21 Quotes by Sri S. Satchidananda

There’s no value in digging shallow wells in a hundred places. Decide on one place and dig deep. Even if you encounter a rock, use dynamite and keep going down. If you leave that to dig another well, all the first effort is wasted and there is no proof you won’t hit rock again. (52)

What is it that dies? A log of wood dies to become a few planks. The planks die to become a chair. The chair dies to become a piece of firewood, and the firewood dies to become ash. You give different names to the different shapes the wood takes, but the basic substance is there always. If we could always remember this, we would never worry about the loss of anything. We never lose anything; we never gain anything. By such discrimination we put an end to unhappiness. (118-119)

In not only the physical science, but in the real mental silence, the wisdom dawns. (75)

These Sutras are reminiscent of the Four Noble Truths of Lord Buddha: the misery of the world, the cause of misery, the removal of that misery, and the method used to remove it. Patanjali tells us that pain can be avoided. He further tells us that its cause is ignorance. (115)

Mere philosophy will not satisfy us. We cannot reach the goal by mere words alone. Without practice, nothing can be achieved. (3)

. . . I feel we don’t really need scriptures. The entire life is an open book, a scripture. Read it. Learn while digging a pit or chopping some wood or cooking some food. If you can’t learn from your daily activities, how are you going to understand the scriptures? (233)

The purification of the mind is very necessary. (72)

At various points in our lives, or on a quest, and for reasons that often remain obscure, we are driven to make decisions which prove with hindsight to be loaded with meaning. (225)

If we only look within, we will see he Light as if we were seeing our own image in a mirror. (122)