Quotes about Concentration
Anapana means breath and sati means mindfulness. Tang Hoi translated it as "Guarding the Mind." The Anapanasati Sutra, that is, is the sutra on using one's breath to maintain mindfulness.
- Thich Nhat Hanh
Concentration, samadhi in Sanskrit, is a powerful force that you can generate to make a breakthrough, to see clearly what is there and understand its true nature.
- Thich Nhat Hanh
When we're sitting, we're truly there in the present moment; we have come home, we have arrived. We are present in that time and place; we're not pulled away by the past, the future, or by anger or jealousy in the present.
- Thich Nhat Hanh
When we're first learning sitting meditation, it can be useful to count our breaths. Count one for the first in- and out-breath. Count two for the second, and so on. If your mind wanders and you lose count, go back to one and begin again. This exercise helps develop concentration. You may think counting to ten is easy, but counting to ten while breathing mindfully takes a lot of focus.
- Thich Nhat Hanh
In - out Deep - slow. Breathing in I feel fine, breathing out I feel light. Breathing in, my mind is still. Breathing out, my lips are smiling. Breathing in, I dwell in the present moment. Breathing out I know this is a wonderful moment.
- Thich Nhat Hanh
As a magnifying glass concentrates the rays of the sun into a little burning knot of heat that can set fire to a dry leaf or a piece of paper, so the mystery of Christ in the Gospel concentrates the rays of God's light and fire to a point to set fire to the human spirit.
- Thomas Merton
Even though my natural acts are good they have a tendency, when they are only natural, to concentrate my faculties on the man that I am not, the one I cannot be, the false self in me, the character that God does not know. This is because I am born in selfishness. I am born self-centered. And this is original sin.
- Thomas Merton
Meditation for them consisted in making the words of the Bible their own by memorizing them and repeating them, with deep and simple concentration, "from the heart." Therefore the "heart" comes to play a central role in this primitive form of monastic prayer.
- Thomas Merton
As a magnifying glass concentrates the rays of the sun into a little burning knot of heat that can set fire to a dry leaf or a piece of paper, so the mystery of Christ in the Gospel concentrates the rays of God's light and fire to a point that sets fire to the spirit of man.
- Thomas Merton
The underlying idea is none other than that the times preceding the parousia require a unique concentration of the minds of believers upon the Lord and the manner in which they may best please Him.
- Geerhardus Vos
To do two things at once is to do neither.
- Publilius Syrus
Purity of heart is to will one thing.
- Soren Kierkegaard