Attaining Quotes & Sayings

Read the sacred writings of all the peoples on Earth. Through all of them runs, like a red thread, the hidden Science of attaining and maintaining wakefulness. — Gustave Meyrink

There is no secret in attaining God. In the path of Enlightenment, any theoretical mystery-mongering preacher that weakens the mind, should be rejected at once. Science has no secrets. The very purpose of it is to unravel the secrets of Nature and the Universe. That is why it is so beautiful. And so should be the path of Enlightenment. — Abhijit Naskar

Love, Arthur, is a poodle's chance of attaining the infinite, and personally I have my pride. — Louis-Ferdinand Celine

For remember, ever, that Mind in its entirety is ever the Builder. For it is step by step, line by line, precept upon precept, here a little, there a little, that the attaining is accomplished in the mental, the spiritual, the material applications of an entity in this material world. — Edgar Cayce

Achieving price stability is not only important in itself, it is also central to attaining the Federal Reserve's other mandate objectives of maximum sustainable employment and moderate long-term interest rates. — Ben Bernanke

Attaining bliss can take lifetimes, or one can simply choose to experience it in their deepest dreams. Sleep well my friend, as dreams are vehicles that can quickly take you to the awareness that you call Nirvana — Gary Hopkins

Men of warm imaginations and towering thoughts are apt to overlook the goods of fortune which are near them, for something that glitters in the sight at a distance; to neglect solid and substantial happiness for what is showy and superficial; and to contemn that good which lies within their reach, for that which they are not capable of attaining. Hope calculates its schemes for a long and durable life; presses forward to imaginary points of bliss; grasps at impossibilities; and consequently very often ensnares men into beggary, ruin, and dishonour. — Joseph Addison

If a man gives way to all his desires, or panders to them, there will be no inner struggle in him, no 'friction,' no fire. But if, for the sake of attaining a definite aim, he struggles with desires that hinder him, he will then create a fire which will gradually transform his inner world into a single whole. — P.D. Ouspensky

Each of us believes, quite unconsciously of course, that he alone pursues the truth, which the rest are incapable of seeking out and unworthy of attaining. This madness is so deep-rooted and so useful that it is impossible to realize what would become of each of us if it were someday to disappear. — Emil M. Cioran

Why do you have to do all this after attaining a jhana? Jhana is like a juggling act. You keep things suspended in the air or balanced. Then you drop them. Then you start over. — Henepola Gunaratana

If you can listen to yourself and obey yourself more, then you have increased your chances for attaining personal effectiveness. — Archibald Marwizi

While combat efficiency is a primary function of Shaolin Kung Fu, a more immediate and useful benefit in our law-abiding society is attaining radiant health and vitality. — Wong Kiew Kit

I am persuaded that I shall obtain the highest amount of present happiness, I shall do most for God's glory and the good of man, and I shall have the fullest reward in eternity, but maintaining a conscience always washed in Christ's blood, by being filled with the Holy Spirit at all times, and by attaining the most entire likeness to Christ in mind, will, and heart, that it is possible for a redeemed sinner to attain to in this world. — Robert Murray M'Cheyne

Who says you cannot hold the moon in your hand?
Tonight when the stars come out and the moon rises in the velvet sky, look outside your window, then raise your hand and position your fingers around the disk of light.
There you go . . . That was easy! — Vera Nazarian

May it not be that he loves chaos and destruction (there can be no disputing that he does sometimes love it) because he is instinctively afraid of attaining his object and completing the edifice he is constructing? Who knows, perhaps he only loves that edifice from a distance, and is by no means in love with it at close quarters; perhaps he only loves building it and does not want to live in it, but will leave it, when completed ... — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

If one knows how to 'digest' an insult after attaining Self-realization, he will become a 'Gnani' [the enlightened one]. And if he 'digests' an insult before attaining Self-realization, he will become shameless (impudent). — Dada Bhagwan

To the new president, Abraham Lincoln: Sir, if on attaining the presidency you are as happy as I am upon leaving it, then, sir, you are a happy man indeed. — James Buchanan

