Way To Bliss Quotes & Sayings

I pulled, allowing her body to slide down mine. I kept my hands at her waist to slow her descent. The shifting of her body against mine was heavenly. She sucked in a breath, and when our faces were level, her eyes were not narrowed, but closed. Her lips weren't pursed, but her bottom lip was caught between her teeth in a way that made my mouth dry. Her cheeks were still flushed, but I had a feeling it wasn't about anger anymore.
"You did that on purpose," she said.
I laughed, and it came out raspy. She wasn't the only one affected by our closeness. "I definitely did that on purpose. I think we should make this a post-show ritual actually. — Cora Carmack

All Christian religions are outer-directed. "Who can I convert?" "Let's go to this country and make them Christians." "Wear this." "Do that." "No, don't worship that way. Worship this way or I'll kill you - for the good of your soul, of course." Meanwhile, followers of Eastern religions are sitting in the middle of their minds, experiencing a bliss and a level of consciousness that Western man can't begin to approach. — George Carlin

From all that urges and admonishes, the romantic turns away. He wants to dream, enjoy, immerse himself, instead of clearing his way by striving and wrestling. That which has been and rises out of what is past occupies him far more than what is to become and also more than what wants to become; for the word of the future would always be command. Experiences with their many echoes and their billows stand higher in his estimation than life with its tasks; for tasks always establish a bond with harsh reality. And from this he is in flight. He does not want to struggles against fate, but rather to receive it with an ardent and devout soul; he does not want to wrestle for the blessing, but to experience it, abandoning himself, devoid of will, to what spells salvation and bliss. — Leo Baeck

To be sane, he held, was either to be sedated by melancholy or activated by hysteria, two responses which were 'always and equally warranted for those of sound insight'. All others were irrational, merely symptoms of imaginations left idle, of memories out of work. And above these mundane responses, the only elevation allowable, the only valid transcendence, was a sardonic one: a bliss that annihilated the universe with jeers of dark joy, a mindful ecstasy. Anything else in the way of 'mysticism' was a sign of deviation or distraction, and a heresy to the obvious. ("The Medusa") — Thomas Ligotti

It is above all the valorizing of the present that requires emphasizing. The simple fact of existing, of living in time, can comprise a religious dimension. This dimension is not always obvious, since sacrality is in a sense camouflaged in the immediate, in the "natural" and the everyday. The joy of life discovered by the Greeks is not a profane type of enjoyment: it reveals the bliss of existing, of sharing - even fugitively - in the spontaneity of life and the majesty of the world. Like so many others before and after them, the Greeks learned that the surest way to escape from time is to exploit the wealth, at first sight impossible to suspect, of the lived instant. — Mircea Eliade

Following your bliss is not self-indulgent, but vital; your whole physical system knows that this is the way to be alive in this world and the way to give to the world the very best that you have to offer. There IS a track just waiting for each of us and once on it, doors will open that were not open before and would not open for anyone else. — Joseph Campbell

It is like a lighted torch whose flame can be distributed to ever so many other torches which people may bring along; and therewith they will cook food and dispel darkness, while the original torch itself remains burning ever the same. It is even so with the bliss of the Way.
[Sutra of 42 Sections] — Gautama Buddha

Blissfulness does not compel you to behave in any particular way. Out of bliss, I can laugh or cry; I can sit quietly or be active in the world. — Jaggi Vasudev

KISS, n. A word invented by the poets as a rhyme for "bliss." It is supposed to signify, in a general way, some kind of rite or ceremony appertaining to a good understanding; but the manner of its performance is unknown to this lexicographer. — Ambrose Bierce

"Glorious, stirring sight!" murmured Toad ... "The poetry of motion! The real way to travel! The only way to travel! Here today - in next week tomorrow! Villages skipped, towns and cities jumped- always somebody else's horizons! O bliss! O poop-poop! O my! O my!" — Kenneth Grahame

An unusual problem developed when a case of smallpox was brought to the hospital. Smallpox was too contagious to be allowed on the wards. Its victims had to be specially isolated. But where? Osler drove the patient up to the mayor of Hamilton's home, a sure way of getting action. Special accommodation was arranged in a secluded house. Osler visited the patient twice a day until he died, and then did an autopsy on the spot, helped by the German housekeeper. — Michael Bliss

