Good State Of Mind Quotes & Sayings

How strange it is, Anna. Yesterday, I have filed in my mind as a good day, notwithstanding it was filled with mortal illness and the grieving of the recently bereft. Yet it is a good day, for the simple fact that no one died upon it. We are brought to a sorry state, that we measure what is good by such a shortened yardstick. — Geraldine Brooks

Happiness is the successful state of life, pain is an agent of death. Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one's values. A morality that dares to tell you to find happiness in the renunciation of your happiness - to value the failure of your values - is an insolent negation of morality. — Ayn Rand

The goal is that people will find something of themselves in it. But you don't need to know what a hexachord is! You don't need to know what serialism is. You don't need to know anything technical. It's more about the state of mind of being open and listening to what's really going on. And I think that the more open you can be, the better. So maybe it's not good to have expectations. — Missy Mazzoli

Wisconsin isn't a state, it's a state of mind; and gentle good humor is the coin of the realm. — Scott Jacobs

money can't buy good health or a serene state of mind - especially the latter. You can fly to the ends of the earth in search of the best climate or the best medical treatment and the chances are that you will have to keep flying! — Ruskin Bond

Mindfulness can be described as an awareness of yourself in the present, including an awareness of your body, your mind, your thoughts, and your feelings. When you are mindful, you recognize what you are thinking and feeling, but are not compelled to judge these thoughts or feelings as good or bad, right or wrong. The practice of mindful meditation is meant to help you reach this state of awareness. — Suzanne McNeill

So if you cannot concentrate one of the following is the cause: 1. "Deficiency of the motor centers." 2. "An impulsive and emotional mind." 3. "An untrained mind." The last fault can soon be removed by systematic practice. It is easiest to correct. The impulsive and emotional state of mind can best be corrected by restraining anger, passion and excitement, hatred, strong impulses, intense emotions, fretfulness, etc. It is impossible to concentrate when you are in any of these excited states. These can be naturally decreased by avoiding such food and drinks as have nerve weakening or stimulating influences, or a tendency to stir up the passions, the impulses and the emotions; it is a very good practice to watch and associate with those persons that are steady, calm, controlled and conservative. — William Walker Atkinson

But what, after all, is faith? It is a state of mind that leads people to believe something - it doesn't matter what - in the total absence of supporting evidence. If there were good supporting evidence then faith would be superfluous, for the evidence would compel us to believe it anyway. It is this that makes the often-parroted claim that 'evolution itself is a matter of faith' so silly. People believe in evolution not because they arbitrarily want to believe it but because of overwhelming, publicly available evidence. — Richard Dawkins

Holiness is not merely a feeling, state of mind, or good intention. It involves practical separation from sin and real separation unto God. — Paul Washer

Nowhere can I think so happily as in a train. I am not inspired; nothing so uncomfortable as that. I am never seized with a sudden idea for a masterpiece, nor form a sudden plan for some new enterprise. My thoughts are just pleasantly reflective. I think of all the good deeds I have done, and (when these give out) of all the good deeds I am going to do. I look out of the window and say lazily to myself, "How jolly to live there"; and a little farther on, "How jolly not to live there." I see a cow, and I wonder what it is like to be a cow, and I wonder whether the cow wonders what it is to be like me; and perhaps, by this time, we have passed on to a sheep, and I wonder if it is more fun being a sheep. My mind wanders on in a way which would annoy Pelman a good deal, but it wanders on quite happily, and the "clankety-clank" of the train adds a very soothing accompaniment. So soothing, indeed, that at any moment I can close my eyes and pass into a pleasant state of sleep. — A.A. Milne

I am blessed and being blessed is something more than just having something. It is a state of mind in which the good of the world is illuminated, it's understood. It is as if one is vouchsafed a vision of some sort, a vision of love, of 'agape', of the essential value of each and every living thing. — Alexander McCall Smith

No matter whether your life is pleasant or good; whether you are having big challenges or no challenges, your state of your mind has everything to do with how you will relate to your experiences. — Louise Hay

