Top 773 Centered Quotes & Sayings - Page 11

We are always centered in the middle of chaos. It never goes away. It's important to find your inner peace. For me, it's literally looking at the bigger picture. When I think about the size of the universe, I feel like any problems I'm surrounded by are so small. I just do my best to react to chaos with love, and hopefully, other people will catch on and do things out of love too.

It's probably simply a matter of temperament that I never stopped to wonder if I could "match" what I had done, never choked off my writing by competing with myself, or with anybody else for that matter. My ambition was absolutely centered on the work itself, never on what it would bring me, or "who" it would make me. I never cared about that at all.

For the ordinary man, whose mind is a checkerboard of crisscrossing reflections, opinions, and prejudices, bare attention is virtually impossible; his life is thus centered not in reality itself but in his ideas of it. By focusing the mind wholly on each objects and every action, zazen strips it of extraneous thoughts and allows us to enter into a full rapport with life.

It can get really messy inside my head, and it's usually just because everybody can get really self-centered at some point. And so what usually keeps me from quitting is that my reasons for quitting are just lame. I wouldn't want anybody else to talk to myself the way that I talk to myself.

To appeal to God is to appeal to the action of universal love. Love never fails to come when we call to it, but it will always seem to fail us when our bidding is self-centered. The most powerful prayers are simply for God's will to be done, because God's will is healing for all living things.

Further strengthenings of the self-centered instinct for survival recruit even greater numbers of people into some sort of ring of fellowship (church or gender, red state or blue) by populating the terra incognita outside the ring with enough barbarians to verify the existence of a civilization within--to define the preferred stock by what, as all good people agree, it decidedly is not.

I was a self-centered bore. I was masochistic, and only thought I was happy. When I woke up and said, "there must be something wrong with me", I grew up. Because I never understood myself, how could I hope to understand anyone else? That's why I can truly say that now I can give a woman love for the first time in my life, because I can understand her.

Every person in the world, including yourself, will encounter various trials throughout life. Satan seeks to defeat you by tempting you to trust your own wisdom, to live according to your self-centered feelings, and to gratify the desires of your flesh. In contrast, God's will is for you to be an overwhelming conqueror in all of these tests for His honor and glory.

Perhaps the most important contribution to me being centered in the midst of this chaos is my daughter, Krystal Ann. I am very lucky because she works with me and is responsible for many aspects of the business on the marketing side of my career. This allows us to travel together and experience life on the road, seeing the world. Having family with me is very important and grounding.

I come from a boxing background. Three generations of boxers. I personally hate to fight, but I love the science of boxing. Mind, body. So for me, shadow boxing or hitting the heavy bag is something that gets me in a centered state. It's calming for me. To me, boxing isn't about the other person. It's about me. My inner struggles. It works for me.

I am running on fumes, so it's time to get centered again. I start with eating healthier and cutting out caffeine - at least cutting back on caffeine. I exercise and get outside to play. I reconnect with my spiritual practice, which is daily meditation and prayer. Most importantly, I reconnect with my family and friends. If all else fails, a few deep breaths.

For the past several centuries the bonding power of the family dinner table has been one of the few constants, and now it's binding no more. The potency of the media is now stronger than that of the family. The wonder is that families still exist at all, since the forces of modern life mainly all pull people away from a family centered way of life.

The Bible makes clear a basic truth that we self-centered humans find difficult to accept, namely, that the natural universe was not created primarily for us. There is no doubt that God wants us to enjoy it and even use its resources to optimize a good life for ourselves. But the ultimate purpose of creation is worship. Nature and all living things were created to glorify God.

In all the people I meet - though some may be governed by the self-centered nature and may not know their potential at all - I see that divine spark. And that's what I concentrate on. All people look beautiful to me; they look like shining lights to me. I always have the feeling of being thankful for these beautiful people who walk the earth with me.

What I've taken from my spiritual study is the wisdom of living a balanced life. My spiritual path has also helped me to be more emotionally centered, to be more understanding of those that disagree with me, and to learn how to let go of some of my power issues so that I can be more effective and bring a sense of humility to my work - while still having the self-confidence to be effective.

