
― Swami Vivekananda
Astrology and all these mystical things are generally signs of a weak mind; therefore as soon as they are becoming prominent in our minds, we should see a physician, take good food, and rest.
― Swami Vivekananda
Avoid excessive merriment. A mind in that state never becomes calm; it becomes fickle. Excessive merriment will always be followed by sorrow. Tears and laughter are near kin. People so often run from one extreme to the other.
― Swami Vivekananda
Be a hero. Always say, “I have no fear.” Tell this to everyone—“Have no fear.”
― Swami Vivekananda
Be not afraid, for all great power throughout the history of humanity has been with the people. From out of their ranks have come all the greatest geniuses of the world, and history can only repeat itself. Be not afraid of anything. You will do marvelous work.
― Swami Vivekananda
Both the forces of good and evil will keep the universe alive for us, until we awake from our dreams and give up this building of mud pies.
― Swami Vivekananda
By doing well the duty which is nearest to us, the duty which is in our hands now, we make ourselves stronger; and improving our strength in this manner step by step, we may reach a state in which it shall be our privilege to do the most coveted and honored duties in life and in society.
― Swami Vivekananda
Come out into the universe of Light. Everything in the universe is yours, stretch out your arms and embrace it with love. If you every felt you wanted to do that, you have felt God.
― Swami Vivekananda
Discriminate within yourself between the real and the unreal. Have you not read the Vedanta? Even when you sleep, keep the sword of discrimination at the head of your bed, so that covetousness cannot approach you even in dream. Practicing such strength, renunciation will gradually come, and then you will see the portals of heaven are wide open to you.
― Swami Vivekananda
Do not hate anybody, because that hatred which comes out from you must, in the long run, come back to you. If you love, that love will come back to you, completing the circle.
― Swami Vivekananda
Every individual is a center for the manifestation of a certain force. This force has been stored up as the resultant of our previous works, and each one of us is born with this force at our back.
― Swami Vivekananda
God is merciful to those whom He sees struggling heart and soul for realization. But remain idle, without any struggle, and you will see that His grace will never come.
― Swami Vivekananda
If the mind is intensely eager, everything can be accomplished—mountains can be crumbled into atoms.
If there is no strength in body and mind, the Atman cannot be realized. First you have to build the body by good nutritious food—then only will the mind be strong.
― Swami Vivekananda
If you want to be a yogi, you must be free, and place yourself in circumstances where you are alone and free from all anxiety. One who desires a comfortable and nice life and at the same time wants to realize the Self is like the fool who, wanting to cross the river, caught hold of a crocodile, mistaking it for a log of wood.
― Swami Vivekananda
If you want to have life, you have to die every moment for it. Life and death are only different expressions of the same thing looked at from different standpoints; they are the falling and the rising of the same wave, and the two form one whole.
― Swami Vivekananda
In real meditation you forget the body. You may be cut to pieces and not feel it at all. You feel such pleasure in it. You become so light. This perfect rest we will get in meditation.
― Swami Vivekananda
In the world take always the position of the giver. Give everything and look for no return. Give love, give help, give service, give any little thing you can, but keep out barter. Make no conditions and none will be imposed. Let us give out of our own bounty, just as God gives to us.
― Swami Vivekananda
It is only by doing good to others that one attains to one's own good.
― Swami Vivekananda
It is the patient building of character, the intense struggle to realize the truth, which alone will tell in the future of humanity.
― Swami Vivekananda
Karma is the eternal assertion of human freedom. If we can bring ourselves down by our karma, surely it is in our power to raise ourselves by our own karma.
― Swami Vivekananda
Knowledge can only be got in one way, the way of experience; there is no other way to know.
― Swami Vivekananda
Learn to feel yourself in other bodies, to know that we are all one. Throw all other nonsense to the winds. Spit out your actions, good or bad, and never think of them again. What is done is done. Throw off superstition. Have no weakness even in the face of death. Do not repent, do not brood over past deeds. Be âzâd ("free").
― Swami Vivekananda
Learning and wisdom are superfluities, the surface glitter merely, but it is the heart that is the seat of all power. It is not in the brain but in the heart that the Atman, possessed of knowledge, power, and activity, has its seat.
― Swami Vivekananda
Let each one of us pray day and night for the downtrodden millions who are held fast by poverty, priestcraft, and tyranny. Pray day and night for them. I care more to preach religion to them than to the high and the rich.
― Swami Vivekananda
Let the mind be cheerful but calm. Never let it run into excesses, because every excess will be followed by a reaction.
― Swami Vivekananda
Let us make our hearts as big as an ocean, to go beyond all the trifles of the world and see it only as a picture. We can then enjoy the world without being in any way affected by it
― Swami Vivekananda
Let us put forth all our energies to acquire that which never fails—our spiritual perfection. If we have true yearning for realization, we must struggle, and through struggle growth will come. We shall make mistakes, but they may be angels unawares.