The return and reintegration with society, which is indispensable to the continuous circulation of spiritual energy into the world, and which, from the standpoint of the community, is the justification of the long retreat, the hero himself may find the most difficult requirement of all. For if he has won through, like the Buddha, to the profound repose of complete enlightenment, there is danger that the bliss of this experience may annihilate all recollection of, interest in, or hope for, the sorrows of the world; or else the problem of making known the way of illumination to people wrapped in economic problems may seem too great to solve. — Joseph Campbell

I am a great believer in what we've been told time and time again by people like Joseph Campbell, "find your bliss." Find out what it is that touches you most deeply. Pursue it, learn about it, explore it, expand on it. Live with it and nurture it. Find your own way and make your own contribution. Find a way to make a contribution to this society because God knows we need contributions from the coming generation. This planet and this civilization is in need. I see it as a time of need. — Leonard Nimoy

Silence and solitude are universally recognized spiritual practices, and there are good reasons for this. Learning how to discipline your speech is a way of preventing your energies from spilling out of you through the rupture of your mouth, exhausting you and filling the world with words, words, words instead of serenity, peace and bliss. — Elizabeth Gilbert

You need music, I don't know why. It's probably one of those Joe Campbell questions, why we need ritual. We need magic, and bliss, and power, myth, and celebration and religion in our lives, and music is a good way to encapsulate a lot of it. — Jerry Garcia

That's just pain she said. It goes eventually. And when it's gone, there's no lasting memory. Not the worst of it anyway. It fades. Our minds aren't made to hold on to the particulars of pain the way we do bliss. It's a gift God gives us, a sign of His care for us. — Charles Frazier

There may have been something identical about the way she fell prey to fear and to longing, namely, the act of falling prey to something, of being trapped in a craving
that fixation on a single thing, when the empty gaze forgets multiplicity or, taken over by craving and passion, considers nothing else. But that longing may also have opened up empires for her, strange, colorful empires she was at home in and could love with the living bliss that never changes. — Hannah Arendt

To get a perfect husband takes a wait That's just the way things are; and you shall find That virtuous patience is the only bait To land one handsome, wealthy, brave, and kind. And what a sweeter pause has ever been? To sleep a century of peaceful dreams, And then, to better dreams, awake again! Such wait is joy, however long it seems. A long delay brings even greater bliss; The greatest bliss must suffer long delays. The god of marriage oaths has promised this: The love that comes most slowly, longest stays. This moral's hard to hear, because it's true. To even utter it is hard to do. — Charles Perrault

In today's world of fear and uncertainty, every child should have one class period a day to dive within himself and experience the field of silence-bliss-t he enormous reservoir of energy and intelligence that is deep within all of us. This is the way to save the coming generation. — David Lynch

One way or another, I'll watch her from a distance, silently and wihtout her knowledge, if that's what it takes. And no matter how long you live
I'll be around when you're gone. I get to spend my entire life either with Laurel, or watching over her while she's with someone else. Bliss or torture
there's really no middle ground. — Aprilynne Pike

I could hear Dean, blissful and blabbering and frantically rocking. Only a guy who's spent five years in jail can go to such maniacal helpless extremes; beseeching at the portals of the soft source, mad with a completely phsycial realization of the origins of life-bliss; blindly seeking to return the way he came — Jack Kerouac

These days I find that I am happy enough in the same way that I am warm enough - the goal isn't bliss or even comfort in some cases. The goal is to feel alive. — Dee Williams

I'm not saying that there's anything better than mated bliss at its best, but I'm saying that living alone is as good in its own way. But we haven't quite given ourselves permission to recognize that. — Barbara Feldon

I envy people with dreams and passions, but I don't think that way. I still don't have a 'bliss' to follow. For people like me - I suspect that's most people - holding out for a 'dream' or a 'passion' is paralyzing. I just like having work I enjoy that feels meaningful. That's hard enough ... but it's enough. — Jane Pauley