My hope is to see people of color in roles that do not emphasize race. Often times when movies are centered around people of color, they are movies where the storyline is based on some racial component. I want to see movies where people of color play more interesting, nuanced characters.

How do we accomplish this matter of gathering life together in God? We must begin primarily by refocusing our attention keeping our minds and hearts directed toward God. The essence of the centered life is attention to God in all we think, say and do. It is the growing realization of His presence in our most down-to-earth living.

In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities; in the expert's mind there are few.... In the beginner's mind there is no thought, 'I have attained something.' All self-centered thoughts limit our vast mind. When we have no thought of achievement, no thought of self, we are true beginners. We can really learn something.

I first read Wendell Berry's short-story collections, "Fidelity" and then "Watch with Me." They just knocked my socks off. The characters and the fellowship of the small town reminded me of my own small town in Illinois.Then I discovered that, much like J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, that all of Berry's fiction was centered in this same town.

Our national purpose, not our party differences, must define the American Brand. We must change the conversation from one centered around what defines our differences to one that hangs a lantern on what binds us, supports our collective well being and makes us all stronger and more productive as a result.

When you are soul-centered, you can focus your attention where and when you want to, easily, without distraction. You know to look for what you want to see and experience. You know that what you seek you shall find, and what you focus on in life will be more prominent in your awareness. You know your awareness is powerful and creative.

Id have to say, for me, as a child, my favorite memories were always centered around Christmas time. It always seemed like no matter how much money my parents had or didnt have, we got completely spoiled rotten. There were always presents under the tree, and we always did special things, like hide elves around the house.

Are we that self-centered to believe no one in the world is aware of racism right now? That, as athletes, we solve the real issues by using our platforms to speak? We don't need to say more. We need to find a way to achieve more. Protesting during an anthem, wearing T-shirts is great, but we need to see real actions being put in to the works.

One of the problems with any kind of talking about the media landscape is that we've just been through an unusually stable period in which, for fifty years, English language media was centered in three cities - London, New York, and Los Angeles - around a very stable group of people working in a relatively stable set of media.

What Americans desperately need is a way to transition from the current system - which is fragmented and focuses on high-cost, high-tech interventions after illness strikes - to a modern system that delivers coordinated, high-touch, lower-cost, patient-centered care with an emphasis on primary care and prevention.

I see the main problem as a spiritual one, not a resource problem, or a problem with this or that government, but a larger problem centered around human beliefs, the troublesome elements founded in our mythology. Our problematic mythology is collapsing all around us. It is a mythology that is predatory.

The great Way is easy, yet people prefer the side paths. Be aware when things are out of balance. Stay centered within the Tao. When rich speculators prosper While farmers lose their land; when government officials spend money on weapons instead of cures; when the upper class is extravagant and irresponsible while the poor have nowhere to turn- all this is robbery and chaos. It is not in keeping with the Tao.

There are people so blind and self-absorbed in all matters that they always believe that, whatever they desire or think, they can impose their will on other people. Whatever bad reason they use to persuade others, these self-centered people are so caught up in the process that it seems to them all they have to do is to speak their wishes in a lofty and commanding tone of voice in order to convince everybody.

Human nature means battling constantly between being completely self-absorbed and trying to be a communal creature. Nature makes you a communal creature. The ultimate single-minded, self-centered creature is a cancer cell. And mostly, we're not made up of cancer cells.

That’s what it was like to be alive. To move about in a cloud of ignorance; to go up and down trampling on the feelings of those...of those about you. To spend and waste time as though you had a million years. To be always at the mercy of one self-centered passion, or another. Now you know- that’s the happy existence you wanted to go back to. Ignorance and blindness. -Simon Stimson, OUR TOWN

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People are unreasonable, illogical and self-centered. Love them anyway.... Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable. Be honest and frank anyway.... What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight. Build anyway. .. Give the world the best you have and you'll get kicked in the teeth. Give the world the best you've got anyway.

