To attain true inner freedom, you must be able to objectively watch your problems instead
of being lost in them. No solution can possibly exist while you’re lost in the energy of a
problem. Everyone knows you can’t deal well with a situation if you’re getting anxious,
scared, or angry about it. The first problem you have to deal with is your own reaction.
– Michael A. Singer
If you want to be free, you must first accept that there is pain in your heart. You have
stored it there. And you’ve done everything you can think of to keep it there, deep inside, so
that you never have to feel it. There is also tremdendous joy, beauty, love, and peace within
you. But they are on the other side of the pain. On the other side of the pain is ecstasy. On
the other side is freedom.
– Michael A. Singer
The mind runs because you are giving it the power of your attention. Withdraw your
attention, and the thinking mind falls away.
– Michael A. Singer
If you sit within the Self, you will experience the strength of your inner being even when your
heart feels weak. This is the essence of the path. This is the essence of a spiritual life.
– Michael A. Singer
There are two distinct aspects of your inner being. The first is you, the awareness, the
witness, the center of your willful intentions; and the other is that which you watch. The
problem is, the part that you watch never shuts up. If you could get rid of that part, even
for a moment, the peace and serenity would be the nicest vacation you’ve ever had.
– Michael A. Singer
So you decide to use life to free yourself. You become willing to pay any price for the
freedom of your soul. You will realize that the only prize you will have to pay is letting go of
yourself. Only you can take inner freedom away from yourself, or give it to yourself. Nobody
else can. It doesn’t matter what others do, unless you decide that it matters to you. Begin
with small things. We tend to let ourselves get bothered by the little, meaningless things that
happen every day.
– Michael A. Singer
You will someday come to see that there is no use for that incessant internal chatter, and
there is no reason to constantly attempt to figure everything out. Eventually you will see
that the real cause of problems is not life itself. It’s the commotion the mind makes about life
that really causes problems.
– Michael A. Singer
Energy can heal, and that’s why love can heal.
– Michael A. Singer
Your inner growth is completely dependent upon the realization that the only way to find
peace and contentment is to stop thinking about yourself. You’re ready to grow when you
finally realize that the “I” who is always talking inside will never be content.
– Michael A. Singer
There are two ways you can live: you can devote your life to staying in your comfort zone,
or you can work on your freedom.
– Michael A. Singer
The way out is through awareness. Stop defining the disturbed mind as a negative
experience; just see if you can relax behind it. When your mind is disturbed, don’t ask, “What
do I do about this?” Instead ask, “Who am I that notices this?”
– Michael A. Singer
You have to realize that you really only have one choice in this life, and it’s not about your
career, whom you want to marry, or whether you want to seek God. People tend to burden
themselves with so many choices. But, in the end, you can throw it all away and just make
one basic, underlying decision: Do you want to be happy, or do you not want to be happy?
It’s really that simple. Once you make that choice, your path through life becomes totally
clear.
– Michael A. Singer
One should view their spiritual work as learning to live life without stress, problems, fear, or
melodrama. This path of using life to evolve spiritually is truly the highest path. There really is
no reason for tensions or problems. Stress only happens when you resist life’s events.
– Michael A. Singer
In case you haven’t noticed, you have a mental dialogue going on inside your head that
never stops. It just keeps going and going. Have you ever wondered why it talks in there?
How does it decide what to say and when to say it? How much of what it says turns out to
be true? How much of what it says is even important? And if right now you are hearing, “I
don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t have any voice inside my head!” – that’s the
voice we’re talking about.
– Michael A. Singer
Ninety-nine percent of your thoughts are a complete waste of time. They do nothing but
freak you out.
– Michael A. Singer
In order to be who you are, you must be willing to let go of who you think you are.
– Michael A. Singer
Stop and think about what you are capable of achieving. Up to now, your capacities have
been constrained by constant inner struggles. Imagine what would happen if your awareness
was free to focus only on the events actually taking place. You would have no noise going on
inside. If you lived like this, you could do anything.
– Michael A. Singer
Come from a space of peace and you’ll find that you can deal with anything.
– Michael A. Singer
You only think about your body when there is a problem. In contrast, you think about your
psychological well-being all the time. People are constantly thinking things like, “What if I get
put on the spot? What should I say? I get so nervous if I’m not prepared.” That is suffering.