Modern Christianity, in dramatic reversal of its biblical form, promises to relieve the pain of living in a fallen world. Then message, whether it's from fundamentalists requiring us to live by a favored set of rules or from charismatics urging a deeper surrender to the Spirit's power, is too often the same: The promise of bliss is for now! Complete satisfaction can be ours this side of heaven. Some speak of the joys of fellowship and obedience, others of a rich awareness of their value and worth. The language may be reassuringly biblical or it may reflect the influence of current psychological thought. Either way, the point of living the Christian life has shifted from knowing and serving Christ till He returns to soothing, or at least learning to ignore, the ache in our soul. — Larry Crabb

He alone is worthy of the appellation who either does great things, or teaches how they may be done, or describes them with a suitable majesty when they have been done; but those only are great things which tend to render life more happy, which increase the innocent enjoyments and comforts of existence, or which pave the way to a state of future bliss more permanent and more pure. — John Milton

He remembered Mrs. Dews' light brown eyes last night. The way they'd closed in bliss when he'd fed her the plum tart ... Her emotion was foreign, wild and exciting, and entirely fascinating
and she tried so very hard to hide it. Why? He wanted to spend time with the source of such powerful emotion. Wanted to experiment, poke and prod, see what else made her cheeks flush her breath come fast. — Elizabeth Hoyt

...I've had a lot of time to think about this, and yes, we could go down your route. The difficult, painful one, because, let's face it, Ellie, you're a fan of the hard way through. Or, we could, slowly but surely, try to forgive each other for all the mistakes we've made and the hurt we've caused each other. None of us sitting here is innocent... — Harper Bliss

Damen is gorgeous. I know this without looking up. I just focus on my book as he makes his way toward me since I know way too much about my classmates already. So as far as I'm concerned, an extra moment of ignorance really is bliss.
But according to the innermost thoughts of Stacia Miller sitting just two rows before me - Damen Auguste is totally smoking hot.
Her best friend, Honor, completely agrees.
So does Honor's boyfriend, Craig, but that's a whole other story — Alyson Noel

Perspective basically guarantees that there's no such thing as a pure emotion. Every emotion is based on how sucky (or not) something is in relation to something else that has already happened. I realized that Hy and Marcus and my ankle wouldn't be so huge if I had experienced a Hiroshima-size disaster.It kind of makes me wish that the worst thing that will ever happen to me will just hurry up and happen already. That way I could live the rest of my life in bliss, if only because I
know how much worse things could be. — Megan McCafferty

The usual marriage in traditional cultures was arranged for by the families. It wasn't a person-to-person decision at all ... In the Middle Ages, that was the kind of marriage that was sanctified by the Church. And so the troubadour idea of real person-to-person Amor was very dangerous ... It is in direct contradiction to the way of the Church. The word AMOR spelt backwards is ROMA, the Roman Catholic Church, which was justifying marriages that were simply political and social in their character. And so came this movement validating individual choice, what I call following your bliss. — Joseph Campbell

Have you ever noticed," he said, stirred now by this vision of domestic bliss that was beyond his reach, and shocked earlier that evening to find himself crying in the subway on his way home from a client, "that gay people secrete everything in each other's presence but tears? — Andrew Holleran

All would wish to be saved and to enjoy the glory of paradise; but to gain heaven, it is necessary to walk in the straight road that leads to eternal bliss. This road is the observance of the divine commandments. Hence, in his preaching, the Baptist exclaimed: Make straight the way of the Lord. — Alphonsus Liguori

And on the endless dusty ribbon of the highway, on sunken roads vaulted over by branches, on paths between stands of grain that rose to his knees, the sun on his shoulders and the morning air in his nostrils, his heart full of the night's bliss, his spirit at peace and his flesh content, he would ride on his way ruminating his happiness, like someone who keeps savoring, hours later, the fragrance of the truffles he has eaten for dinner. — Gustave Flaubert

Ulver Seich woke up in the best possible way. She surfaced with a languorous slowness through fuzzy layers of luxurious half-dreams and memories of sweetness, sensuality and sheer carnal bliss ... to find it all merging rather splendidly into reality, and what was happening right now. — Iain M. Banks

She wanted to walk slowly and smell the wafting perfumes of bouquets that men had bought for their sweethearts and watch couples holding each other tight as they dashed along the pavement on their way to or from something that made them grateful to be in each other's company. Going home felt the same as going to sleep, and she was too bouncing, too overcome with bliss for that. — Anna Godbersen

