Guy finley quotes

An unattended mind is the breeding ground of self-defeat.

Those who dare to try what others only dream of - never fail to discover that real effort is always rewarded.

Getting stressed and struggling to change the outcome of any past event is like arguing with an echo to make it see your point of view.

The great ones in life are not those who are handed silver spoons. Their excellence comes from digging into the raw ore of their own character, through hard work, persistence and faith turning whatever they touch into gold.

What you don't want to know about yourself wants to be known, which is why it keeps 'showing up' at your door unannounced!

Weak thoughts and feelings often feel strong but remember, real strength is never anxious, cruel, or punishing.

The fear of seeing ourselves as we are ensures we will never see the end of our fears.

All created forms are fractal, as is their purpose, use, and allotted time for existence.

Instead of always asking yourself why so-and-so acts this or that way, learn to ask: "What's inside of me that wants to hurt itself over how anyone else acts?"

Real achievement -- the true measure of how far we have advanced in life -- is not determined by what we have acquired, but rather by the degree to which we have put our fears behind us.

If you want light to come into your life, you need to stand where it is shining.

True happiness isn't something that can be made. It isn't the result of anything. Happiness comes to those who understand that you can't seek it any more than you seek the air you breathe. It is a part of life to be found within living. ... All pursuit of happiness is based upon the false assumption that there is a way to possess it; you may as well try to grab a handful of breeze! Happiness is the natural expression of a stress-free life, just as sunlight naturally warms the Earth after dark clouds appear.

There is nothing as certain as silence, stillness, and solitude to introduce you to the secrets of yourself.

The heart at peace is its own reward, needing nothing outside of itself to be fully content.

All things good come to those for whom the Good is all things.

One of the most important rules for me is: Don't ever defend myself. If we could put this one principle into practice, how much more simple life would be.

On the other side of resistance is the flow of real life.

The only reason your mind won't stop its endless chattering is because you won't stop listening to it!

Letting go, at its heart, is an act of agreement with Life.

To know that every moment — regardless of how it comes wrapped — is a gift greater than you can give yourself, is to be well on your way to a life without fear.

Never run from what you don't understand, as it will be waiting for you every time you come to a stop.

Once you know what it means to choose in favor of yourself, there is no power in the universe that can make you choose against yourself.

Wasting your time in anxious worry over what you may not have is a good way to waste what you need to get it.

It's time to break our ties with anything in us that would rather complain about its situation than go to work to change it.

Ours is the task of discovering that our true nature has nothing to fear.

Each time that you don't know you are choosing, then of those choices you are not the chooser.

Looking to any angry, anxious, or otherwise stressed emotional state to help you sort out the pain you're in is like trying to organize your monthly bills by throwing them into a blender

Real freedom isn't subject to how others estimate our value; it is in realizing that none are free who find their sense of worth wondering how others measure their lives.

Staying present, living in Presence is the best gift anyone can give to those they love.

False life is exhausting; Real Life is inexhaustible.

The nature of what the Divine notices about you is completely different from the nature of what you do to get noticed.

If we only knew how many times our seemingly clever comment cut straight into the heart of the person with whom we have just spoken, it is we who would bleed.

We conquer ourselves by learning patience, for she gives to us our longed for victory only in the surrender of self.

Be still; quietly remember the presence of and within yourself, and you will know, without thinking, that while all around you everything changes, within you lives something unchanging.

The Peace you long for also longs for you.

Act on what you love, not from what you fear, and watch how fear fades as love grows.

The only mistake that we can make as human beings is to be asleep, unaware of ourselves.

Psychologically speaking, what is true requires no protection, and never becomes negative when challenged. On the other hand, what is false almost never stops trying to protect itself, which it does by finding fault with whatever or whoever challenges the false image behind which it always hides.

Every one of us lives in a world that is no larger and no smaller than our understanding.

We must do the work to prove our fears groundless, otherwise it is our fears that will gain ground and our lives will be spent in their service.

Trying to “fix” the people in your life that cause you pain is like massaging your shoes because your feet ache.

Life isn't a race to win, it's a school for our higher education.

Learn to be one with who you are in Reality, and the waves of a thousand passing worlds cannot wash you away.

Do the moment-to-moment work of dropping anything that wants to drag you down, and Reality itself will see to it that you rise.

You have a destination far beyond where you find yourself standing today.

Everything passes. There is great beauty in this, both in the passing of pain and in the passing of pleasure. When things present themselves to you as permanent, don't believe it.

