Inspirational Quotes

Inspirational Quotes

Quotes Inspirational

One Liners

The easiest way to make your old car run better, is to check the prices of new car.

 
• Sometimes when I reflect back on all the ciggarettes I smoked, I feel ashamed. Then I look into the ciggarette think about the workers in the ciggarette factory all of their hopes dreams. If I don't smoke this ciggarette, they might be out of work their dreams would be shattered, Then I say to myself, it's better that I smoke this ciggarette let their dreams come true then be selfish worry about my LUNGS.

• Several women appeared in court, each accusing the other of the trouble in the flat where they lived. The judge called for orderly testimony. "I'll hear the oldest first," he decreed. The case was closed for lack of evidence.

 
• My wife thinks "freedom of the press" means no-iron clothes.

 
• When the best actors are chosen by other actors, it's called the Oscars. When the best actors are chosen by the people, it's called an election.

 
• A husband, the owner of a new car, was somewhat reluctant to allow his wife to drove his prize possession.. .even to the grocery store which was a few blocks from the house.  After she insisted, he finally relented, cautioning her as she departed, "Remember, if you have an accident, the newspaper will print your age!"

• "Take a pencil and paper," the teacher said, "and write an essay with the title 'If I Were a Millionaire'"
   Everyone but Philip, who leaned back with arms folded, began to write furiously.
   "What's the matter," the teacher asked. "Why don't you begin?"
   "I'm waiting for my secretary," he replied.

• Q: What's the difference between a good lawyer and a great lawyer?
   A: A good lawyer knows the law. A great lawyer knows the judge.

 
• Nurse: A beautiful woman who holds your hand for one full minute and then expects your pulse to be normal

• A French in a hotel in NY, phoned room service for some pepper.
  Attendant: Black pepper or white pepper?
  French: Toilette pepper!

Do Lipton Tea employees take 'coffee breaks?'

BHAVLA N  
“If we can not love  the person whom we see, how can we love God whom we can not see?" - Mother Teresa

How Meditation Can Help You Find the Perfect Friend

“When you love someone, the best thing you can offer is your presence. How can you love if you are not there?” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

I meet with a lot of people who say things like, “Oh, I’ve tried meditation before but I’m just not good at it.” When asked to explain, the most common answer is, “I just can’t make my mind get quiet.”

I’ve heard responses like this so often that I’ve come to realize that this is the single greatest misunderstanding about meditation. In truth, meditation is not about calming our mind or achieving a state free from mental noise and cognitive clutter. Far from it, actually.

I have many decades worth of experience practicing meditation. Still, when I sit cross-legged, my mind floats and roams through shifting states like a cloud-adorned sky filled with hundreds of colorful kites.

Thoughts of my wife and children mix with those of household chores, distant goals, past memories, judgments about a fly that lands on my ear, or the sound of a neighbor’s lawnmower I wish was not there.

And, sure, there are times when my consciousness—my sense of an individual self—dissolves into a state of vacuous bliss and timelessness, but this just happens sometimes, and that’s okay. Whenever it does happen, that’s successful meditation. Whenever it doesn’t, that’s successful meditation too.

During meditation, no matter how busied and chaotic the inner activity of your mind may be, you’re successfully meditating, because meditation isn’t about calming your mind. It’s about spending quality time with the most important person in your life: you!

This is the true method (and goal) of meditation. We sit, pausing to pay attention to what’s really going on inside ourselves.

We enter our home and witness what’s happening there, whatever this may be. In so doing, we discover ourselves, who and how we really are, something we only fully notice when we allow ourselves to take a brief hiatus from the daily hustle of life on planet Earth.

It’s like taking a moment to sit down with someone over a cup of coffee or tea, except that, in this case, this someone is you.

And once you’re face-to-face with this person, you can really start to build an extraordinary relationship with him or her.

You can genuinely connect with yourself in a way that is rarely possible while the “two of you” are preoccupied with picking up the dry cleaning, taking the kids to school, answering emails, or a thousands other activities that so quickly seem to crowd each day.

Really, this is such an important relationship! But how often do we set aside time to connect with ourselves in such a simple yet beautiful way, to truly meet and spend time with ourselves?

That’s all that meditation is. It’s an opportunity for us to build a peaceful, harmonious friendship with this essential person in our life, just like we would with anyone else.

Our favorite people in the world are those who we know judge us the least. These are the people who we know like us for who and how we are exactly. They don’t criticize or scold us or demand us to be different. Around such people, we know we can be most fully ourselves, without walking on eggshells or fearing reprimand. This is the very definition of true friendship.

Mediation provides us with a chance to build such a relationship with ourselves. I call this internal friendship and it’s cultivated just like any other friendship, by sparing this person from judgment about right or wrong, good or bad.