To find your own way is to follow your bliss. This involves analysis, watching yourself and seeing where real deep bliss is
not the quick little excitement , but the real deep, life-filling bliss. — Joseph Campbell

This journey then, is nothing more, yet nothing less than a period of acclimating to a new way of seeing, a time of transition and revelation as it gradually comes upon "that" which remains when there is no self. this is not a journey for those who expect love and bliss, rather, it is for the hardy who have been tried by fire and have come to rest in a tough, immovable trust in "that" which lies beyond the known, beyond the self, beyond union and even beyond love and trust itself — Bernadette Roberts

One way to access the field is through the daily practice of silence, meditation, and non-judgment. Spending time in nature will also give you access to the qualities inherent in the field: infinite creativity, freedom, and bliss. — Deepak Chopra

The allure of unthinking animal bliss is powerful; it always calls to us, in the same way as the edge of a cliff or the waves of the ocean: Jump. It is a necessary part of our natures, full of delight and danger in equal measure. Yet to the mind trained in language, taught to spy subtleties and take joy in them, such crude, baser matters can pale after a while. But there lies grave peril also: The propensity to empathize with pain expressed in words encourages a poet to avoid the real thing, and a too-passionate love of books can mew one in a cloister, putting up walls where there should be free range. I decided long ago - to keep myself sane amongst the illiterate and unthinking - that there would be poetry in my life. But there would also be fucking. I would have them both, but follow the sage advice of modern beer commercials and enjoy responsibly. — Kevin Hearne

The fruit does not come from the outside, the fruit is created within you. Whatever you do, you develop receptivity for it inside yourself. Someone who wants love should give his love. Someone who wants bliss should start sharing his bliss. Someone who wants flowers to shower in his home should shower flowers in other people's homes. There is no other way. So compassion is an emotion that each person has to develop in order to enter into meditation. — Rajneesh

Reality is always true to itself. When you're in harmony with it, you experience bliss. As soon as you are not in harmony with it, you experience pain. This is the law of the universe; it is the way things are. Nobody gets out of this law. — Adyashanti

At that period I paid as constant attention to the greater securing of my happiness, to enjoying and judging it, too, as I had always done for the smallest details of my acts; and what is the act of love, itself, if not a moment of passionate attention on the part of the body? Every bliss achieved is a masterpiece; the slightest error turns it awry, and it alters with one touch of doubt; any heaviness detracts from its charm, the least stupidity renders it dull. My own felicity is in no way responsible for those of my imprudences which shattered it later on; in so far as I have acted in harmony with it I have been wise. I think still that someone wiser than I might well have remained happy till his death. — Marguerite Yourcenar

Now I knew that life and truth were one; that life mere and pure is in itself bliss; that where being is not bliss, it is not life, but life-in-death. Every inspiration of the dark wind that blew where it listed went out a sigh of thanksgiving. At last I was! I lived, and nothing could touch my life! My darling walked beside me, and we were on our way home to see the Father! — George MacDonald

57. Omniscience and bliss, and mature wisdom, Remaining independent, limitless strength - Attaining all these, he shines ever, the Self without afflictions. With an immaculate body, he, as the Self, merges in Siva. 58. Japa of the name, worship, bathing in holy waters, ritual sacrifices, None of these or others are needed. The fruits of dharma and adharma, Water oblations to forefathers, None of these are for him. 59. No injunctions for observance, no fasts, Nothing required by way of getting into or out of (any action), No vows of celibacy for him, know this. 60. Not having any recourse to falling into the fire or water, Or falling from the mountain top, Enjoy the feast of the Knowledge of Siva, eternal and pure. Rid of the rules applying to all creation, move about as you please. 61. I tell you this is the Truth, the Truth, the Truth, thrice over. There is nothing greater than this, Nothing greater is there to be known, Nothing at all, nowhere ever. — Ramana Maharshi

It is utterly unfair," she said, shooing Wrigley away and
tossing aside her blanket, "that your country boy smile isn't
illegal." She pulled her feet from beneath him, but then she swung a leg over him and straddled his lap, still smiling at him while she took his cheeks in her hands and pressed a soft, open-lipped kiss to his mouth.
Will's pulse kicked up the tempo. He gripped her hips and
pushed against her, parted his lips to make way for her tongue.
Music exploded inside him. Electric guitars, keyboard, fiddle,
bongos. No words, just the white-hot melody of their bodies.
The intoxicating scent of her shampoo tickled his nose, but the intrigued woman scent was stronger - heady and spicy and everything.
He wanted her. — Jamie Farrell

