Swami Vivekananda Quotes

“Never say NO, Never say, 'I cannot', for you are INFINITE. All the power is WITHIN you. You can do anything.”

“If you have knowledge and see a man weak, do not condemn him. Go to his level and help him if you can. He must grow.”

“Neither seek nor avoid, take what comes.”

“Love makes no distinction between man and man, between an Aryan and a Mlechchha, between a Brâhmana and a Pariah, nor even between a man and a woman. Love makes the whole universe as one's own home. True progress is slow but sure. Work among those young men who can devote heart and soul to this one duty - the duty of raising the masses of India. Awake them, unite them, and inspire them with this spirit of renunciation; it depends wholly on the young people of India.”

“If you have not even a little imagination, you are simply a brute. So you must not lower your ideal, neither are you to lose sight of practicality. We must avoid the two extremes.... You must try to combine in your life immense idealism with immense practicality.”

“It is nature that is driving us towards perfection, and eventually she will bring everyone there.”

“Man only remains hypnotised with the false idea of an ego. When this ghost is off from us, all dreams vanish, and then it is found that the one Self only exists from the highest Being to a blade of grass.”

“We are responsible for what we are, and whatever we wish ourselves to be, we have the power to make ourselves.”

“Non-injuring has to be attained by him who would be free. No one is more powerful than he who has attained perfect non-injuring. No one could fight, no one could quarrel, in his presence. Yes, his very presence, and nothing else, means peace, means love wherever he may be. Nobody could be angry or fight in his presence. Even the animals, ferocious animals, would be peaceful before him.”

“Perfection is not to be attained, it is already within us.”

“Things do not grow better; they remain as they are. It is we who grow better, by the changes we make in ourselves.”

“Weakness is constant strain and misery: weakness is death.”

“Everything is ended if you forgive and forget.”

“It is the want that creates the body.”

“All misery and pain come from attachment.”

“My hope of the future lies in the youths of character, intelligent,renouncing all for the service of others, and obedient - good to themselves and the country at large”

“Thought ceases in meditation; even the mind's elements are quite quiet. Blood circulation stops. His breath stops, but he is not dead.”

“The fire that warms us can also consume us; it is not the fault of the fire.”

“You are strong, omnipotent, and omniscient. No matter that you have not expressed it yet, it is in you. All knowledge is in you, all power, all purity, and all freedom-why cannot you express this knowledge? Because you do not believe in it... Believe in it, and it must and will come out.”

“The animal man lives in the senses. If he does not get enough to eat, he is miserable; or if something happens to his body, he is miserable. In the senses both his misery and his happiness begin and end.”

“Man's free agency is not of the mind, for that is bound. There is no freedom there.”

“You may meditate on whatever you like, but I shall meditate on the heart of a lion. That gives strength”

“Help and not fight. Assimilation and not destruction. Harmony and Peace and not dissension.”

“Be strong! Don't talk of ghosts and devils.”

“As soon as I think that I am a little body, I want to preserve it, to protect it, to keep it nice, at the expense of other bodies; then you and I become separate.”