Trying to change ourselves in order to please others - so that we can feel temporarily whole for having won their approval - is like cutting a flower into pieces so that it will fit into a vase.

We become what we love. What we put first in our lives is what we receive from life.

As the lesser is always found within the greater, so this principle holds true with regards to time and the eternal.

No one rises above who he or she has been without first having fallen down. The best time - in fact, the only time - to make a real change in your life is in the moment of seeing the need for it. He who hesitates always gets lost in the hundred reasons why tomorrow is a better day to get started.

Resistance to revelation, resistance to becoming conscious of all that dwells within us - high and low, light and dark - is the anti-change factor. It is also the mainspring of all our psychological fears.

We need to see, and agree that what we seek already lives within us, and we within it. Now we know our one great task: watch for whatever promises us freedom, and then quietly, consciously refuse to see ourselves through the eyes of what we know is incomplete. Then we live wholeness itself, instead of spending our lives looking for it.

The real quality of our life is not determined by what we have won from it, but by what we have discovered within it.

The more time we spend considering the shortcomings of others, the smaller a person we become.

To be more aware, we need only listen for and let go of the thoughts which steal our attention.

Work to connect yourself to the allness of life -- instead of identifying with the smallness of it -- and you'll awaken to a greatness already living within you that is no more bothered by the little things in life than a mountain is made miserable by the rain that falls upon it.

Fearlessness comes with the birth of this new understanding: The only reason life changes as it does is to reveal the secret Goodness underlying those same changes.

You must learn to stop thinking in terms of beginnings and endings, successes and failures, and begin to treat everything in your life as a learning experience instead of a proving one.

The vast majority of our troubles and heartaches would simply vanish from view if only we could remember - before we act - that we are made victims mostly by our own tendencies.

Who you really are, your True Nature, is no more tied to the kind of person you've been than the wind is tied to the skies through which it moves. Your past is just that, the past, a place within your psyche with no more reality to it than a picture of a castle on a postcard is made from stone. You have a destination far beyond where you find yourself standing today.

A whole new kind of spiritual happiness dawns in us as we realize that dark clouds do not ruin sunny skies... they merely pass through them to help us remember our love of the light.

Anyone or anything that asks you to be untrue to yourself has already acted against you.

Being fully present is the best guarantee for a bright future.

Knowledge without Spirit is like finding yourself on a cold night with all the wood in the world and no flame to ignite it.

Chasing after a pleasure to ease a pain is like running after a breeze to cool you down.

The mistake we have made in our lives is that over and over again we've run into the needful moment and then failed to learn its higher lesson. We don't like needful moments and therefore we resist them.

In spite of how things may appear to us, we are never trapped by where we are. The trap is always who we are

If you love getting gifts - and who doesn't - then why not accept, with gratitude, the greatest gift there is: the present moment.

Only you can choose the nature of what grows, or what doesn't, within you.

The only world in which "defeat" exists as a reality is the one darkened by the false idea that what may have happened to us a moment ago is the same as what's possible for us to achieve now.

We are not here on earth to change our destiny, but to fulfill it.

The limit of your present understanding is not the limit of your possibilities.

Discouragement is a negative emotion with more than one trick up its dark sleeve. It tricks you into mentally or emotionally dwelling in the very place you want to leave. Drop all such sorrow permanently by daring to see through this deception of the unconscious mind. You have a destination far beyond where you find yourself standing today

The right attitude toward any negative state begins with understanding that its only authority over you is a direct reflection of your attitude towards it.

Life can only be as new as you Choose to be.

Make it your moment-to-moment aim to recognize the difference between being aware of your thoughts, and being carried along by them.

Nothing in the universe can stop you from letting go and starting over.

A crisis is a close encounter of the third kind.

The only one interested in hearing your sad story is . . . you; and even you wish you didn't have to relive it again!

Discouragement tricks you into mentally or emotionally dwelling in the very place you want to leave.

The belief that you have no choice but to keep suffering through whatever frightens you is like believing you have to hold onto a scalding cup so that you won't spill your coffee!

Past mistakes cannot create a present pain; no mistake in life has the power to make us ache any more than the echo of someone crying can shed tears.

It only seems that there is something more important for you to do than to just quietly be yourself.

What good is any feeling we may have about ourselves, if it only lasts as long as others agree to it?

Never speak out of anger, Never act out of fear, Never choose from impatience, But wait... and peace will appear.