A guy approached her, beer bottle in one hand, smiling at her in that way guys do when they think they're good- looking enough to smile and get anything they want. "My friend and I were just talking about what a sausage fest this was, and then you came in." He ran his appraising gaze down her body, lingering on the V of her neckline.
Faith crossed her arms. "That works out, because I'm here for a weenie roast.
He put a protective hand over his package - probably without realizing he was doing it - but his smile widened. — Cindi Madsen

I saw that all living things were doomed, to bliss: that's not living; it's just a way to waste what we have, a drain. — Arthur Rimbaud

O let me be undone the common way, And have the common comfort to be pity'd, And not be ruin'd in the mask of bliss, And so be envy'd, and be wretched too! — Edward Young

Love is the radiance, the fragrance of knowing oneself, of being oneself.
Love is overflowing joy.
Love is when you have seen that you are not separate from Existence.
Love is not a relationship, love is a state of being.
Fear is the opposite of love. In love, one expands. In fear, one shrinks. In fear, one becomes closed. In love, one opens.
In fear, one doubts. In love, one trusts.
Do not be afraid, this Existence is not your enemy. This existence loves you, this existence is ready to support you in any way.
Trust and you will feel a new overflowing energy. That energy is love. That energy wants to bless the whole existence. Because of this energy, one feels blessed.
Love is a deep desire to bless the whole Existence. — Swami Dhyan Giten

The real problem is I'm greedy. I want complete, utter, unceasing bliss. But I don't want to fall into it either. If happiness were money I wouldn't want to win the lottery. I want to accomplish it, urn it as John Houseman would say. I want it to be an achievement because I want to be in control of my life. I don't want things to happen to me, I want them to happen because of me. Power I want. I want to feel the way I do when I stretch a new canvas and I want to feel that way all the time. the blank canvas fills me with the power of imminent creation. I'm its god an it always bends to my will and when I'm done I know, inside, that it's markedly better than what almost all of my similarly-engaged others can achieve. That's happiness. — Sergio De La Pava

Bipolar disorder is about buying a dozen bottles of Heinz ketchup and all eight bottles of Windex in stock at the Food Emporium on Broadway at 4:00 a.m., flying from Zurich to the Bahamas and back to Zurich in three days to balance the hot and cold weather (my sweet and sour theory of bipolar disorder), carrying $20,000 in $100 bills in your shoes into the country on your way back from Tokyo, and picking out the person sitting six seats away at the bar to have sex with only because he or she happens to be sitting there. It's about blips and burps of madness, moments of absolute delusion, bliss, and irrational and dangerous choices made in order to heighten pleasure and excitement and to ensure a sense of control. The symptoms of bipolar disorder come in different strengths and sizes. Most days I need to be as manic as possible to come as close as I can to destruction, to get a real good high
a $25,000 shopping spree, a four-day drug binge, or a trip around the world. — Andy Behrman

A 5'5", 182-pound, 43-year-old man wearing khaki shorts and a UCLA sweatshirt runs to Nicolas Cage in a manner he will spend the rest of the night describing to his slightly bored but equally boring date as "ambushing." No one else is on the street and Nicolas Cage is unable to avoid the man, who wants a picture with his "brand new Droid." As the man, who actually seems to be vibrating and hovering in an almost hummingbird-like way, adjusts his stance for the third attempt at a picture his crotch lightly brushes Nicolas Cage's upper thigh, causing his face to shift from "bemused resignation" to, strangely, "serene bliss," for what will become the man's inaugural Facebook profile picture. — Megan Boyle

Passion is a feeling that tells you: this is the right thing to do. Nothing can stand in my way. It doesn't matter what anyone else says. This feeling is so good that it cannot be ignored. I'm going to follow my bliss and act upon this glorious sensation of joy. — Wayne W. Dyer

