Best 120 quotes of Vernon Howard on MyQuotes

A cheery relaxation is man's natural state, just as nature itself is relaxed. A waterfall is concerned only with being itself, not with doing something it considers waterfall-like.

A chief cause of unhappiness is what I call mental movies. Mental movies are a misuse of the imagination. You know how it goes. You have a painful experience with someone, then run it over and over in your mind. You visualize what you said, what he did, how you both felt. As awful as it is, you feel compelled to repeat the film day and night. It is as if you were locked inside a theatre playing a horrible movie.

A clear understanding of negative emotions dismisses them.

A desperation to escape a problem is the wrong way. A passion to understand it is the right way

A false path must be tensely and angrily defended by those it has deceived.

All forms of self-defeating behavior are unseen and unconscious, which is why their existence is denied.

All we have to do is to receive what we are given...We are given the naturalness to love someone, to be calm in crisis, to ignore self-defeating suggestions, to be pleasant, forgiving, tender, helpful, unworried, brave, energetic.

Aloneness is a wise teacher. Kierkegaard remarked that one sign of spiritual maturity was the ability to be comfortable when alone.

Always walk through life as if you have something new to learn, and you will.

Anger or bitterness toward those who have hurt you will block your path to higher ground. You can have anger toward people or you can have freedom from people, but you can't have both.

An obvious fact about negative feelings is often overlooked. They are caused by us, not by exterior happenings. An outside event presents the challenge, but we react to it. So we must attend to the way we take things, not to the things themselves.

A perfect method for awakening is to examine the results of our daily actions.  If they are harmful, we know we need more consciousness.

A person obsessed with the need to be happy will never be so. The obsession is the obstruction.

As incredible as it sounds, an unhappy man does not realize that happiness is better than unhappiness. Knowing only his own concealed anguish, he worships it, which is the same as self-worship.

Awareness of your weakness and confusion makes you strong because conscious awareness is the bright light that destroys the darkness of negativity. Detection of inner negativity is not a negative act, but a courageously positive act that makes you a new person.

Beauty is only skin deep, but it's a valuable asset if you're poor or haven't any sense.

Be teachable. That is the whole secret.

Be very careful that you do not unconsciously assume that nervous tension is power. This is vital. Watch yourself the next time you work toward some goal. Look very closely to discover tense feelings and nervous thoughts whirling around inside. Do not let them deceive you into assuming that they are creative forces; they are not. They are thieves of genuine powers. As always, your awareness of their thievery is your first fine step toward casting them out.

Bitterness is the outcome of a wrong mental movement - the attempt to force external events to conform to internal fantasy. The cure is to see fantasy as fantasy, which will reveal it as neither necessary nor rewarding.

Can you think of anything more permanently elating than to know that you are on the right road at last?

Change is never a loss - it is change only.

Cruelty practiced as a matter of social principle or public policy, and presented to the community as a means to a higher goal is the most obscene and decadent phenomenon of any civilization.

Do not be impatient with your seemingly slow progress. Do not try to run faster than you presently can. If you are studying, reflecting and trying, you are making progress whether you are aware of it or not. A traveler walking the road in the darkness of night is still going forward. Someday, some way, everything will break open, like the natural unfolding of a rosebud.

Do not mistake desire for love. Desire leaves home in a frantic search for one gratification after another. Love is at home with itself.

Don't look for someone in whom to believe. Believe in yourself. The only authentic authority is your own original nature.

Don't try to be unafraid. That is impossible. Rather, go ahead while being afraid. That is the entire secret for abolishing fear. The Supermind teaches us to have no self-concern at all. Whatever happens to you, act as though it happened to someone else.

Don't try to be spiritual. That is only a word in the dictionary. Make it your goal to become a normally functioning individual. Let these principles shape you according to your real nature of a simple, decent, honest, unafraid human being.

Every day that you attempt to see things as they are in truth Is a supremely successful day.

Everyone must concede that there is in existence something wiser than himself. Now there is a challenge, there is a challenge which few even investigate. We're going to do that now. Let's see what we're talking about. All troubled people, which is all people, must if they are going to be delivered from themselves, must make the concession that there is a force, an entity, a power that is higher than their own present nature.

Find yourself for courage and confidence are as easy as breathing to the person who really knows who he is.

Freedom begins as we become conscious of it.

Genuine effort is success.

Genuine kindness is not what we do, it is what we are.

Happiness is liberty from everything that makes us unhappy.

Happiness is yours in the here and now. The painful states of anxiety and loneliness are abolished permanently. Financial affairs are not financial problems. You are at ease with yourself. You are not at the mercy of unfulfilled cravings. Confusion is replaced with clarity. There is a relieving answer to every tormenting question. You possess a True Self. Something can be done about every unhappy condition. While living in the world you can be inwardly detached from its sorrows to live with personal peace and sanity.

Have the daring to stop doing the things you really don't want to do. Can you see them? Look closely. Can you observe the many things you do because you reluctantly feel you should or must? Watch closely. Examine every action and reaction. Do you act naturally or do you act because you feel compelled? If you feel compelled, stop. Compulsion is slavery. Example: Refuse to go along with the crowd.

Healing fails to occur because it is much easier to injure another than to heal oneself.

How would you feel if you had no fear? Feel like that. How would you behave toward other people if you realized their powerlessness to hurt you? Behave like that. How would your react to so-called misfortune if you saw its inability to bother you? React like that. How would you think toward yourself if you knew you were really all right? Think like that.

Human sickness is so severe that few can bear to look at it...but those who do will become well.

If heaven existed as a physical building on earth, human beings would remodel it to make it right.

If you call one thing good, you must call its opposite bad. If you think it wonderful to make a big profit in your business, you will also think it terrible if you incur a large loss. The idea is to live above the opposites.

Ignorant people remain ignorant because they have a secret agreement to call one another intelligent.

Inner guidance is heard like soft music in the night by those who have learned to listen.

Inner liberty can be judged by how often a person feels offended, for you can no more insult a mature man than you can paint the air.

Insight into the two selves within a man clears up many confusions and contradictions. It was our understanding that preceded our victory.

Instead of fighting your problems, picture your way out of them.

Interpretation blocks reception while masquerading as reception. Rightness does not need interpretation; it requires simple acceptance and nothing else.

Is the beam from a lighthouse affected by howling wind and rain? It remains perfectly steadfast and unaffected by the storm. Your true self is like that. Nothing can ever harm you once you are consciously aware that it is so.

It is against the law to permit weak people to steal your strength. Never permit it.

It is a mistake for anyone to think he has lived too long in his old, unsatisfactory ways to make the great change. If you switch on the light in a dark room, it makes no difference how long it was dark because the light will still shine. Be teachable. That is the whole secret.