I think Dr. Willis McNelly at the California State University at Fullerton put it best when he said that the true protagonist of an sf story or novel is an idea and not a person. If it is *good* sf the idea is new, it is stimulating, and, probably most important of all, it sets off a chain-reaction of ramification-ideas in the mind of the reader; it so-to-speak unlocks the reader's mind so that the mind, like the author's, begins to create. Thus sf is creative and it
inspires creativity, which mainstream fiction by-and-large does not do. We who read sf (I am speaking as a reader now, not a writer) read it because we love to experience this chain-reaction of ideas being set off in our minds by something we read, something with a new idea in it; hence the very best since fiction ultimately winds up being a collaboration between author and reader, in which both create and enjoy doing it: joy is the essential and final ingredient of science fiction, the joy of discovery of newness. — Philip K. Dick

The good of the governed is the end, and rewards and punishments are the means, of all government. The government of the supreme and all-perfect Mind, over all his intellectual creation, is by proportioning rewards to piety and virtue, and punishments to disobedience and vice ... The joys of heaven are prepared, and the horrors of hell in a future state, to render the moral government of the universe perfect and complete. Human government is more or less perfect, as it approaches nearer or diverges further from an imitation of this perfect plan of divine and moral government. — John Adams

My state of mind regarding the pilfering from which I had been so unexpectedly exonerated did not impel me to frank disclosure; but I hope it had some dregs of good at the bottom of it. — Charles Dickens

Once the state starts providing, it feels free to hand out the rules, too!" Larch blurted hastily.
... "In a better world ... " she began patiently.
"No, not in a better world!" he cried. "In this one
in this world. I take this world as a given. Talk to me about this world!" ...
"Oh, I can't always be right," Larch said tiredly.
"Yes, I know," Nurse Caroline said sympathetically. "It's because even a good man can't always be right that we need a society, that we need certain rules
call them priorities, if you prefer," she said ...
Always in the background of his mind, there was a newborn baby crying ... And they were not crying to be born, he knew; they were crying because they were born. — John Irving

When you see evil do not form ideas that are in the likeness of that evil; do not think of the evil as bad, but try to understand the forces that are back of that evil - forces that are good in themselves, though misdirected in their present state. By trying to understand the nature of the power that is back of evil or adversity, you will not form bad ideas, and therefore will feel no bad effects from experiences that may seem undesirable. At the same time, you will think your own thought about the experiences, thereby developing the power of the master mind. — Christian D. Larson

I have now been an officer in this Church for a very long time. I am an old man who cannot deny the calendar. I have lived long enough and served in enough different capacities to have removed from my mind, if such were necessary, any doubt of the divinity of this, the work of God. We respect those of other churches. We desire their friendship and hope to render meaningful service with them. We know they all do good, but we unabashedly state - and this frequently brings criticism upon us - that this is the true and living Church of our Father in Heaven and His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. — Gordon B. Hinckley

I would like to meet myself sometime to see how I would look to myself. But I'd have to be in an extremely good state of mind on such a day, because I don't like unpleasantness. — Multatuli

Though neither happiness nor respect are worth anything, because unless both are coming from the truest motives, they are simply deceits. A successful man earns the respect of the world never mind what is the state of his mind, or his manner of earning. So what is the good of such respect, and how happy will such a man be in himself? And if he is what passes for happy, such a state is lower than the self-content of the meanest animal. — Richard Llewellyn

The Islamic State's ideology exerts powerful sway over a certain subset of the population. Life's hypocrisies and inconsistencies vanish in its face. Musa Cerantonio and the Salafis I met in London are unstumpable: No question I posed left them stuttering. They lectured me garrulously and, if one accepts their premises, convincingly. To call them un-Islamic appears, to me, to invite them into an argument that they would win. If they had been froth-spewing maniacs, I might be able to predict that their movement would burn out as the psychopaths detonated themselves or became drone-splats, one by one. But these men spoke with an academic precision that put me in mind of a good graduate seminar. I even enjoyed their company, and that frightened me as much as anything else. — Graeme Wood

A positive state of mind is not merely good for you, it benefits everyone with whom you come into contact, literally changing the world. — Dalai Lama

When stress is the basic state of mind, even good things stress us out. We have to learn to let go. — Sakyong Mipham

Success will come about because you are in a higher state of mind. If you create good karma, then you will go into higher states of mind. — Frederick Lenz

When the rhythms of our body-mind are in synch with nature's rhythms, when we are living in harmony with life, we are living in the state of grace. To live in grace is to experience that state of consciousness where things flow effortlessly and our desires are easily fulfilled. Grace is magical, synchronistic, coincidental, joyful. It's that good-luck factor. But to live in grace we have to allow nature's intelligence to flow through us without interfering. — Deepak Chopra