I was not in the bathroom, in the tub, or in the spigot; I did not hold court in the mirror above her head or stand in miniature at the tip of every bristle on Lindsey's or Buckley's toothbrush. In some way I could not account for- had they reached a state of bliss? were my parents back together forever? had Buckley begun to tell someone his troubles? would my father's heart truly heal?- I was done yearning for them, needing them to yearn for me. Though I still would. Though they still would. Always. — Alice Sebold

If I had to describe what love meant, really, not in the abstract or the sentimental or the way I'd imagined it before, that I'd say it was completely irrational, made up of so many opposites, the kind that couldn't exist without the other: bliss and sadness, courage and fear, adoration and disgust. — Jill Bialosky

She smoothes the front of the dress, looking down at her hands, at her bitten fingernails, at her big feet in the pointy-toes shoes. This is a woman's dress, she thinks, a young woman's dress. It is not a girl's dress. It is solidly on the other side of the line outside of girlhood. It is a dress that says something big in a very quiet way; it is a dress that is talking to Alice right now, a dress that is making her feel possibilities never before considered, the possibility of perfume and pretty and dancing and boys. This dress is who she might be, only more so. — Laura Harrington

The problem has to be answered by means of art, because you can't blast them with bliss. Tat freaks them out even more. So instead, you have to have an artful way of approaching them. You do a dance for them, you get them to imagine being interconnected, and to imagine being free of their suffering, and not so self involved, through art that draws them out. Then you, and they, are all established in what's called a Buddha-verse, or Buddha-land — Robert Thurman

Go your way. Forget Prometheus, And all the woe that he is doom'd to bear; By his own choice this vile estate preferring To ignorant bliss and unfelt slavery. — Hartley Coleridge

Reading is everything. Reading makes me feel like I've accomplished something, learned something, become a better person. Reading makes me smarter. Reading gives me something to talk about later on. Reading is the unbelievably healthy way my attention deficit disorder medicates itself. Reading is escape, and the opposite of escape; it's a way to make contact with reality after a day of making things up, and it's a way of making contact with someone else's imagination after a day that's all too real. Reading is grist. Reading is bliss. — Nora Ephron

The men in my life are always like the countries I visit: I fall in love briefly and then move on. I visit, regard the wonders, delve into the history, taste the cooking, peer into dark corners, feel a few moments of excitement and maybe ecstasy and bliss, and then, though I am often sad to leave - or stung that no one insists that I stay - I am on my way. — Laura Fraser

There are no words and there is no singing, but the music has a voice. It is an old voice and a deep voice, like the stump of a sweet cigar or a shoe with a hole. It is a voice that has lived and lives, with sorrow and shame, ecstasy and bliss, joy and pain, redemption and damnation. It is a voice with love and without love. I like the voice, and though I can't talk to it, I like the way it talks to me. It says it is all the same, Young Man. Take it and let it be. — James Frey

The movement called Christianity cannot be understood apart from the Jewish concept of shalom. The Christian gospel does not call people to give their mental assent to a certain list of correct propositions, nor does it provide its adherents with a password that will gain them disembodied bliss when they die and the pleasure of confidently awaiting their escape until then. Shalom is a way of being in the world. The Christian gospel invites us to partake in shalom, to embody shalom, and to anticipate its full realization in the coming kingdom of God. — David Dark

Now when you meditate, try to meditate in a sustained way, first of all sustain it. Then you find that you are getting into the state of Samadhi, means at a state where you start feeling the joy and the bliss of God's blessings, and then you start saying "O God, what a blessing, what a blessing, and what a blessing". Once you have reached that state then you have to realize "Who am I". Who are you? What are you? You are the Spirit. After establishing your sustained attention on the Spirit you'll develop a state where you'll be in a complete state of witnessing with joy. — Nirmala Srivastava

In my 30s I used to go to the gym even though I hated it. The purpose of going to the gym was to postpone the day when I would stop going. That's what writing is to me: a way of postponing the day when I won't do it any more, the day when I will sink into a depression so profound it will be indistinguishable from perfect bliss. — Geoff Dyer

He leans forward seriously. "Bliss. At work and at play, let safety lead the way."
Of course," I say. "Silly me."
Danger never takes a vacation."
That's right. Expect the unexpected."
And never, never -"
Yes?"
He wags his finger. "Check a gas tank with a lighted flare."
A laugh snorts out. "Good to know. — Lauren Myracle