The object of all life is development; and everything that lives has an inalienable right to all the development it is capable of attaining — Wallace D. Wattles

Check-up is so necessary when attaining increase in all things — Sunday Adelaja

Sometimes we desire absolute nonsense because in our stupidity we see in this nonsense the easiest way of attaining some conjectural good. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

The violence of men, though, is modulated by a slider: they can allocate their energy along a continuum from competing with other men for access to women to wooing the women themselves and investing in their children, a continuum that biologists sometimes call "cads versus dads."103 In a social ecosystem populated mainly by men, the optimal allocation for an individual man is at the "cad" end, because attaining alpha status is necessary to beat away the competition and a prerequisite to getting within wooing distance of the scarce women. — Steven Pinker

When people learn to master their feelings, they can soon learn to master their reflections and thoughts in the degree requisite for attaining the objects they are seeking. But while they yield to a feeling or spirit that distracts their minds from a subject they wish to study and learn, so long they will never gain the mastery of their minds. — Brigham Young

We cannot live in the past; it is gone. Nor can we live in the future; it is forever beyond our grasp. We can live only in the present. If we are unaware of our present actions, we are condemned to repeating the mistakes of the past and can never succeed in attaining our dreams for the future. — S. N. Goenka

A person whom works exclusively for money places a price tag on his or her soul. A person whom labors to attain fame seeks a false form of adulation. The writer ignores the lure of a glamorous life by seeking to penetrate the darkness of their own being and meditate the larger issues that frame existence. A seeker knowingly follows a path that is barren, bleak, desolate, and unproductive in terms of attaining recognition and exulted social and financial status. — Kilroy J. Oldster

How far is the Soul from attaining moksha (ultimate liberation)? Only the obstructive (antray) karmas. — Dada Bhagwan

Most hoarders are capable of discarding things if they can convince themselves that the object will not be wasted, that it will go to a good home, or, as in this case, that the opportunity it presented is no longer available. But the amount of time and effort involved in attaining this certainty makes it impossible to keep up with the volume of stuff entering the home. — Gail Steketee

Our choice is usually mistaken from a false view of our advantage. We sometimes choose absolute nonsense because in our foolishness we see in that nonsense the easiest means for attaining a supposed advantage. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

I conceived from the outset a strong objection to Zionism. I considered it immoral that immigrants should come from abroad with the avowed intention of attaining to majority in the country and thus to dispossess the people whose country it had been since time immemorial. — Muhammad Asad

We Neuroscientists have come a long way in proving that God is neither a Delusion nor an Almighty Being watching over life on Earth. God is the Event Horizon of Human Consciousness. I termed this state of attaining God, as 'Absolute Unity Qualia'. — Abhijit Naskar

The ego with its protective defense mechanisms is the biggest impediment to attaining spiritual growth. — Kilroy J. Oldster

Egoism of the ignorant stage (ignorance of the true self) is considered live egoism. It becomes lifeless after attaining knowledge of the Self. If one takes the side of this lifeless egoism that, "I am not like that"- it will become alive again. Lifeless egoism is to be disposed off; it is not to be protected. — Dada Bhagwan

The language for attaining Liberation [moksha] is beyond duality. The language for worldly life is with duality. — Dada Bhagwan

It is better to be unsuccessful pursuing a significant goal that being successful attaining an insignificant one. — Michael Josephson

Liberty is inseparable from social justice, and those who dissociate them, sacrificing the first with the purpose of attaining the second more quickly, are the true barbarians of our time. — Mario Vargas-Llosa

We are undoing a pattern ... It's the human pattern: we project onto the world a zillion possibilities of attaining resolution. — Pema Chodron