Believing that anxious thoughts and feelings can restore order to your life is like using a chain-saw to fold your laundry.

Disappointment, discouragement, and despair are nothing but the bitter fruit of an unfulfilled expectation allowed to live beyond its time.

Each moment of life is only as precious as is our ability to attend to it.

Freedom is not overcoming what you think stands in your way. It is understanding that what is in your way is part of the way.

The greatest power you possess in life is your understanding that life gives you a fresh start any moment you choose.

You must dare to do the thing you think cannot be done... as this is the only way to discover that there's nothing you can't do.

Real love cannot be deceived because it wants nothing outside of itself

The next time you catch yourself starting to feel bad about anything, immediately stop everything you are doing for a moment and, as simply and as honestly as you can, ask yourself: "Is this what I really want?

What is true never fears investigation; what is false... fears everything.

Know that everything is in perfect order whether you understand it or not.

The character of greatness must be measured in two ways, else the measurement is flawed. First, and by far most popular of all, is by one's ability to succeed in times of trial where others may fail. But of no less importance, and perhaps foundational to any form of greatness, is one's willingness to start over in spite of failure, when success seems farthest away.

Once something has outlived its usefulness in one area of life, its purpose for being in existence is no longer the same. The leaf that captures a stream of sunlight, and then transfers its energy to the tree, serves one purpose in the spring and summer, and another completely different one through the fall and winter.

The Only Power You Need to Be Free of Troublesome People Since what other people do to you is not in your power to change, you need only concern yourself with what you do to yourself, for that is in your power

You don't need strength to let go of something. What you really need is understanding.

Talking to yourself proves only one thing: you're still unable to tell the difference between good and bad company.

Instead of always asking how to get others to approve of you... learn to ask: What do I really want, the applause of the crowds or to quietly have my own life?

Rushing around, hoping to find peace of mind anywhere other than within yourself, is like looking for your heart in someone else's body!

The strength of any weakness within us is the degree to which it is feared.

If I am identified with my relationship, with my house, or with my money, I am doomed to suffer.

Real change isn't found in some new way to think about yourself, but in freedom from the need to think about yourself at all.

Far better is it for you to go through one small thing that frightens you than to make a thousand plans for an imagined fearless day to come.

No condition outside ourselves can create a rut or trap us in it. It's impossible.

If any of those times you rushed around madly - trying to get somewhere faster - had ever made any real difference in the quality of your life... don't you think you'd be able to slow down by now?

Eventually, we reach the point where we start to realize that we are not going to find peace, contentment, happiness, strength, fearlessness - all of the things that in our heart of hearts we wish we had - outside of us.

Any form of measuring yourself by the unkind action of another towards you is like looking into a badly fractured mirror... and then blaming yourself for the shattered image you see therein.

The secret self knows the anguish of our attachments and assures us that letting go of what we think we must have to be happy is the same as letting go of our unhappiness.

Most people would rather complain about some painful life pattern than dare to meet the level of their own consciousness responsible for its repeated appearance... and therein do the work needed to change it once and for all.

Nothing glows brighter than the heart awakened to the unseen light of love that lives within it.

I am willing to walk toward, and then through, whatever may be seen in the moment as being greater than myself.

When you realize no one else on this earth can be like you... that no other soul may know the beauty, sorrow, light and darkness you alone are given to see... then you will, at last, be the fearless individual your Heart of hearts has called you to be.

It's a paradox of the true spiritual path, but the more conscious we become of what limits us, the more limitless becomes our life.

The only way to cultivate a quiet mind is by planting seeds of silence.

Until you can love what the truth would teach you about yourself... then your love is incomplete.

Much like the hands of a clock go nowhere fast, anxious thoughts run us round-and-round without taking us anywhere!

Every relationship that we have in our lives - our contact with each person, place, and event - serves a very special, if yet to be realized purpose: They are mirrors that can serve to show us things about ourselves that can be realized in no other way.

The smallest effort to remember the Divine, or even one of its timeless truths, connects you to a calmness whose power is in that secret strength found in all things deep.

Any conclusion you reach about yourself has to be an unseen limitation because there's always more to see.

See that any time you feel pained or defeated, it is only because you insist on clinging to what doesn't work. Dare to let go and you won't lose a thing except for a punishing idea.

We can only begin to change the world around us when we are willing to become a conscious part of all that is changing.

Better that the whole world should turn against you... than you should consent to turn against what is true within you.