The people beneath the pendulum were in their own orbits of bliss or grief, which Shawna did not want to invade. Instead she made her way upstairs, reading the inscriptions that caught her eye, moved by the sheer accumulation of loss. Grief-fiti. That's what it was. — Armistead Maupin

The way to Heaven is straight and narrow: they who wish to arrive at that place of bliss by walking in the paths of pleasure shall be disappointed; and therefore few reach it, because few are willing to use violence to themselves in resisting temptations. — Alphonsus Liguori

As the innocent infant relies upon the mother for sustenance, so the innocent wanderer, following his native compassion and bliss, relies upon the natural intelligence of life to sustain him. There are various Ways. There is the Way of salvation by the law of Buddha, the Way of Confucius governing the Way of learning, the Way of healing as a doctor, as a poet teaching the Way of Waka, tea, archery, and many arts and skills. Each man practices as he feels inclined. — Miyamoto Musashi

Creation is a sustained period of bliss, even though the subject can still be very sad. Because there's the triumph of coming through and understanding that you have, and that you did it the way only you could do it. You didn't do it the way somebody told you to do it. — Alice Walker

There is nothing I have to do, nowhere I have to go, and no way I have to be except exactly the way I am being right now. My happiness is knowing this, my joy is expressing it, my bliss is experiencing it. — Neale Donald Walsch

Nothing Twice Nothing can ever happen twice. In consequence, the sorry fact is that we arrive here improvised and leave without the chance to practice. Even if there is no one dumber, if you're the planet's biggest dunce, you can't repeat the class in summer: this course is only offered once. No day copies yesterday, no two nights will teach what bliss is in precisely the same way, with exactly the same kisses. One day, perhaps, some idle tongue mentions your name by accident: I feel as if a rose were flung into the room, all hue and scent. The next day, though you're here with me, I can't help looking at the clock: A rose? A rose? What could that be? Is it a flower or a rock? Why do we treat the fleeting day with so much needless fear and sorrow? It's in its nature not to stay: today is always gone tomorrow. With smiles and kisses, we prefer to seek accord beneath our star, although we're different (we concur) just as two drops of water are. — Wislawa Szymborska

Probit analysis provides a mathematical foundation for the doctrine first established by the sixteenth-century physician Paracelsus: "Only the dose makes a thing not a poison." Under the Paracelsus doctrine, all things are potential poisons if given in a high enough dose, and all things are nonpoisonous if given in a low enough dose. To this doctrine, Bliss added the uncertainty associated with individual results. One reason why many foolish users of street drugs die or become very sick on cocaine or heroin or speed is that they see others using the drugs without being killed. They are like Bliss's insects. They look around and see some of their fellow insects still alive. However, knowing that some individuals are still living provides no assurance that a given individual will survive. There is no way of predicting the response of a single individual. — David Salsburg

...If only Dad hadn't cheated. If only Mom had found a way to be happier. If only Nina hadn't run away. If only I could deal with it better. 'If' and 'only' are the two most useless words in the human vocabulary, Dr. Hakim had made a habit of saying. They should never be used together in a sentence, because they speak of something that's beyond your ability to change. A waste of energy. — Harper Bliss

The Awakening

I dreamed that I was a rose
That grew beside a lonely way,
Close by a path none ever chose,
And there I lingered day by day.
Beneath the sunshine and the show'r
I grew and waited there apart,
Gathering perfume hour by hour,
And storing it within my heart,
Yet, never knew,
Just why I waited there and grew.

I dreamed that you were a bee
That one day gaily flew along,
You came across the hedge to me,
And sang a soft, love-burdened song.
You brushed my petals with a kiss,
I woke to gladness with a start,
And yielded up to you in bliss
The treasured fragrance of my heart;
And then I knew
That I had waited there for you. — James Weldon Johnson

I would learn to discern and distinguish the difference between presumption and confession, between those who see what the goal is but not how to get there and those who see the way which leads to the home of bliss, not merely as an end to be perceived but as a realm to live in. — Augustine Of Hippo