― Swami Vivekananda
Let us worship the spirit in spirit, standing on spirit. Let the foundation be spirit, the middle spirit, the culmination spirit.
― Swami Vivekananda
Love is always mutual and reflective. You may hate me, and if I want to love you, you repulse me. But if I persist, in a month or a year you are bound to love me. It is a well-known psychological phenomenon.
― Swami Vivekananda
Many of us get many messages in our lives, or think we get them. As long as the message is regarding our own selves, go on doing what you please. But when it is in regard to our contact with and behavior to others, think a hundred times before you act upon it—and then you will be safe.
― Swami Vivekananda
Nature grinds all of us. Keep count of the ounce of pleasure you get. In the long run, nature did her work through you, and when you die your body will make other plants grow. Yet we think all the time that we are getting pleasure ourselves. Thus the wheel goes round.
― Swami Vivekananda
Nature, body, mind go to death, not we. We neither go nor come. The man Vivekananda is in nature, is born and dies; but the Self we see as Vivekananda is never born and never dies. It is the eternal and unchangeable Reality.
― Swami Vivekananda
Neither seek nor avoid; take what comes. It is liberty to be affected by nothing. Do not merely endure; be unattached.
― Swami Vivekananda
No one should be judged by their defects. The virtues a person has are his especially; his errors are the common weaknesses of humanity and should never be counted in estimating his character.
― Swami Vivekananda
Not even the deepest sleep will give you such a rest as meditation can. The mind goes on jumping even in deepest sleep. Just those few moments in meditation your brain has almost stopped. … You forget the body. … You feel such pleasure in it. You become so light. This perfect rest we will get in meditation.
― Swami Vivekananda
Take up one idea. Make that one idea your life--think of it, dream of it, live on that idea. Let the brain, muscles, nerves, every part of your body, be full of that idea, and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success, and this is the way great spiritual giants are produced. Others are mere talking machines.
― Swami Vivekananda
That which is nearest is least observed. The Atman is the nearest of the near, therefore the careless and the unsteady mind gets no clue to it. But the person who is alert, calm, self-restrained, and discriminating ignores the external world and, diving more and more into the inner world, realizes the glory of the Atman and becomes great.
― Swami Vivekananda
The greatest help to spiritual life is meditation. In meditation we divest ourselves of all material conditions and feel our divine nature. We do not depend upon any external help in meditation.
― Swami Vivekananda
The moment you fear, you are nobody. It is fear that is the greatest cause of misery in the world. It is fear that is the greatest of all superstitions. It is fear that is the cause of our woes, and it is fearlessness that brings heaven in a moment.
― Swami Vivekananda
The secret of life is not enjoyment but education through experience.
― Swami Vivekananda
The Self when it appears behind the universe is called God. The same Self when it appears behind this little universe—the body—is the soul.
― Swami Vivekananda
The Soul is not composed of any materials. It is unity indivisible. Therefore it must be indestructible.
The varieties of religious belief are an advantage, since all faiths are good, so far as they encourage us to lead a religious life. The more sects there are, the more opportunities there are for making a successful appeal to the divine instinct in all of us.
― Swami Vivekananda
There is hope for all. None can die; none can be degraded forever. Life is but a playground, however gross the play may be. However we may receive blows, and however knocked about we may be, the Atman is there and is never injured. We are that Infinite.
― Swami Vivekananda
To believe blindly is to degenerate the human soul. Be an atheist if you want, but do not believe in anything unquestioningly.
― Swami Vivekananda
To succeed, you must have tremendous perseverance, tremendous will. "I will rink the ocean," says the persevering soul, "at my will mountains will crumble up." Have that sort of energy, that sort of will, work hard, and you will reach the goal.
― Swami Vivekananda
Try a little harder, and meditation comes. You do not feel the body or anything else. When you come out of it after the hour, you have had the most beautiful rest you ever had in your life. That is the only way you ever give rest to your system. Not even the deepest sleep will give you such a rest as that.
― Swami Vivekananda
Understanding human nature is the highest knowledge, and only by knowing it can we know God. It is also a fact that the knowledge of God is the highest knowledge, and only by knowing God can we understand human nature.
― Swami Vivekananda
We must plunge heart and soul and body into the work. And until we are ready to sacrifice everything else to one Idea and to one alone, we never, never will see the Light.
― Swami Vivekananda
We reap what we sow. We are the makers of our own fate. None else has the blame, none has the praise.
We want to know in order to make ourselves free. That is our life: one universal cry for freedom.
― Swami Vivekananda
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