25 Inspiring Quotes to Help You Live a More Mindful Life

Mindfulness, at its heart, is about waking up to your life in the present moment.

The power of this is that when you cultivate mindfulness in your daily life, you’re able to experience things you never noticed before. Little things like the beauty of a flower, the smell of fresh air in the morning, and the rising of the sun become rejuvenating and fill your spirit with a sense of energy.

But mindfulness can also act as our best friend when working through difficult issues, giving us clarity, presence, and nonjudgmental acceptance. And it can help us become more present for those we love, mending old wounds and allowing us to maintain strong and healthy connections to those we love.

Years ago, mindfulness changed my life forever. At a time when I felt like the world was coming down around me and I didn’t know what to do, it helped me go from stressed and anxious to happier and more at peace. And it can do the same for you, if you let it.

Use these quotes to help inspire you to live a more mindful, intentional life.

25 Inspiring Quotes to Help You Live a More Mindful Life

Drink your tea slowly and reverently, as if it is the axis on which the world earth revolves – slowly, evenly, without rushing toward the future; live the actual moment. Only this moment is life.

– Thich Nhat Hanh

Mindfulness is the aware, balanced acceptance of the present experience. It isn’t more complicated than that. It is opening to or receiving the present moment, pleasant or unpleasant, just as it is, without either clinging to it or rejecting it.

– Sylvia Boorstein

The only thing that is ultimately real about your journey is the step that you are taking at this moment. That’s all there ever is.

– Eckhart Tolle

Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet.

– Thich Nhat Hanh

Mindfulness is about being fully awake in our lives. It is about perceiving the exquisite vividness of each moment. We also gain immediate access to our own powerful inner resources for insight, transformation, and healing.

– Jon Kabat-Zinn

Wherever you are, be there totally.

– Eckhart Tolle

Do every act of your life as though it were the last act of your life.

– Marcus Aurelius

Everything is created twice, first in the mind and then in reality.

– Robin Sharma

If you miss the present moment, you miss your appointment with life. That is very serious!

– Thich Nhat Hanh

When you do something, you should burn yourself up completely, like a good bonfire, leaving no trace of yourself.

– Shunryu Suzuki

Now is the future that you promised yourself last year, last month, last week. Now is the only moment you’ll ever really have. Mindfulness is about waking up to this.

– Mark Williams

People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don’t even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle.

– Thich Nhat Hanh

Reality is only an agreement - today is always today.

– Zen Proverb

Feelings, whether of compassion or irritation, should be welcomed, recognized, and treated on an absolutely equal basis; because both are ourselves. The tangerine I am eating is me. The mustard greens I am planting are me. I plant with all my heart and mind. I clean this teapot with the kind of attention I would have were I giving the baby Buddha or Jesus a bath. Nothing should be treated more carefully than anything else. In mindfulness, compassion, irritation, mustard green plant, and teapot are all sacred.

– Thich Nhat Hanh

Guilt, regret, resentment, sadness & all forms of nonforgiveness are caused by too much past & not enough presence.

- Eckhart Tolle

Be happy in the moment, that's enough. Each moment is all we need, not more.

– Mother Teresa

I’m here to tell you that the path to peace is right there, when you want to get away.

– Pema Chodron

This is the real secret of life — to be completely engaged with what you are doing in the here and now. And instead of calling it work, realize it is play.

– Alan Watts (more Alan Watts quotes)

Pure awareness transcends thinking. It allows you to step outside the chattering negative self-talk and your reactive impulses and emotions. It allows you to look at the world once again with open eyes. And when you do so, a sense of wonder and quiet contentment begins to reappear in your life.

– Mark Williams

Today, you can decide to walk in freedom. You can choose to walk differently. You can walk as a free person, enjoying every step.

– Thich Nhat Hanh

In today’s rush, we all think too much — seek too much — want too much — and forget about the joy of just being.

– Eckhart Tolle

The art of living… is neither careless drifting on the one hand nor fearful clinging to the past on the other. It consists in being sensitive to each moment, in regarding it as utterly new and unique, in having the mind open and wholly receptive.

– Alan Watts

The standard way of reducing stress in our culture is to put as much energy as possible into trying to arrive at a moment that matches our preferences. This ensures that we feel some level of stress until we get there (assuming we ever will) and worse, it makes the present moment into an unacceptable place to be.

– David Cain

Look at other people and ask yourself if you are really seeing them or just your thoughts about them.

– Jon Kabat-Zinn

Mindfulness, also called wise attention, helps us see what we’re adding to our experiences, not only during meditation sessions but also elsewhere.

– Sharon Salzberg