Rwanda is a very open and free country. Key to our recovery as a nation has a range of grassroots, citizen-centered polices we call "homegrown solutions." The idea that Rwanda is highly controlled from the center belies the reality, which is that citizens in every village have a powerful say in how things get done. We prize accountability and Rwandans are quickly adapting themselves to the possibilities of a digital economy.

Anyone too undisciplined, too self-righteous or too self-centered to live in the world as it is has a tendency to idealize a world which ought to be. But no matter what political or religious direction such idealists choose, their visions always share one telling characteristic: in their utopias, heavens or brave new worlds, their greatest personal weakness suddenly appears to be a strength.

A technique can only work if it is in harmony with universal principles. Such principles need to be grasped through Mind, pure consciousness. Selfish desires thwart your progress, but Mind, not captivated by notions of victory or defeat, will liberate you. Mind fixes your senses and keeps you centered. Mind is the key to wondrous power and supreme clarity.

I think the people marching in L.A., on college campuses around the country, aren't marching simply because Trump was a Republican president and he got elected. They're marching because the Trump campaign is very much centered on demagogic rhetoric against immigrants, against Muslim-Americans, against black protest, against sort of America's non-white community.

My life now centered around sleepless nights and stand-bys, dodging the Brits and calming nerves to go out on operations. But the people stood by us. The people not only opened the doors of their homes to lend us a hand, but they opened their hearts to us. I learned that without the people, we could not survive and I knew that I owed them everything.

Another hallmark of Christianity is that salvation is not individualistic-it's not something one person receives for himself or herself. Salvation is the reign of God. It is a political alternative to the way the world is constituted. That's a very important part of the story that has been lost to accounts of salvation that are centered in the individual. But without an understanding that salvation is the reign of God, the need for the church to mediate salvation makes no sense at all.

We need to repent of our willing cooperation in our money-centered culture, which is depleting the natural resources that God designed for all humankind. He gave us a good earth. Let us serve him by helping to preserve it for our children. 'A good man leaves an inheritance for his children's children' (Proverbs 13:22 ).

Never before has the seductive market way of life held such sway in nearly every sphere of American life. This marketing way of life promotes addictions to stimulation and obsessions with comfort and convenience ... centered primarily around bodily pleasures and status rankings. ... The common denominator is a rugged and ragged individualism and rapacious hedonism in quest of a perennial "high" in body and mind.

Because Al-Qaeda has been a non-state centered organisation, many of these scenarios do not exactly apply. These are not wars between states. And yet, it seems to me that we make a mistake if we accept the view that states are fighting terrorism, since we have abundant evidence for accepting the idea of state terrorism, and what is most urgent is to track and expose how state terrorism operates under the rubric of "democracy."

The thought must have its own center of gravity; it cannot just be either here or there. We must find this center of gravity. It is the same for the body; if it is not centered, no movement will be possible. It is the same for the feeling. These Movements are designed to enable us to pass from one center of gravity to another; it is the shift that creates the state. The gesture, the movement, is what is important, not the attitudes.

If you go on a mission to preach the gospel with lightness and frivolity in your hearts, looking for this and that, and to learn what is in the world, and not having your minds riveted - yes, I may say riveted - on the cross of Christ, you will go and return in vain...Let your minds be centered on your missions, and labor earnestly to bring souls to Christ.

I really have been enjoying performing more lately than I have in a long time and you know, it's all about that sort of centered feeling that I have now. You know, thanks to, not just my kid, but her father before her. You know, I have a kind of a grounding through them that I really relish, and I think is also good for my work, you know.

Loving yourself has nothing to do with being selfish, self-centered or self-engrossed. It means that you accept yourself for what you are. Loving yourself means that you accept responsibility for your own development, growth and happiness.

I discovered that it is necessary, absolutely necessary, to believe in nothing. That is, we have to believe in something which has no form and no color--something which exists before all forms and colors appear... No matter what god or doctrine you believe in, if you become attached to it, your belief will be based more or less on a self-centered idea.