The forgiving state of mind is a magnetic power for attracting good. — Catherine Ponder

I had so many beliefs against being a singer or what it takes. There was a lot of pain associated with that. The rejection of it all. I lived in a rejection state of mind. Not because of my voice; the mike never rejected me. It was harboring all those bad memories of being broke. It teaches you your worth. Nothing good comes from that. — Ester Dean

Happiness is an elusive state of mind not to be gained by clumsy pursuit.It is given to those who do not sue for it:to be unconcerned about a desired good is probably the only way to possess it. — Ruskin Bond

A low mood is not the time to analyze your life. To do so is emotional suicide. If you have a legitimate problem, it will still be there when your state of mind improves. The trick is to be grateful for our good moods and graceful in our low moods - not taking them too seriously. The next time you feel low, for whatever reason, remind yourself, "This too shall pass." It will. — Richard Carlson

It's interesting that we can always find someone who will give an articulate and persuasive defense for the ethical legitimacy of some of the activities that God has judged to be an outrage to Him. As humans, our ability to defend ourselves from moral culpability is quite developed and nuanced. We become a culture in trouble when we begin to call evil good and good evil. To do that, we must distort the conscience, and, in essence, make man the final authority in life. All one has to do is to adjust his conscience to suit his ethic. Then we can live life with peace of mind, thinking that we are living in a state of righteousness. — R.C. Sproul

Many of us are slaves to our minds. Our own mind is our worst enemy. We try to focus, and our mind wanders off. We try to keep stress at bay, but anxiety keeps us awake at night. We try to be good to the people we love, but then we forget them and put ourselves first. And when we want to change our life, we dive into spiritual practice and expect quick results, only to lose focus after the honeymoon has worn off. We return to our state of bewilderment. We're left feeling helpless and discouraged. It seems we all agree that training the body through exercise, diet, and relaxation is a good idea, but why don't we think about training our minds? — Sakyong Mipham

Also, always encourage 'being good' over 'doing good.' Acts of goodness are the difficulty for us and should, of course, be avoided. 'Being good' is far less problematic, largely because it lacks definition and can be solely a state of mind completely unattached to reality. — Geoffrey Wood

It is always possible to get into a higher state of mind. The way you get into a higher state of mind is by generating good karma. — Frederick Lenz

Good-humor is a philosophic state of mind; it seems to say to Nature that we take her no more seriously than she takes us. I maintain that one should always talk of philosophy with a smile. — William James

Hatred, jealousy and excessive attachment cause suffering and agitation. I feel compassion can help us overcome these disturbances and let us return to a calm state of mind. Compassion is not just being kind to your friend. That involves attachment because it is based on expectation. Compassion is when you do something good without any expectations - based on realizing that "the other person is also just like me". — Dalai Lama

A Frenchman is self-assured because he considers himself personally, in mind as well as body, irresistibly enchanting for men as well as women. An Englishman is self-assured on the grounds that he is a citizen of the best-organized state in the world, and therefore, as an Englishman, he always knows what he must do, and knows that everything he does as an Englishman is unquestionably good. An Italian is self-assured because he is excitable and easily forgets himself and others. A Russian is self-assured precisely because he does not know anything and does not want to know anything, because he does not believe it possible to know anything fully. A German is self-assured worst of all, and most firmly of all, and most disgustingly of all, because he imagines that he knows the truth, science, which he has invented himself, but which for him is the absolute truth. — Leo Tolstoy

While functions being unable to change state is good because it helps us reason about our programs, there's one problem with that. If a function can't change anything in the world, how is it supposed to tell us what it calculated? In order to tell us what it calculated, it has to change the state of an output device (usually the state of the screen), which then emits photons that travel to our brain and change the state of our mind, man. — Miran Lipovaca

Can you imagine a mind state in which there is no bitter, condemning judgement of oneself or of others? This mind does not see the world in terms of good and bad,might and wrong, good and evil; it sees only 'suffering and the end of suffering. — Sharon Salzberg

I would be lying, if I said that sometimes it is just a job that you show up for because you're getting paid, and that's important, too. But, if you can be in a state of mind where you enjoy your job, whether it's just a job, or it's actually cathartic for you, or it's something personal. I think it would be much easier to be content with doing a good job. — Julianne Moore