Something else emerges from this discussion about us as human individuals: we're not fixed, stable intellects riding along peering at the world through the lenses of our eyes like the pilots of people-shaped spacecraft. We are affected constantly by what's going on around us. Whether our flexibility is based in neuroplasticity or in less dramatic aspects of the brain, we have to start acknowledging that we are mutable, persuadable and vulnerable to clever distortions, and that very often what we want to be is a matter of constant effort rather than attaining a given state and then forgetting about it. Being human isn't like hanging your hat on a hook and leaving it there, it's like walking in a high wind: you have to keep paying attention. You have to be engaged with the world. — Nick Harkaway

The sadness it feels in attaining any happiness less than the infinite - all these constitute the mating call of God to the soul. — Fulton J. Sheen

The Protestant wing of the western church, which is a tiny percentage of the Body of Christ, is nearly completely (98%) unaware that the Holy Spirit is restoring contemplative prayer-center stage-to the church The Holy Spirit is restoring this precious jewel (contemplative prayer) to the body of Christ. This is the God ordained means of attaining the fullness of God. — Mike Bickle

In order to win the femininity game, women and girls must abandon the valued "masculine" characteristics of self-efficacy and self-determination. However, this is the catch: the femininity game ultimately presents girls and women with a "no-win" situation. Although failure to live up to the expectations of femininity can have devastating effects on girls' and women's self-esteem, so can success in attaining them. A "winner" of the femininity game has effectively stripped herself of valued human characteristics in adopting an undervalued identity. — Lauraine Leblanc

There must be something beyond man in this world. Even on attaining to his highest possibilities, he is like a bird beating against his cage. There is something beyond, O deathless like a sea-shell, moaning for the bosom of the ocean to which you belong! — Edwin Hubbel Chapin

All opinions in the world agree in this, that pleasure is our end, although they differ as to the means of attaining it. — Michel De Montaigne

There are two ways of attaining an important end, force and perseverance; the silent power of the latter grows irresistible with time. — Sophie Swetchine

Winning the Pritzker assures a flood of work in one's seventies and eighties, jobs necessarily carried out by assistants as the demands of modern-day cultural stardom and the inevitable waning of physical capacities prevent many architects from attaining the transcendent final phase more easily achieved by artists in other mediums. — Martin Filler

Where the 'charging' (of karma) stops, there lies the symptoms (signs) of attaining moksha. — Dada Bhagwan

Consulting maps can diminish the wanderlust that they awaken,as the act of looking at them can replace the act of travel. But looking at maps is much more than an act of aesthetic replacement. Anyone who opens an atlas wants everything at once, without limits
the whole world. This longing will always be great, far greater than any satisfaction to be had by attaining what is desired. Give me an atlas over a guidebook any day. There is no more poetic book in the world. — Judith Schalansky

We do not have to die to get to the gates of Heaven. — Thich Nhat Hanh

We have abundant reason to rejoice that in this Land the light of truth and reason has triumphed over the power of bigotry and superstition, and that every person may here worship God according to the dictates of his own heart. In this enlightened Age and in this Land of equal liberty it is our boast, that a man's religious tenets will not forfeit the protection of the Laws, nor deprive him of the right of attaining and holding the highest Offices that are known in the United States. — George Washington

It is an indication of truth's jealousy that it has not made for anyone a path to it, and that it has not deprived anyone of the hope of attaining it, and it has left people running in the deserts of perplexity and drowning in the seas of doubt; and he who thinks he has attained it, it dissociates itself from, and he who thinks he has dissociated himself from it has lost his way. — Naguib Mahfouz

I have never been a poster boy for serenity, but I knew I needed to restore some semblance of inner peace. In search of a fix much quicker than my weekly forays into the talking cure, I came upon an ancient and proven practice, one that exists in every culture and religious tradition as a means to attaining calm and an alternate plane of consciousness: an extended fast. Buddha did it, Jesus did it, even Pythagoras and George Bernard Shaw did it. It's like a Cole Porter song from the world's least-fun musical. — David Rakoff

Her strength, she would tell Van much later on, was nothing more nor less than the hope of, at last, attaining that goal which had become so important for her
not to succeed in doing something, but simply to do something good. — Laurence Cosse

