Anthony de Mello -Quotes

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Anthony De Mello -Quotes :

Where there is love there are no demands, no expectations, no dependency. I do not demand that you make me happy; my happiness does not lie in you. If you were to leave me, I will not feel sorry for myself; I enjoy your company immensely, But I do not cling.

-Anthony De Mello

Waking up is unpleasant, you know. You are nice and comfortable in bed. It is irritating to be woken up. That’s the reason the wise guru will not attempt to wake people up. I hope I’m going to be wise here and make no attempt whatsoever to wake you up if you are asleep. It is really none of my business, even though I say to you at times, "Wake up!" My business is to do my thing, to dance my dance. If you profit from it fine; if you don’t, too bad! As the Arabs say, "The nature of rain is the same, but it makes thorns grow in the marshes and flowers in the gardens.

-Anthony De Mello

Problems only exist in the human mind.

-Anthony De Mello

We see people and things not as they are, but as we are.

-Anthony De Mello

Most people don't live aware lives. They live mechanical lives, mechanical thoughts -- generally somebody else's -- mechanical emotions, mechanical actions, mechanical reactions.

-Anthony De Mello

Loneliness is not cured by human company. Loneliness is cured by contact with reality.

-Anthony De Mello

We're crazy, We're living on crazy ideas about love, about relationships, about happiness, about joy, about everything.

-Anthony De Mello

The only way to change is by changing your understanding.

-Anthony De Mello

Pleasant experiences make life delightful. Painful experiences lead to growth.

-Anthony De Mello

Most people tell you they want to get out of kindergarten, but don't believe them. Don't believe them! All they want you to do is to mend their broken toys. "Give me back my wife. Give me back my job. Give me back my money. Give me back my reputation, my success." This is what they want; they want their toys replaced. That's all. Even the best psychologist will tell you that, that people don't really want to be cured. What they want is relief; a cure is painful.

-Anthony De Mello

Spirituality means waking up.  Most people, even though they don't know it, are asleep.  They're born asleep, they live asleep, they marry in their sleep, they breed children in their sleep, they die in their sleep without ever waking up.  They never understand the loveliness and the beauty of this thing that we call human existence.

-Anthony De Mello

You know, all mystics - Catholic, Christian, non-Christian, no matter what their theology, no matter what their religion - are unanimous on one thing: that all is well, all is well. Though everything is a mess, all is well. Strange paradox, to be sure. But, tragically, most people never get to see that all is well because they are asleep. They are having a nightmare.

-Anthony De Mello

A man found an eagle's egg and put it in a nest of a barnyard hen. The eaglet hatched with the brood of chicks and grew up with them. All his life the eagle did what the barnyard chicks did, thinking he was a barnyard chicken. He scratched the earth for worms and insects. He clucked and cackled. And he would thrash his wings and fly a few feet into the air.

Years passed and the eagle grew very old. One day he saw a magnificent bird above him in the cloudless sky. It glided in graceful majesty among the powerful wind currents, with scarcely a beat on his strong golden wings. The old eagle looked up in awe. "Who's that?" he asked. "That's the eagle, the king of the birds," said his neighbour. "He belongs to the sky. We belong to the earth - we're chickens." So the eagle lived and died a chicken, for that's what he thought he was.

-Anthony De Mello

What you are aware of you are in control of; what you are not aware of is in control of you.

-Anthony De Mello

Wouldn't it be wonderful if we had a world where everybody said, 'We don't know?' The fact is that you're surrounded by God and you don't see God, because you KNOW ABOUT God. The final barrier to the vision of God is your God concept. You miss God because you think you know. The highest knowledge of God is to know God as unknowable. All revelations, however divine, are never any more than a finger pointing at the moon. As we say in the East, 'When the sage points to the moon, all the idiot sees is the finger'.

-Anthony De Mello

The important thing is not to know who "I" is or what "I" is.  You'll never succeed. There are no words for it.  

The important thing is to drop the labels.  

As the Japanese Zen masters say, "Don't seek the truth; just drop your opinions."  Drop your theories; don't seek the truth.  Truth isn't something you search for.  If you stop being opinionated, you would know.  Something similar happens here.  If you drop your labels, you would know.  What do I mean by labels?  Every label you can conceive of except perhaps that of  human being.  I am a human being.  Fair enough; doesn't say very much.  But when you say, "I am successful," that's crazy.  Success is not part of the "I".  

Success is something that comes and goes; it could be here today and gone tomorrow.  That's not "I".  When you said, "I was a success," you were in error; you were plunged into darkness.  You identified yourself with success.  The same thing when you said, "I am a failure, a lawyer, a businessman." You know what's going to happen to you if you identify yourself with these things.  You're going to cling to them, you're going to be worried that they may fall apart, and that's where your suffering comes in.  That is what I meant earlier when I said to you, "If you're suffering, you're asleep." Do you want a sign that you're asleep? Here it is: You're suffering.  Suffering is a sign that you're out of touch with the truth.  Suffering is given to you that you might open your eyes to the truth, that you might understand that there's falsehood somewhere, just as physical pain is given to you so you will understand that there is disease or illness somewhere.  Suffering points out that there is falsehood somewhere.  

Suffering occurs when you clash with reality.  

When your illusions clash with reality when your falsehoods clash with the truth, then you have suffering.  

Otherwise there is no suffering.

-Anthony De Mello

You have within yourself the answer to every question you propose -- if you only knew how to look for it.  In the Land of the spirit, you cannot walk by the light of someone else's lamp.  You want to borrow mine.  I'd rather teach you how to make your own.

-Anthony De Mello

Said the river to the seeker, "Does one really have to fret about enlightenment? No matter which way I turn, I’m homeward bound."

-Anthony De Mello

Rare indeed, is the relationship in which the other is not cultivated for what one can get for oneself.

-Anthony De Mello

To relate is to react. To react is to understand oneself. To understand oneself is to be enlightened. Relationships are schools for enlightenment.

-Anthony De Mello

All that you give to others you are giving to yourself. 

-Anthony De Mello

"Understand the obstructions you are putting in the way of love, freedom, and happiness and they will drop. Turn on the light of awareness and the darkness will disappear. Happiness is not something you acquire; love is not something you produce; love is not something you have; love is something that has you."

Courtesy of n_light_10

-Anthony De Mello

Get rid of your fear of failure, your tensions about succeeding, you will be yourself. Relaxed. You wouldn't be driving with your brakes on. That's what would happen.

-Anthony De Mello