I remember a cartoon depicting a chimney sweep falling from the roof of a tall building and noticing on the way that a signboard had one word spelled wrong, and wondering in his headlong flight why nobody had thought of correcting it. In a sense, we all are crashing to our death from the top story of our birth to the flat stones of the churchyard and wondering with an immortal Alice in Wonderland at the patterns of the passing wall. This capacity to wonder at trifles - no matter the imminent peril - these asides of the spirit, these footnotes in the volume of life are the highest forms of consciousness, and it is in this childishly speculative state of mind, so different from common sense and its logic, that we know the world to be good. — Vladimir Nabokov

Luck is personal; we all have our own. Sometimes it's good, sometimes it's bad, but it's yours, and it follows you wherever you go...And luck can change, because as my nana always insisted, luck was a state of mind. — Lynne Matson

Gratitude feels so good because it is the state of mind closest to your natural state in which you were born to live. — Esther Hicks

Good cheer is a state of mind or mood that promotes happiness or joy ... With God's help, good cheer permits us to rise above the depressing present or difficult circumstances. It is a process of positive reassurance and reinforcement. It is sunshine when clouds block the light. — Marvin J. Ashton

I hug her one more time and pull her down to the bed. And in my mind, I rise up from the bed and look down on us, and look down at everybody else in this hospital who might have the good fortune of holding a pretty girl right now, and then at the entire Brooklyn block, and then the neighborhood, and then Brooklyn, and then New York City, and then the whole Tri-State Area, and then this little corner of America- with laser eyes I can see into every house- and then the whole country and the hemisphere and now the whole stupid world, everyone in every bed, couch, futon, chair, hammock, love seat, and tent, everyone kissing or touching eachother ... and i know that i'm the happiest of all of them. — Ned Vizzini

Good-humor is a state between gayety and unconcern,
the act or emanation of a mind at leisure to regard the gratification of another. — Samuel Johnson

To the American People: Christmas is not a time or a season but a state of mind. To cherish peace and good will, to be plenteous in mercy, is to have the real spirit of Christmas. If we think on these things, there will be born in us a Savior and over us will shine a star sending its gleam of hope to the world.
Presidential message, December 25, 1927 — Calvin Coolidge

Try to meditate as you would engage in a good conversation: maintain a sense of openness, without judgment or anticipating what is going to be said next. As I already noted (but almost can't emphasize too much), having an agenda prevents you from observing objectively and accepting things as they are. When you first sit down to meditate, briefly check in with yourself. Don't engage in a long monologue about your state of mind; just see how you feel, literally. There's a good chance, especially if you're new to this, you'll find an uneasiness that comes from wanting to do something else or from hoping you'll get some kind of payoff from meditating. Observe what that wanting feels like without trying to change it. Just accept that this feeling or feelings is reality for you at this moment, and that's okay - this too will pass. If you're finding you're having a lot of difficulty concentrating, it can be helpful to check in this way again. — Marshall Glickman

Sometimes in life, we may have to experience solitude, the baseless accusations of people, the betrayal and misunderstanding of trusted and loyal ones, the great judgments and suggestions of 'they that know better', and a moment of a state of double mindedness. But those are also for good, for they are the very things that shape and prepare our mind, body and spirit to face the world and to accomplish our mission with great zeal, tenacity and distinctiveness. — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

To preserve permanent good health, the state of mind must be taken into consideration. — Robert Owen

I will be the first. As of tonight, I renounce my citizenship in the United Nations, and my allegiance to the Shelter state. From now on I will be a citizen--a citizen of no country but that bounded by the limits of my own mind. I do not know what those limits are, and I may never find out, but I shall devote my life to searching for them, in whatever manner seems good to me, and in no other manner whatsoever.
You must do the same. Tear up your registration cards. If you are asked your serial number, tell them you never had one. Never fill in another form. Stay above ground when the siren sounds. Stake out plots; grow crops; abandon the corridors. Do not commit any violence; simply refuse to obey. Nobody has the. right to compel you, as non-citizens. Passivity is the key. Renounce, resist, deny! — James Blish

Tharn. It was a good word for a bad state of mind. — Stephen King

I knew that now, reading it in the oversensitized state of my mind after much too much brandy, I would remember it somewhere, and afterwards it would seem as though it had really happened to me. I would always have it. That was another good thing you paid for and then had. — Ernest Hemingway,