When you like this person that is yourself for who he or she is exactly, demanding nothing, then a true internal friendship develops from this (not that it’s always easy).

When I was living at one monastery, we’d meditate each morning and night for an hour and half each sitting.

I didn’t have a ton of experience at the time, so this was supremely tortuous for me. I remember often angrily glaring at the master—a docile, elderly Sri Lankan monk—psychically trying to get him to ring the bell that would conclude our session. I adamantly blamed my discomfort and anguish on him.

When my resentful stares failed, I’d have no choice but to turn inward again, facing all my thoughts about how “I can’t do this,” “This sucks,” “Why am I so much more pathetic than everyone else meditating around me?” “I’m not cut out for this.”

Then one day, it dawned on me. All I was doing was fighting with myself and, instead, I chose to let go, to embrace myself for being just as I was.

If I was in physical pain, I let myself just feel it. If I felt angry or frustrated, I gently reminded myself that this was okay. If my mind bounced around all over the place instead of resting in stillness, I allowed it. I stopped criticizing myself.

“This is me right now and there’s nothing wrong with that. This is me and that’s okay.” And, from this, I began to befriend myself, to genuinely like me for me.

Unexpectedly, as I did this, meditation suddenly became enjoyable for me. I’d sit, focus on my breathing, and just experience myself as is.

The internal chatter faded away and I’d become fully present, not only to myself, but to all around me, to each bird singing in the trees outside, each creak in the shifting walls of the temple, each whisper of breath from those around me.

By befriending myself in this way, a friendship to all existence developed. I finally experienced the calm I had chased for so long.

It is relatively easy for us to experience harmony, peacefulness, and calm within our relationships to our best and closest friends. As our internal friendship grows through meditation (just sitting with ourselves as we are without complaint), the calm that exists within our mental and emotional interior grows right along with it. See how this works?

Meditation builds friendship; friendship builds calm. This is so important that it bears repeating. Meditation builds friendship; friendship builds calm.

As we aim for greater calm in our lives, we cannot skip this important middle step of building friendship and still expect to reap great rewards.

The stillness that slowly emerges from a continued practice of meditation comes not from forcing ourselves to think less; it comes from allowing ourselves to be exactly as we are.

It comes from liking ourselves enough to spend some quality, unfettered time with ourselves, to just sit alone together for a bit, experiencing all that it means to be us in the moment amidst the limitless vastness of time and space.

As we sit with ourselves without judgment, friendship grows. We experience the joys of being liked and the joys of liking, both simultaneously. And when this all-important relationship blossoms as a result, a bounty of benefits emerge.

We begin to experience greater mental clarity, insight, awareness, and stillness. Meanwhile, we enjoy the emotional rewards of this internal harmony—more compassion, patience, calm, and feelings of loving-kindness.

As we cultivate friendship within ourselves, our overall ability to live in a spirit of friendship unfolds. Everything around us appears worthy of friendship. All of life, including its greatest difficulties and challenges, its ugliest scars and hardest woes, invites a graceful smile upon our hearts. We become capable of embracing everything with friendship.

This is what meditation is truly about, not creating an emptier mind, but building a true spirit of friendship, starting with the internal friendship we have with ourselves.

So, the next time this important person in your life asks you to sit down with him or her for a while, accept the invitation and see what happens.

Enjoy a little time together. It doesn’t have to be more complicated than this and, best of all, there’s nothing you can do to mess it up. Every moment of meditation is successful meditation.

40 Ways to Create Peace of Mind

“Set peace of mind as your highest goal, and organize your life around it.” ~Brian Tracy

There was a time when I thought peace was a destination, in much the same way I imagined I’d eventually arrive at happiness or success.

It seemed like something I needed to chase or find—definitely not something I could experience without dramatically changing my life.

I needed to work less, relax more, and generally revamp my circumstances and relationships in order to be a peaceful person.

Despite seeing peace as an endpoint, I also saw it as something passive—after all, that’s why I was so stressed: I had so much to do.

I’ve since realized that peace is always available, and like any desirable state of mind, it requires effort, even if that effort entails consciously choosing to be still.

Sure, our circumstances affect our mental state, but they don’t have to control them, not if we make tiny choices for our well-being.

Admittedly, it’s not easy to choose peace when we’re going through tough times. I still go through periods when I get caught up in worries and stresses, and it can feel like that’s the only available response to things that have happened.

But it’s not. There are countless things we can do to create peace of mind—both in response to events in our lives, and proactively, everyday.