Whoever we are, wherever we are, however we are, whatever our condition is, there is no impediment to attaining the perfection of life-if we are humble & sincere. — Radhanath Swami

And of all illumination which human reason can give, none is comparable to the discovery of what we are, our nature, our obligations, what happiness we are capable of, and what are the means of attaining it. — Adam Weishaupt

If your men grow weary of the work or balk at obedience, you must bear with them. Get what you can gently from them. True, it is good to be firm in attaining your goal, but use appropriate, attractive, and agreeable means. — Vincent De Paul

Purifying the heart is a process. First, one must understand the necessity of having courtesy with God and the importance of fulfilling its requirements, as noted above. Second, one must be aware of the diseases of the heart - aware of their existence, their ailments, and the deleterious complications and troubles that ensue from them, and recognize that these diseases prevent one from attaining this courtesy. — Hamza Yusuf

The eighteenth and nineteenth centuries abandoned the idea of spiritual or intellectual happiness in order to have this material happiness, consisting of a certain number of essential consumer goods. And hence, in the nineteenth century, happiness was linked to a well-being obtained by mechanical means, industrial means, production. The new thing that Saint-Just spoke about was that, in the past, happiness could appear as a very vague, very distant prospect for humanity, whereas now, people seemed to be within reach of the concrete, material possibility of attaining it. That was why happiness was to become an absolutely essential image for the nineteenth-century bourgeoisie, and for modern society. Happiness was attainable thanks to industrial development, and this image of happiness brought us fully into the consumer society. — Jacques Ellul

The limits of pleasures are as yet neither known nor fixed, and we have no idea what degree of bodily bliss we are capable of attaining. — Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

In attaining our ideals,our means should be as pure as the end! — Rajendra Prasad

The value of an ambitious goal is not measured by what it will bring to you. The worth of a goal is measured by what it will make of you in the process of following and attaining it. — Ralph Marston

Success can never be enjoyed if there is no congruity or alignment of your beliefs, values and how you behave in attaining your achievements. — Archibald Marwizi

Suffering for the sake of attaining God's goal is good. It should be received with joy — Sunday Adelaja

My failure to lay aside the sin that so easily entangles is the direct result of my refusal to die to my natural proclivity toward attaining my own freedom, meaning, value, worth, and righteousness - not believing that, by virtue of my Spirit - wrought union with Christ, everything I need, I already possess. — Tullian Tchividjian

In this world, unity is achievable only by learning to unite in spite of differences, rather than insisting on unity without differences. For their total eradication is an impossibility. The secret of attaining peace in life is tolerance of disturbance of the peace. (p. 99) — Maulana Wahiduddin Khan

Without a doubt, one of the things which keeps us from attaining perfection is our tongue. When one has reached the point of no longer committing faults in speech, he has surely reached perfection, as was said by the Holy Spirit. The worst defect in talking is talking too much. Hence, in speech be brief and virtuous, brief and gentle, brief and simple, brief and charitable, brief and amiable. — Saint Francis De Sales

-no matter what we do, we'll never succeed in attaining the 'perfect' body or the 'perfect' face. This isn't just because perfection is an unattainable goal; it's because capitalism relies on people being constantly unhappy so it can keep selling us the promise that consumerism will make our lives better. — Clementine Ford

Attaining achievement is not simple. It is not attain by chance, you have to work with it. There ought to be diligence and own path on the best way to accomplish achievement. It takes much time before having the tree grown foods of your work. As you come the way, you will know the things on the best way to be fruitful. Achievement needs time, exertion and tolerance. — Auliq Ice

The two seem, at first glance, to be opposed, but when you have advanced a little in both, you find that concentration learned in Yoga is of immense use in attaining the mental powers necessary in Magick; on the other hand, the discipline of Magick is of the greatest service in Yoga. — Aleister Crowley