It is not education, but education of a certain kind, that will serve us. And the current model of western, urban-centered, school-based, education, which is so often more focused on turning children into efficient corporate units rather than curious and open-minded adults, will only lead us further down the wrong path.

I'd have to say, for me, as a child, my favorite memories were always centered around Christmas time. It always seemed like no matter how much money my parents had or didn't have, we got completely spoiled rotten. There were always presents under the tree, and we always did special things, like hide elves around the house.

Our good nature and endearing qualities will not arouse the answers to our prayers. Rather it is our mischievous, dishonest attributes that provide the master keys to heaven. When we identify and work to transform our self-centered qualities and crooked characteristics, the key turns and the gates unlock. Blessings and good fortune are now free to rain down upon us.

To worship God 'in spirit and in truth' is first and foremost a way of saying that we must worship God by means of Christ. In him the reality has dawned and the shadows are being swept away (Hebrews 8:13). Christian worship is new covenant worship; it is gospel-inspired worship; it is Christ-centered worship; it is cross-focused worship.

We exist because of suburbia. Suburbia is a freak’s dreamworld, a world of extra rooms upstairs and long, lazy afternoons with no interference. A place where you can listen to your LPs for hours on end. You can live in your room, your own rent-free corner of the universe, and create a world of pleasure and interest entirely centered on yourself and your interior aesthetic and logic.

The spirit of a production-centered, commodity-greedy society is such that only the non-conformist can defend himself sufficiently against it. Those who are seriously concerned with love as the only rational answer to the problem of human existence must, then, arrive at the conclusion that important and radical changes in our social structure are necessary, if love is to become a social and not a highly individualistic, marginal phenomenon.

If we understand the dangers of materialism, it will help liberate us to experience the joys of Christ-centered stewardship. Jesus speaks of the "deceitfulness of wealth" . The psalmist warns, "Though your riches increase, do not set your heart on them" . The dangers of materialism are far-reaching. We should not think that we're immune to the value-changing nature of wealth.

Those afraid of the universe as it really is, those who pretend to nonexistent knowledge and envision a Cosmos centered on human beings will prefer the fleeting comforts of superstition. They avoid rather than confront the world. But those with the courage to explore the weave and structure of the Cosmos, even where it differs profoundly from their wishes and prejudices, will penetrate its deepest mysteries.

I do not personally want to believe that we already know the equations that determine the evolution and fate of the universe; it would make life too dull for me as a scientist. ... I hope, and believe, that the Space Telescope might make the Big Bang cosmology appear incorrect to future generations, perhaps somewhat analogous to the way that Galileo's telescope showed that the earth-centered, Ptolemaic system was inadequate.

Because I really love tax, tax topics actually feature quite a lot in my fiction of various lengths. I once wrote a science fiction short story centered around the idea of an alien tax code, and the idea that you can understand a society by parsing its tax code.

We begin life with the natural, next we come into the spiritual; but then, when we have truly received the kingdom of God and His righteousness, the natural is added to the spiritual, and we are able to receive the gifts of His providence and the blessings of life without becoming centered in them or allowing them to separate us from Him.

My single greatest challenge is to remain centered and loving in an overwhelmingly nonvegan world. In today's world, cruelty and exploitation of other beings - human and non-human alike - are accepted, practiced, and profited from by most every institution of society - from commerce and science to education and entertainment. Unfortunately, the vast majority of Homo sapiens are either unaware of the cruelty or accept it as unavoidable and even normal.

We have been very effectively pacified by the pernicious ideology of a consumer society that is centered on the cult of the self - an undiluted hedonism and narcissism. That has become a very effective way to divert our attention while the country is reconfigured into a kind of neofeudalism, with a rapacious oligarchic elite and an anemic government that no longer is able to intercede on behalf of citizens but cravenly serves the interests of the oligarchy itself.

When you trust in the Lord, when you are willing to let your heart and your mind be centered in His will, when you ask to be led by the Spirit to do His will, you are assured of the greatest happiness along the way and the most fulfilling attainment from this mortal experience. If you question everything you are asked to do, or dig in your heels at every unpleasant challenge, you make it harder for the Lord to bless you.