When you're headlining, people are paying to come see you specifically. It's a different kind of pressure, because you've got to deliver. You've got to give these people what they paid for. It's a different mind state, a different type of mentality, but it's honestly a pretty good problem to have, you know? — J. Cole

One desire has been the ruling passion of my life. One high motive has acted like a spur upon my mind and soul. and sooner than that I should seek escape from the sacred necessity that is laid upon me, let the breath of life fail me. It is this: That in spite of all worldly opposition, God's holy ordinances shall be established again in the home, in the school and in the State for the good of the people; to carve as it were into the conscience of the nation the ordinances of the Lord, to which Bible and Creation bear witness, until the nation pays homage again to God — Abraham Kuyper

Thus it is well to seem merciful, faithful, humane, sincere, religious, and also to be so; but you must have the mind so disposed that when it is needful to be otherwise you may be able to change to the opposite qualities. And it must be understood that a prince, and especially a new prince, cannot observe all those things which are considered good in men, being often obliged, in order to maintain the state, to act against faith, against charity, against humanity, and against religion. And, therefore, he must have a mind disposed to adapt itself according to the wind, and as the variations of fortune dictate, and, as I said before, not deviate from what is good, if possible, but be able to do evil if constrained. — Niccolo Machiavelli

It's a question of not copying the masters, to look for something, good or bad, for oneself. To enter this liberated state of mind, one cannot copy the others. — Nathalie Sarraute

I once mentioned in a school report, how a young man in one of our English training colleges having to paraphrase the passage in Macbeth beginning,

Can'st thou not minister to a mind diseased?

turned this line into, "Can you not wait upon the lunatic?" And I remarked what a curious state of things it would be, if every pupil of our national schools knew, let us say, that the moon is two thousand one hundred and sixty miles in diameter, and thought at the same time that a good paraphrase for

Can'st thou not minister to a mind diseased?

was, "Can you not wait upon the lunatic?" If one is driven to choose, I think I would rather have a young person ignorant about the moon's diameter, but aware that "Can you not wait upon the lunatic?" is bad, than a young person whose education had been such as to manage things the other way — Matthew Arnold

Clues. Sometimes we get involved with things that have both advantages and disadvantages. Sometimes the bad points outweigh (or outwit) the good, and we choose to ignore the negatives. Our subconscious won't let us get away with that. Remember, the mind will lie, the body cannot! * * * Getting Better by Getting It Together As we've see, your state of health depends on many constantly changing conditions. When you experience an illness or accident, it is usually because an imbalance between your inner and outer worlds has triggered a body problem. So you must work backwards: begin by looking at the body problem for clues to the cause of the imbalance, then take the steps necessary to restore your inner alignment. — Rochelle Gordon

None of our men are 'experts.' We have most unfortunately found it necessary to get rid of a man as soon as he thinks himself an expert because no one ever considers himself expert if he really knows his job. A man who knows a job sees so much more to be done than he has done, that he is always pressing forward and never gives up an instant of thought to how good and how efficient he is. Thinking always ahead, thinking always of trying to do more, brings a state of mind in which nothing is impossible. The moment one gets into the 'expert' state of mind a great number of things become impossible. — Henry Ford

So it went. Bob was increasingly cynical, leery, uneasy; Jesse was increasingly cavalier, merry, moody, fey, unpredictable. If his gross anatomy suggested a strong smith in his twenties, his actual physical constitution was that of a man who was incrementally dying. He was sick with rheums and aches and lung congestions, he tilted against chairs and counters and walls, in cold weather he limped with a cane. He coughed incessantly when lying down, his clever mind was often in conflict, insomnia stained his eye sockets like soot, he seemed in a state of mourning. He counteracted the smell of neglected teeth with licorice and candies, he browned his graying hair with dye, he camouflaged his depressions and derangements with masquerades of extreme cordiality, courtesy, and good will toward others. — Ron Hansen

Hope is a state of mind, not of the world. Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as joy that things are going well, or willingness to invest in enterprises that are obviously heading for success, but rather an ability to work for something because it is good. — Vaclav Havel

Research has been called good business, a necessity, a gamble, a game. It is none of these - it's a state of mind. — Martin H. Fischer