If you’d also like to develop a greater sense of peace, you may find these suggestions helpful:

Meditation

1. Take 5-10 minutes for a simple seated meditation.

2. Take 100 deep breaths, counting “and one,” “and two,” and so on, with “and” on the inhalations and the numbers on the exhalations.

3. Take a meditative walk, focusing solely on the physical sensations of walking—the earth under your feet, the swing of your hips.

4. Find a guided meditation on YouTube and let it lull you into a blissful state of presence.

5. Practice alternate nostril breathing. Hold the left nostril down and inhale through the right; then hold the breath. Release the left nostril, hold the right one down, and exhale through the left. Now start on the left with an inhalation, exhaling on the right. This is one set. Do up to five of them.

Communication

6. Write down everything that’s weighing you down mentally and then burn it as a form of letting go.

7. Write down everything you’ve learned from a difficult experience so you can see it as something useful and empowering instead of something to stress you out.

8. Tell someone how their actions affected you instead of holding it in and building resentment.

9. Call someone you’ve denied forgiveness and tell them you forgive them.

10. Apologize for a mistake instead of rehashing it, and then choose to forgive yourself.

Creativity

11. Engage in a little art therapy; grab some crayons, markers, or paint and put all your feelings on the page.

12. Create a peace collage. Include images that make you feel relaxed and at ease. (Google “peace collage” and you’ll get lots of ideas!)

13. Meditate on your favorite peace quote and then write it in calligraphy for framing.

14. Take a walk with the sole intention of photographing beautiful things that make you feel at peace, like a tree with colorful autumn leaves.

15. Write a blog post about what gives you peace of mind. (This has been a calming experience for me!)

Activity

16. Get up and dance to your favorite song, focusing solely on the music and the movement. Get into your body and get out of your head!

17. Take a long walk on the beach, focusing on the feel of the sand between your toes and the sound of the crashing waves. Cliché, but highly effective!

18. Go for a bike ride in a scenic part of town, and immerse yourself in the calm of your environment.

19. Take 5−10 minutes for stretching, syncing your breath with the movements (or if you have an hour, visit a local studio for a yoga class).

20. Declutter a cluttered part of your home, creating a more peaceful space.

Acceptance

21. Muster compassion for someone who hurt you, instead of wallowing in bitterness, which will make it easier to forgive them and set yourself free.

22. Set aside some time to actively enjoy the good things about the present instead of scheming to create a better future.

23. Create a list of things you love about yourself instead of dwelling on how you wish you were different.

24. Focus on what you appreciate about the people in your life instead of wishing they would change (assuming you’re in healthy relationships).

25. Recognize if you’re judging yourself in your head with phrases like “I should have” or “I shouldn’t have.” Replace those thoughts with, “I do the best I can, my best is good enough, and I’m learning and growing every day.”

Solitude

26. Start reading that book you bought about dealing with the challenge you’ve been facing.

27. Schedule a date with yourself—a time when you don’t need to meet anyone else’s requests—and do something that feeds your mind and spirit. Go to a museum or take yourself to your favorite restaurant and simply enjoy your own company.

28. Sit in nature—under a tree, on a mountain—and let yourself simply be.

29. Be your own best friend. Tell yourself what’s on your mind, and then give yourself the advice you’d give a good friend who had the same issue.

30. Repeat some positive affirmations that help you feel present, peaceful, and empowered.

Connection

31. Tell the truth in your relationships. When we hold in our true feelings, we create stress for ourselves. Be kind but honest and share what you really feel.

32. Catch critical, blaming, or self-victimizing thoughts. Instead of ruminating on what someone else did wrong, express yourself and ask yourself what you can do to create the change you’re seeking.

33. Have fun with someone you love. Forget about everything that feels like a problem and do something silly and childlike.

34. Connect with someone online who can relate to what you’re going through and create a mutually supportive relationship by sharing and listening.

35. Let someone into your self-care routine—ask a friend to join a yoga studio with you, or invite your sister to jog with you on the beach.

Contribution

36. Volunteer your time to help a charity you believe in. Put all your energy into helping someone else, and you will inadvertently help yourself.

37. Volunteer at your local animal shelter. Animals are naturally present, and it’s contagious!

38. Do something kind for someone else without expecting anything in return. If they ask what they can do for you, tell them to pay it forward.

39. Leverage your passion to help someone else (i.e.: if you’re an aspiring designer, design a logo for a friend). You get to get in the zone doing something you love; someone else gets support they need. A win/win!

40. Leverage your purpose to serve someone else, not for money—just because. That might mean helping them pursue their passion, or motivating them to reach their fitness goals. Whatever gives your life meaning, give it to someone freely.

As is often the case with these types of list, this can seem a little long and overwhelming. The important thing is that we do at least one tiny thing every day to create mental stillness.