Buddha's goal was to help people avoid suffering by teaching them to live according to four Noble Truths and the Eightfold Path. The truths are that the world is full of suffering; that desire and attachment are the causes ofworldly life; that worldly life can be stopped if we destroy desire and attachment; and that to do this we must learn the way. The way is the Eightfold Path: right speech, right action; right living; right effort; right thinking; right meditation; right hopes; and right view. The Eightfold Path leads us to "Nirvana," a state of eternal bliss and peace. — Irina Gajjar

Follow your bliss on the way to success; all the obstacles will melt away. — Debasish Mridha

Oftentimes you give others the opportunity to create your happiness, and many times they fail to create it the way you want it. Why? Because only one person can be in charge of your joy, of your bliss, and that's you. So even your parent, your child, your spouse - they do not have the control to create your happiness. They simply have the opportunity to share in your happiness. Your joy lies within you. — Rhonda Byrne

The way to find out about happiness is to keep your mind on those moments when you feel most happy, when you are really happy - not excited, not just thrilled, but deeply happy. This requires a little bit of self-analysis. What is it that makes you happy? Stay with it, no matter what people tell you. This is what is called following your bliss. — Joseph Campbell

Meditation is the uncovering of this whole process of becoming and being - the negation of becoming in order to be. All this can be seen by a meditative mind at a glance, and this glance doesn't involve time at all. Seeing truth is not a matter of time; either you see or you don't see. The incapacity to see cannot become capable of seeing. So negation is the movement of meditation, and there is no way, no path, no system that can lead a chattering, shallow mind to the heights of bliss. The seeing of this instantly is the truth that frees the shallow mind from itself. — Jiddu Krishnamurti

We often take for granted those familiar faces and places, the repetitive nature of something once new, excitement wanes. To capture that early moment and hold onto it for all our days, true bliss. Looking at the old in in a different way, making it new once again. — Jonathan P. Lamas

Only here is suffering really suffering. Not in the way that those who suffer here are to be ennobled in some other world for their suffering, but that what passes for suffering in this world is, in another world, without any change and merely without its contrariety, bliss. — Franz Kafka

With rope-ladders learned I to reach many a window, with nimble legs did I climb high masts: to sit on high masts of perception seemed to me no small bliss; To flicker like small flames on high masts: a small light, certainly, but a great comfort to cast-away sailors and shipwrecked ones!
By diverse ways and wendings did I arrive at my truth; not by one ladder did I mount to the height where mine eye roveth into my remoteness. And unwillingly only did I ask my way - that was always counter to my taste! Rather did I question and test the ways themselves.
A testing and a questioning hath been all my travelling: and verily, one must also learn to answer such questioning! That, however - is my taste: Neither a good nor a bad taste, but my taste, of which I have no longer either shame or secrecy.
"This is now my way - where is yours?" Thus did I answer those who asked me "the way." For "the way" - it doth not exist! — Friedrich Nietzsche

Chocolate or a good man can instigate your heart's surrender, but full-bodied pleasure and overflowing love - opening until you are exposed fully to God as love's bliss - is the only way to live true to your deepest desire, with or without a trustable lover or a tasty dessert. — David Deida

What if?..
What if I am all to see?
What if life is only this? And Ignorance is bliss?
What if love is only pain? And nothing can be gained by living everyday
And there is no better way?
What then? — Melody Carlson

The way to bliss lies not on beds of down, And he that had no cross deserves no crown. — Francis Quarles

And you do know I'm the one who decides who I date" - she glared at Sam - "not you. If I want to drag this guy into the janitor's closet and have my way with him, that's none of your business."
"Drag me into a closet?" Hunter asked, his eyebrows up near his hairline. "Offer to buy me dinner first, then I'm all yours. — Ophelia London

There is only one way in the world to be distinguished. Follow your instinct! Be yourself, and you'll be somebody. Be one more blind follower of the blind, and you will have the oblivion you desire. — Bliss Carman

Christ, it is sad, sad to see on quite a few of these faces - young ones particularly - a glum, defeated look. Why do they feel this way about their lives? Sure, they are underpaid. Sure, they have no great prospects, in the commercial sense. Sure, they can't enjoy the bliss of mingling with corporation executives. But isn't it any consolation to be with students who are still three-quarters alive? Isn't it some tiny satisfaction to be of use, instead of helping to turn out useless consumer goods? Isn't it something to know that you belong to one of the few professions in this country which isn't hopelessly corrupt? — Christopher Isherwood