A good Judoka never anticipates his action in a match, but his mind is as clever as a polished mirror which enables him to foresee precisely anything to happen and he displays freedom of his physique to cope with any change. Such mental state and physical action are called sei or tranquility and do or action, sometimes they are called ju and go or tenderness and sturdiness, in and yo or negative and positive, etc. — Kyuzo Mifune

She was fairly good at any kind of housework not demanding brains. Nobody could say why some of Ossian Popham's gifts of mind and conversation had not descended to his children, but though the son was not really stupid at practical work, Lallie Joy was in a perpetual state of coma. — Kate Douglas Wiggin

When you say to yourself, 'I am going to have a pleasant visit or a pleasant journey,' you are literally sending elements and forces ahead of your body that will arrange things to make your visit or journey pleasant ... Our thoughts, or in other words, our state of mind, is ever at work 'fixing up' things good or bad in advance. — Prentice Mulford

The next day round about ten o'clock I was walking down Welbeck Street. I was in a bad temper. By daylight the whole project seemed very much less attractive. I felt that to be snubbed by a film star would put me in a bad state of mind for months. But I regarded the matter as something which had been decided and which now simply had to be carried out. I often used this method for deciding difficult cases. In stage one I entertain the thing purely as a hypothesis, and in stage two I count my stage one thinking as a fixed decision on which there is no going back. I recommend this technique to any of you who are not good at making decisions. — Iris Murdoch

For a great state, qua state, is not one which embraces a great population or an extensive territory, but one which achieves a great intensity of social unity. And in this matter we must bear in mind that unity means unity of purpose and will, and not merely unity of action and result. One of the most significant reasons for refusing to attribute an unlimited degree of statehood to those associations which are legally known as states, is that their size is governed by considerations of commerce, mere whim, or by other limited ends, rather than by reference to the good life or the excellence of souls. — Michael Oakeshott

There is this quality esteemed within every good writer. She knows ... she knows that truth must be un-sheltered within every human transition phase or stable state. It must reflect in every mind untouched by shadows. She knows ... she knows what burdens must be carried of the human plight. She knows ... — Dew Platt

A good stance and posture reflect a proper state of mind. — Morihei Ueshiba

What is the nature of the guilt that your teachers call his Original Sin? What are the evils man acquired when he fell from a state they consider perfection? Their myth declares that he ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge
he acquired a mind and became a rational being. It was the knowledge of good and evil
he became a moral being. He was sentenced to earn his bread by his labor
he became a productive being. He was sentenced to experience desire
he acquired the capacity of sexual enjoyment. The evils for which they damn him are reason, morality, creativeness, joy
all the cardinal values of his existence. It is not his vices that their myth of man's fall is desired to explain and condemn, it is not his errors that they hold as his guilt, but the essence of his nature as man. Whatever he was
that robot of the Garden of Eden, who existed without mind, without values, without labor, without love
he was not man. — Ayn Rand

Sometimes people try to read into my strip and find out what my state of mind is. And I can say if I'm in a good mood, generally the comic strip starts out in a good mood, but the punchline is very negative and sour. — Matt Groening

Our life is composed of events and states of mind. How ewe appraise our life from our deathbed will be predicated not only on what came to us in life but how we lived with it. It will not be simply illness or health, riches or poverty, good luck or bad, which ultimately define whether we believe we have had a good life or not, but the quality of our relationship to these situations: the attitudes of our states of mind. (34) — Stephen Levine

There is one thing in this good old world that is positively sure - happiness is for all who strive to be happy - and those who laugh are happy. Everybody is eligible - you - me - the other fellow. Happiness is fundamentally a state of mind - not a state of body. — Douglas Fairbanks

A good deal is a state of mind. — Lee Iacocca

To me, true prosperity begins with feeling good about yourself. It is also the freedom to do what you want to do, when you want to do it. It is never an amount of money; it is a state of mind. Prosperity or lack of it is an outer expression of the ideas in your head. — Louise Hay

Well, that's going to be up to the pundits and the people to make up their mind. I'll tell you what is a president for him, for example, talking about my record in the state of Texas. I mean, he's willing to say anything in order to convince people that I haven't had a good record in Texas. — George W. Bush

The modern State exists not to protect our rights but to do us good or make us good - anyway, to do something to us or to make us something. Hence the new name 'leaders' for those who were once 'rulers'. We are less their subjects than their wards, pupils, or domestic animals. There is nothing left of which we can say to them, 'Mind your own business.' Our whole lives are their business. — C.S. Lewis