I believed that I was approaching the end of my days without having tasted to the full any of the pleasures for which my heart thirsted ... without having ever tasted that passion which, through lack of an object, was always suppressed ... The impossibility of attaining the real persons precipitated me into the land of chimeras; and seeing nothing that existed worthy of my exalted feelings, I fostered them in an ideal world which my creative imagination soon peopled with beings after my own heart. — Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Since attaining the full use of my reason no one has ever heard me laugh. — Lord Chesterfield

If the selflessness of phenomena is analyzed and if this analysis is cultivated, it causes the effect of attaining nirvana. through no other cause does one come to peace. — Gautama Buddha

167. And having not the faith that is resolute, that faith cannot endure, and because it endureth not, how can he attain unto the faith of determination? And attaining not unto the faith of determination, the faith is not sanctified in him. — Shinran

The office of the Vice-President is a greater honor than I ever dreamed of attaining. — Chester A. Arthur

Each person on this planet is inherently, intrinsically capable of attaining "dizzying heights" of happiness and fulfillment. — Wayne Dyer

The fear of failure, the fear of being imperfect (perfectionism), and the fear of impossible expectations (being overwhelmed) that prevent us from acting on and attaining humanly possible goals and relationships. — Neil A. Fiore

Improve yourself by other men's writings thus attaining effortlessly what they acquired through great difficulty. — Socrates

We human beings are born in ego, live in ego, are brought up in ego and will die in ego. We need a certain degree 0f vision when we live in this world for achieving and attaining our goals in life. — Mata Amritanandamayi

Love ... is a poodle's chance of attaining the infinite ... — Louis-Ferdinand Celine

Appetite, with an opinion of attaining, is called hope; the same, without such opinion, despair. — Thomas Hobbes

Anthropologists have invented the ingenious, convenient, fictional notion of the "true Negro," which allows them to consider, if need be, all the real Negroes on earth as fake Negroes, more or less approaching a kind of Platonic archetype, without ever attaining it. Thus, African history is full of "Negroids," Hamites, semi-Hamites, Nilo-Hamitics, Ethiopoids, Sabaeans, even Caucasoids! Yet, if one stuck strictly to scientific data and archeological facts, the prototype of the White race would be sought in vain throughout the earliest years of present-day humanity. — Cheikh Anta Diop

If the good so loved and desired do appear possible and feasible in the attaining, then it exciteth the passion of hope, which is a compound of desire and expectation : when we look upon it as requiring our endeavour to attain it, and as it is to be had in a prescribed way, then it provokes the passion of courage or boldness, and concludes in resolution. Lastly, If this good be apprehended as preset, then ti provoketh to delight or joy. If the thing itself be present, the jy is greatest. If but the idea of it, either through the remainder or memory of the good that is past, or through the fore-apprehension of that which we expect, yet even this also exciteth our joy. And this joy is the perfection of all the rest of the affections, when it is raised on the full fruition of the good itself(575). — Richard Baxter

In a well-written book we are presented with the maturest reflections, or the happiest flights of a mind of uncommon excellence. It is impossible that we can be much accustomed to such companions without attaining some resemblance to them. — William Godwin

At the classical origins of philosophic thought, the transcending concepts remained committed to the prevailing separation between intellectual and manual labor to the established society of enslavement ... Those who bore the brunt of the untrue reality and who, therefore, seemed to be most in need of attaining its subversion were not the concern of philosophy. It abstracted from them and continued to abstract from them. — Herbert Marcuse

Meditation means cleansing the mirror, dropping thoughts, letting thoughts disappear, attaining to moments when thinking ceases. And those are the most blissful moments in life. Once you have tasted a single moment of no-thought, you have taken a great leap into truth; then things will become more and more easy every day. — Rajneesh

Self-doubt is common, but when it impedes you from attaining your goals it's time to take action. This book shows you how to move beyond feeling like an imposter so that you can achieve your full personal and professional potential. — Lois P Frankel