– Michael A. Singer
When you become truly spiritual, you are totally different fom anbody else. That which
everybody else wants, you don’t want. That which everybody else resists, you totally
accept.
– Michael A. Singer
If something happens that we don’t like, we resist it. But since what we’re resisting has
already taken place, what good is it to resist?
– Michael A. Singer
You have a wellspring of beautiful energy inside you. When you are open you feel it; when you
are closed you don’t. This flow of energy comes from the depth of your being. It’s been called
by many names. In ancient Chinese medicine, it is called Chi. In yoga, it is called Shakti. In the
West, it is called Spirit. Call it anything you want. All the great spiritual traditions talk about
your spiritual energy; they just give it different names. That spiritual energy is what you’re
experiencing when love rushes up into your heart. That is what you’re experiencing when
you’re enthused by something and all this high energy comes up inside of you. You should
know about this energy because it’s yours. It’s your birthright, and it’s unlimited.
– Michael A. Singer
In order to grow, you must give up the struggle to remain the same, and learn to embrace
change at all times.
– Michael A. Singer
Real spiritual growth happens when there is only one of you inside. There’s not a part that’s
scared and another part that’s protecting the part that’s scared. All parts are unified.
Because there’s no part of you that you’re not willing to see, the mind is no longer divided
into the conscious and subconscious.
– Michael A. Singer
You’re sitting on a planet spinning around in the middle of absolutely nowhere. Go ahead, take
a look at reality. You’re floating in empty space in a universe that goes on forever. If you
have to be here, at least be happy and enjoy the experience.
– Michael A. Singer
A wise person affirms, “If with one breath all of this can change, then I want to live at the
highest level while I’m alive. I’m going to stop bothering the people I love. I’m going to live life
from the deepest part from my being.”
– Michael A. Singer
If you’ve ever really loved anybody, then you know what true love means. It means that you
love them more than you love yourself. If you truly love someone, your love sees past their
humanness. It embraces their whole being, including past wrongs and current shortcomings.
It is like the unconditional love of a mother.
– Michael A. Singer
There is nothing more important to true growth than realizing that you are not the voice of
the mind – you are the one who hears it.
– Michael A. Singer
It’s actually a shocking realization when you first notice that your mind is constantly talking.
You might even try to yell at it in a feeble attempt to shut it up. But then you realize that’s
the voice yelling at the voice: “Shut up! I want to go to sleep. Why do you have to talk all
the time?” Obviously, you can’t shut it up that way. The best way to free yourself from this
incessant chatter is to step back and view it objectively.
– Michael A. Singer
The highest state you have ever experienced is simply the result of how open you were.
– Michael A. Singer
If you can learn to remain centered with smaller things, you will see that you can also remain
centered with bigger things. Over time, you will find that you can even remain centered with
the really big things. The types of events that would have destroyed you in the past can
come and go, leaving you perfectly centered and peaceful.
– Michael A. Singer
You don’t have to constantly be mulling over what you said or what this person thinks about
you. What kind of life are you going to have if you worry about these things all the time?
– Michael A. Singer
The signs of the body breaking are pain and weakness. The signs of the psyche breaking are
underlying fear and incessant neurotic thought.
– Michael A. Singer
If you are resisting something, you are feeding it. Any energy you fight, you are feeding. If
you are pushing something away, you are inviting it to stay.
– Michael A. Singer
When you truly awake spiritually, you realize you are caged. You wake up and realize that
you can hardly move in there. You’re constantly hitting the limits of your comfort zone. You
see that you’re afraid to tell people what you really think. You see that you’re too
self-conscious to freely express yourself. You see that you have to stay on top of everything
in order to be okay. Why? There’s really no reason. You have put these limits on yourself.
– Michael A. Singer
The day you decide that you are more interested in being aware of your thoughts than you
are in the thoughts themselves – that is the day you will find your way out.
– Michael A. Singer
The purpose of your life is to enjoy and learn from your experiences. You were not put on
Earth to suffer. You are not helping anybody by being miserable.
– Michael A. Singer
The fact is, you’re generally using your will to resist one of two things: that which has
already happened or that which hasn’t happened yet… Contemplate how much energy is
wasted resisting what might happen. Since most of the things you think might happen never
do, you are just throwing your energy away.