If we allow everything access to our mind, we are simply asking to be kept in a state of mental turmoil or bondage. For nothing enters the mind without having an effect for good or evil. — Dallas Willard

Yes, my good Sir, and there will be no better in which to look for a government. Why? Because of the liberty which reigns there - they have a complete assortment of constitutions; and he who has a mind to establish a State, as we have been doing, must go to a democracy as he would to a bazaar at which they sell them, and pick out the one that suits him; then, when he has made his choice, he may found his State. He will be sure to have patterns enough. And — Plato

Hope has a cost. Hope is not comfortable or easy. Hope requires personal risk. It is not about the right attitude. Hope is not about peace of mind. Hope is action. Hope is doing something. The more futile, the more useless, the more irrelevant and incomprehensible an act of rebellion is, the vaster and more potent hope becomes.
Hope never makes sense. Hope is weak, unorganized and absurd. Hope, which is always nonviolent, exposes in its powerlessness, the lies, fraud and coercion employed by the state. Hope knows that an injustice visited on our neighbor is an injustice visited on all of us. Hope posits that people are drawn to the good by the good. This is the secret of hope's power. Hope demands for others what we demand for ourselves. Hope does not separate us from them. Hope sees in our enemy our own face. — Chris Hedges

Happiness is simply a state of mind in which our thinking is pleasant a good share of the time. — Maxwell Maltz

On considering political societies, their origin, their constitution, and their effects, I have sometimes been in a good deal more than doubt, whether the Creator did ever really intend man for a state of happiness. He has mixed in his cup a number of natural evils, (in spite of the boasts of stoicism they are evils,) and every endeavor which the art and policy of mankind has used from the beginning of the world to this day, in order to alleviate or cure them, has only served to introduce new mischiefs, or to aggravate and inflame the old. Besides this, the mind of man itself is too active and restless a principle ever to settle on the true point of quiet. It discovers every day some craving want in a body, which really wants but little. — Edmund Burke

Yoga helps me with a composed and serene state of mind, which is good for writing. — Damon Galgut

In order to learn true humility (I use this expression to describe the state of mind under discussion), it is good for a person to withdraw from the turmoil of the world (we see that Christ
withdrew when the people wanted to proclaim him king as well as when he had to walk the thorny path), for in life either the depressing or the elevating impression is too dominant for a true
balance to come about. Here, of course, individuality is very decisive. — Soren Kierkegaard

I decided to make spaghetti for lunch again. Not that I was the least bit hungry. But I couldn't just go on sitting on the sofa, waiting for the phone to ring. I had to move my body, to begin working toward some goal. I put water in a pot, turned on the gas, and until it boiled I would make tomato sauce while listening to an FM broadcast. The radio was playing an unaccompanied violin sonata by Bach. The performance itself was excellent, but there was something annoying about it. I didn't know whether this was the fault of the violinist or of my own present state of mind, but I turned off the music and went on cooking in silence. I heated the olive oil, put garlic in the pan, and added minced onions. When these began to brown, I added the tomatoes that I had chopped and strained. It was good to be cutting things and frying things like this. It gave me a sense of accomplishment that I could feel in my hands. I liked the sounds and the smells. — Haruki Murakami

Enlightenment is not some good feeling or some particular state of mind. The state of mind that exists when you sit in the right posture is, itself, enlightenment. If you cannot be satisfied with the state of mind you have in zazen, it means your mind is still wandering about. Our body and mind should not be wobbling or wandering about. In this posture there is no need to talk about the right state of mind. You already have it. This is the conclusion of Buddhism. — Shunryu Suzuki

Suicide is a form of murder - premeditated murder. It isn't something you do the first time you think of doing it. It takes getting used to. And you need the means, the opportunity, the motive. A successful suicide demands good organization and a cool head, both of which are usually incompatible with the suicidal state of mind. — Susanna Kaysen

In my mind, he was guilty of no error - he was chargeable with no exaggeration - he was betrayed by his fancy into no metaphor, who once said that all we see about us, Kings, Lords, and Commons, the whole machinery of the State, all the apparatus of the system, and its varied workings, end in simply bringing twelve good men into a box. — Henry Brougham, 1st Baron Brougham And Vaux