Delusion

Delusion: Maintaining a persistent belief, despite superior evidence to the contrary.

Religion

"Religion is merely a community of people who gather together on a regular basis to reassure each other that it's ok to continue subscribing to absurdities. As for me it is far better to see the world the way it really exists, rather than persist in delusion, no matter how comforting or reassuring that may seem." Carl Sagan

Dreams come True

You know you’re in love when you can’t fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.
~Dr. Seuss

Attachment

The way to love anything is to realize that it might be lost.
~G.K. Chesterton

Talking

Man's word is Spirit in man. Spoken words are sounds occasioned by the vibrations of thoughts, thoughts are vibrations sent forth by the ego or by the soul. Every word you utter should be potent with soul vibration. A mans words are lifeless if he fails to impregnate them with spiritual force. Talkativeness, exaggeration, or falsehood makes your words as ineffective as paper bullets shot from a toy gun. The speech and prayer of garrulous or inaccurate persons are unlikely to produce beneficial changes in the order of things. Mans words should represent not only truth but also his definite understanding and realization. Speech without soul force is like husks without corn...    Paramahansa Yogananda

Suffering

"Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won't be the victim of needless suffering."
~Don Miguel Ruiz

Suffering

"I am a lover of what is, not because I'm a spiritual person, but because it hurts when I argue with reality."
— Byron Katie

Understanding

You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why you must look at the skies, that is why you must sing and dance, and write poems, and suffer, and understand, for all that is life. –J. Krishnamurti

Listening

"One of the greatest steps we can make on the spiritual path is to learn to stop before we judge experience and give it a chance to tell us something about reality - to impart news about ourselves about the seeds we have sown, about the nature of life.  If we can intercept the reactive nature of the mind and the habitual defensiveness of the heart, then we will find ourselves in a world that never runs out of messages."  Elizabeth Lesser

Reality

"We have been taught to believe that negative equals realistic and positive equals unrealistic."  Susan Jeffers

Reality

"Anything that is real has no beginning and no end."  Rachel Naomi Remen

Prayer

"When we pray, we don't change the world, we change ourselves.  We change our consciousness.  We move from an individual making-things-happen kind of consciousness to a connection on the deepest level with the largest possible reality."  Rachel Naomi Remen

Samsara

"Buddhists talk about Samsara, the world of illusion.   It is the place that most of us live.   Mistaking illusion for reality is said to be the root cause of suffering.   Yet in some immensely elegant way suffering itself can release us from illusion.   Often in times of crisis, when we reach for what we have considered our strength we stumble on our wholeness and our real power.   How we were before we fixed ourselves to win approval."  Rachel Naomi Remen

Belief

"A belief is like a pair of sunglasses.  When we wear a belief and look at life through it, it is difficult to convince ourselves that what we see is not what is real.   Knowing that what is real requires that we remember that we are wearing sunglasses and take them off.   One of the great moments in life is the moment we recognize we have them on in the first place.   Freedom is very close to us then.   It is a moment of great power."  Rachel Naomi Remen

Letting Go

"Self-liberate even the antidote" means to simply touch and then let go of whatever you come up with.   Whatever bright solutions or big plans you come up with, just let them go, let them go, let them go."   Pema Chondron

Reality and Truth

"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away."
[Philip K. Dick

Reality

"Do not pray for life to turn out a certain way.  Instead learn from the way life already is.   Everyday events are messages about reality.   Trust in these messages.   They are an accurate description of what came before and what to do next.   Don't fight with reality.  Don't defend against it.  Rather read it like you would a newspaper.   Read everything that happens to you and to others as pertinent news and the reality of being human, of being you."   Chogyam  Trungpa  (Pema Chondron's Teacher)

Reality

"It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring." Carl Sagan

Reality

"Neither love nor hate.  Simply look at the reality of the other."   Sosan

Maturity

"This is what maturity is: to accept the fact and not create a fiction around it; to accept the reality as it is, without trying to sweeten it, decorate it, without trying to make it more acceptable to your heart."   Osho