William Blake
Poet, Painter
"Enlightenment means taking full responsibility for your life."
Enlightenment quotes
Enlightenment
628 quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
U.G. Krishnamurti
Philosopher
"I have searched everywhere to find an answer to my question, 'Is there enlightenment?' but have never questioned the search itself. Because I have assumed that goal of enlightenment exists, I have had to search. It is the search itself which has been choking me and keeping me out of my natural state. There is no such thing as spiritual or psychological enlightenment because there is no such thing as spirit or psyche at all. I have been a damn fool all my life, searching for something which does not exist. My search is at an end."
Mustafa Kemal Ataturk
Statesman, Founder of Republic
"In human life, you will find players of religion until the knowledge and proficiency in religion will be cleansed from all superstitions, and will be purified and perfected by the enlightenment of real science."
Ramana Maharshi
Spiritual Teacher
"The greatest obstacle to enlightenment is getting past your delusion that you are not already enlightened."
Matsuo Basho
Poet
"Before enlightenment, chopping wood and carrying water. After enlightenment, chopping wood and carrying water."
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Enlightenment quotes (page 1 of 32)
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"Peace can only come as a natural consequence of universal enlightenment."
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"The road to enlightenment is long and difficult, and you should try not to forget snacks and magazines."
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"A burrito is a delicious food item that breaks down all social barriers and leads to temporary spiritual enlightenment."
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"Do not try to correct the mind. Trying to correct the mind is like trying to correct the waves in the ocean. Can you stop the waves in the ocean? If you want to see an ocean without waves you only have to dive deeper. When you dive deep inside you will experience the stillness of the ocean. And if it is all frozen that is enlightenment."
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"Have the courage to use your own reason- That is the motto of enlightenment. "Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals" (1785)"
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"Enlightenment isn't found with a full stomach, or on a soft pillow."
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"The progress of human enlightenment can go no further than in picturing people not as vicious, but as mistaken."
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"Being an outsider to some extent, someone who does not "fit in" with others or is rejected by them for whatever reason, makes life difficult, but it also places you at an advantage as far as enlightenment is concerned. It takes you out of unconsciousness almost by force."
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"Dare to know! Have the courage to use your own intelligence!"
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"Enlightenments, like accidents, happen only to prepared minds."
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"Enlightenment is an accident, but some activities make you accident-prone."
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"One always begins with the simple, then comes the complex, and by superior enlightenment one often reverts in the end to the simple. Such is the course of human intelligence."
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"Enlightenment or awakening is not the creation of a new state of affairs but the recognition of what already is."
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"If I could define enlightenment briefly I would say it is 'the quiet acceptance of what is'."
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"They [zealots] would have everybody be as blind as themselves: to them, to be clear-sighted is libertinism."
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"Nonresistance, nonjudgment, and nonattachment are the three aspects of true freedom and enlightened living."
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"Faith is a continuum, and we each fall on that line where we may. By attempting to rigidly classify ethereal concepts like faith, we end up debating semantics to the point where we entirely miss the obvious - that is, that we are all trying to decipher life's big mysteries, and we're each following our own paths of enlightenment."
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"I came to the conclusion that we should aspire to increase the scope and scale of human consciousness in order to better understand what questions to ask. Really, the only thing that makes sense is to strive for greater collective enlightenment."
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"There are many paths to enlightenment. Be sure to take the one with a heart."
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"Before enlightenment; chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment; chop wood, carry water."
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