– Michael A. Singer
The slightest thing happens to you, and you give away your happiness. You were having a
great day until someone cut you off on your way to work. Why? Dare to ask yourself that
question. What good came from letting it ruin your day? There was no benefit. If somebody
cuts you off, let go and stay open. If you really want to, you can.
– Michael A. Singer
True personal growth is about transcending the part of you that is not okay and needs
protection. This is done by constantly remembering that you are the one inside that notices
the voice talking. This is the way out.
– Michael A. Singer
It is not life’s events that are causing problems or stress. It is your resistance to life’s events
that is causing this experience.
– Michael A. Singer
If you decide that you’re going to be happy from now on for the rest of your life, you will not
only be happy, you will become enlightened. Unconditional happiness is the highest technique
there is. You don’t have to learn Sanskrit or read any scriptures. You don’t have to renounce
the world. You just have to really mean it when you say that you choose to be happy. And
you have to mean it regardless of what happens. This is truly a spiritual path, and it is as
direct and sure a path to Awakening as could possibly exist.
– Michael A. Singer
No matter what happens, you can choose to enjoy the experience. If they starve you and
put you in solitary confinement, just have fun being like Gandhi. No matter what happens, just
enjoy the life that comes to you.
– Michael A. Singer
If you relax and release, you will see that it puts you through tremendous spiritual growth.
– Michael A. Singer
The natural ups and downs of life can either generate personal growth or create personal
fears. Which of these dominates is completely depended upon how we view change. Change
can be viewed as either exciting or frightening, but regardless of how we see it, we must all
face the fact that change is the very nature of life. If you have a lot of fear, you won’t like
change. You’ll try to create a world around you that is predictable, controllable, and
definable.
– Michael A. Singer
If you mistreat an animal, it becomes afraid. This is what has happened to your psyche. You
have mistreated it by giving it a responsibility that is incomprehensible. Just stop for a
moment and see what you have given your mind to do. You said to your mind, “I want
everyone to like me. I don’t want anyone to speak badly of me. I want everything I say and
do to be acceptable and pleasing to everyone. I don’t want anyone to hurt me. I don’t want
anything to happen that I don’t like. And I want everything to happen that I do like.” Then
you said, “Now, mind, figure out how to make every one of these things a reality, even if you
have to think about it day and night.” And of course your mind said, “I’m on the job. I will
work on it constantly.”
– Michael A. Singer
Once you become conscious of the consciousness itself, you attain a totally different state.
You are now aware of who you are. You have become an awakened being. It’s really just the
most natural thing in the world. Here I am. Here I always was. It’s like you’ve been sitting on
the couch watching TV, but you were so totally immersed in the show that you forgot where
you were.
– Michael A. Singer
You will come to see that the mind talks all the time because you gave it a job to do. You
use it as a protection mechanism, a form of defense.
– Michael A. Singer
The only permanent solution to your problems is to go inside and let go of the part of you
that seems to have so many problems with reality. Once you do that, you’ll be clear enough
to deal with what’s left.
– Michael A. Singer
Letting go of fear is not letting go of life.
– Michael A. Singer
Imagine if you were to see someone walking around constantly talking to himself. You’d think
he was strange. You’d wonder, “If he’s the one who’s talking and he’s the one who’s listening,
he obviously knows what’s going to be said before he says it. So what’s the point? The same
is true for the voice inside your head. Why is it talking? It’s you who’s talking, and it’s you
who’s listening. And when the voice argues with itself, who is it arguing with? Who could
possibly win?
– Michael A. Singer
It is actually possible to never have another problem for the rest of your life. This because
events are not problems; they’re just events. Your resistance to them is what causes the
problem… You do deal with them. You just deal with them as events that are taking place on
the planet Earth, and not as personal problems.
– Michael A. Singer
No matter what happens below you, just turn your eyes upward and relax your heart. You do
have to leave the Self in order to deal with the darkness. It will purify itself if you let it.
Getting involved in the darkness does not dispel darkness; it feeds it.
– Michael A. Singer
How do you free yourself? In the deepest sense, you free yourself by finding yourself. You
are not the pain that you feel, nor are you the part that periodically stresses out.
– Michael A. Singer