Desire is our imprisonment. The man who wants nothing, who is absolutely contented as he is, is free of all bondage. He has attained to ultimate freedom, nirvana - and that is the goal of life. And it is only by attaining that freedom that you will know the significance of being, the song of being, the celebration of being. Your life will become a continuous bliss, and not only that YOU will be blissful, you will be able to bless others too. The whole existence will be blessed by you, by your very presence. — Rajneesh

The tantras are ancient sacred books of India and Tibet. The tantras detail specific means for attaining liberation. — Frederick Lenz

Attaining inner peace isn't about letting someone else read your lines; it's about embracing your character and giving the performance of a lifetime. Never be afraid to express your inner thoughts, never be afraid to dance to a different beat because when you shine with self-acceptance, you light up the world." -Lakeysha-Marie Green, Author — Lakeysha-Marie Green

Throw aside all hindrances and give up your time to attaining a sound mind — Seneca.

The highest realms of thought are impossible to reach without first attaining an understanding of compassion. — Socrates

Emotional control is essential for attaining higher levels of mind. The thing that the teacher looks for in a student is the degree of self-control, not coldness that someone has. — Frederick Lenz

The major lesson Tiggers need to learn is that if they don't control their impulses, their impulses will control them. No matter how much they do, Tiggers are never satisfied because they don't know the feeling of accomplishment that eventually comes when one persistently applies one's will to the attaining of non-immediately-reachable goals. — Benjamin Hoff

This country has attained 'Swarajya', but unfortunately the dream of 'Surajya' is left unfulfilled. Today, if there is any major challenge before this country, it is that of a 'Surajya' and since the last decade, Gujarat is working in the direction of attaining Surajya. — Narendra Modi

Awakening and owning the dreams that God has placed in our hearts isn't about getting stuff or attaining something. It's about embracing who we are and who he has created us to be. In him. He is our dream come true, and the one true love of our life. But we can't love him with our whole hearts when our hearts are asleep. To love Jesus means to risk coming awake, to risk wanting and desiring. — Stasi Eldredge

In the mass of people, vegetative and animal functions dominate. Their energy of intelligence is so feeble and inconstant that it is constantly overpowered by bodily appetite and passion.Such persons are not truly ends in themselves, for only reason constitutes a final end. Like plants, animals and physical tools, they are means, appliances, for the attaining of ends beyond themselves, although unlike them they have enough intelligence to exercise a certain discretion in the execution of the tasks committed to them. Thus by nature, and not merely by social convention, there are those who are slaves - that is, means for the ends of others. — John Dewey

Man is an animal, formidable both from his passions and his reason; his passions often urging him to great evils, and his reason furnishing means to achieve them. To train this animal, and make him amenable to order; to inure him to a sense of justice and virtue; to withhold him from ill courses by fear, and encourage him in his duty by hopes; in short, to fashion and model him for society, hath been the aim of civil and religious institutions; and, in all times, the endeavor of good and wise men. The aptest method for attaining this end hath been always judged a proper education. — George Berkeley

The unambitious sluggard pretends that the eminence is not worth attaining, declines altogether the struggle, and calls himself a philosopher. I say he is a poor-spirited coward. — William Makepeace Thackeray

Compassion has been advocated by all the great faiths because it has been found to be the safest and surest means of attaining enlightenment. It dethrones the ego from the center of our lives and puts others there, breaking down the carapace of the selfishness that holds us back from an experience of the sacred. And it gives us ecstasy, broadening our perspectives and giving us a larger, enhanced vision. — Karen Armstrong

We must exercise ourselves in the things which bring happiness, since, if that be present, we have everything, and, if that be absent, all our actions are directed toward attaining it. — Gretchen Rubin

I didn't realize I wanted to write about D.C. until after 2000. Even though I was a comedy writer, I stayed away from that subject on purpose. It took attaining some distance and perspective. — Kristin Gore

But man is a fickle and disreputable creature and perhaps, like a chess-player, is interested in the process of attaining his goal rather than the goal itself. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Patience is the capacity to endure all that is necessary in attaining a desired end ... Patience never forsakes the ultimate goal because the road is hard. There can be no patience without an object. — Margaret Kennedy