Rumi is able to verbalize the highly personal and often confusing world of personal growth and development in a very clear and direct fashion
Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Balkhi —aka. Rumi— was a 13th-century Persian poet whose words have broken through barriers of geography and language. He`s the most popular and the best selling poet in the United States with his records blasting through America`s Billboard’s Top 20 list.
Rumi has covered many topics in more than 50 years of writing, yet his ultimate best was his work on love, happiness and mending broken souls, including these quotes:
“A wound is a place where light enters your soul.”
“Keep breaking your heart till it opens.”
“Like a sculptor, if necessary, carve a friend out of stone. Realize that your inner sight is blind and try to see a treasure in everyone.”
“Don’t grieve. Anything you lose comes round in another form.”
“The moon stays bright when it doesn`t avoid the night.”
“If you`re irritated by every rub, how will you be polished?”
“Try something different. Surrender.”
“This being human is a guest house. Every morning is a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness come as an unexpected visitor…Welcome and entertain them all. Treat each guest honorably. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.”
“Give up to grace. The ocean takes care of each wave ’til it gets to shore. You need more help than you know.”
“You think you are alive because you breathe air? Shame on you, that you are alive in such a limited way. Don’t be without Love so you won’t feel dead. Die in Love and stay alive forever.”
“When someone is counting out gold for you, don’t look at your hands, or the gold. Look at the giver.”
“Start a huge, foolish project, like Noah…it makes absolutely no difference what people think of you.”
Stop acting so small. You are the universe in ecstatic motion
“Whoever’s calm and sensible is insane!”
“You think because you understand ‘one’ you must also understand ‘two’because one and one make two. But you must also understand ‘and’.”
“You think of yourself as a citizen of the universe. You think you belong to this world of dust and matter. Out of this dust, you have created a personal image, and have forgotten about the essence of your true origin”
“Reason is powerless in the expression of Love.”
“What you seek is seeking you. “Not only the thirsty seek the water, the water as well seeks the thirsty.”
“What hurts you, blesses you. Darkness is your candle.”
“Dance, when you’re broken open. Dance, if you’ve torn the bandage off. Dance in the middle of the fighting. Dance in your blood. Dance when you’re perfectly free.”
“Do not feel lonely, the entire universe is inside you.”
“Run from what’s comfortable. Forget safety. Live where you fear to live. Destroy your reputation. Be notorious.
“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.”
“You were born with wings, why prefer to crawl through life?”
“Don’t be satisfied with stories, how things have gone with others. Unfold your own myth.”
“Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment.”
“Where there is ruin, there is hope for a treasure.”
“The moment you accept what troubles you’ve been given the door with open.”
“Let the lover be disgraceful, crazy, absentminded. Someone sober will worry about things going badly. Let the lover be. ”
“silence is the language of god, all else is poor translation.
“Raise your words, not voice. It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder.”
“Love comes with a knife, not some shy question, and not with fears for its reputation!”
“Ignore those that make you fearful and sad, that degrade you back towards disease and death.”
“Everything in the universe is within you. Ask all from yourself.”
“If in the darkness of ignorance, you don’t recognize a person’s true nature, look to see whom he has chosen for his leader.”
“Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.”
“Travel brings power and love back into your life.”
“Let yourself be drawn by the stronger pull of that which you truly love.”
“The only lasting beauty is the beauty of the heart”
“The cure for pain is in the pain.”
“Words are a pretext. It is the inner bond that draws one person to another, not words.”
“In Silence there is eloquence. Stop weaving and see how the pattern improves.”
“If you desire to heal, let yourself fall ill.”
“On a day when the wind is perfect, the sail just needs to open and the world is full of beauty. Today is such a day.”
“Goodbyes are only for those who love with their eyes. Because for those who love with heart and soul there is no such thing as separation.”
“A thousand half-loves must be forsaken to take one whole heart home.”
“Set your life on fire. Seek those who fan your flames”
“What matters is how quickly you do what your soul directs.”
“Be like the sun for grace and mercy. Be like the night to cover others’ faults. Be like running water for generosity. Be like death for rage and anger. Be like the Earth for modesty. Appear as you are. Be as you appear.”
“Suffering is a gift. In it is hidden mercy.”
“This is love: to fly toward a secret sky, to cause a hundred veils to fall each moment. First to let go of life. Finally, to take a step without feet.”
“Sorrow prepares you for joy. It violently sweeps everything out of your house, so that new joy can find space to enter. It shakes the yellow leaves from the bough of your heart, so that fresh, green leaves can grow in their place. It pulls up the rotten roots, so that new roots hidden beneath have room to grow. Whatever sorrow shakes from your heart, far better things will take their place.”
These pains you feel are messengers. Listen to them.
“Love is the whole thing. We are only pieces.”
“The truth was a mirror in the hands of God. It fell, and broke into pieces. Everybody took a piece of it, and they looked at it and thought they had the truth.”
“When someone beats a rug, the blows are not against the rug, but against the dust in it.”
“Within tears, find hidden laughter Seek treasures amid ruins, sincere one. ”
“Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder. Help someone’s soul heal. Walk out of your house like a shepherd.”
“Listen with ears of tolerance! See through the eyes of compassion! Speak with the language of love”
“Remember. The way you make love is the way God will be with you.”
“You were born with potential. You were born with goodness and trust. You were born with ideals and dreams. You were born with greatness. You were born with wings. You are not meant for crawling, so don’t. You have wings. Learn to use them and fly.”
“Gamble everything for love, if you’re a true human being.”
“You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in a drop.”
“Two there are who are never satisfied — the lover of the world and the lover of knowledge.”
“You wander from room to room hunting for the diamond necklace that is already around your neck!”
“Wherever you are, and whatever you do, be in love.”
“Take someone who doesn’t keep score, who’s not looking to be richer, or afraid of losing,
who has not the slightest interest even in his own personality: he’s free.”
“Let the beauty of what you love be what you do.”
“People want you to be happy. Don’t keep serving them your pain!
If you could untie your wings and free your soul of jealousy, you and everyone around you
would fly up like doves.”
“Respond to every call that excites your spirit.”
“When you go through a hard period When everything seems to oppose you… When you feel you cannot even bear one more minute, NEVER GIVE UP! Because it is the time and place that the course will divert!”
“Only from the heart can you touch the sky.”
“Love calls – everywhere and always.
“Here is a relationship booster that is guaranteed to work: Every time your spouse or lover says something stupid make your eyes light up as if you just heard something brilliant.”
“When you feel a peaceful joy, that’s when you are near truth.”
“All people on the planet are children, except for a very few. No one is grown up except those free of desire.”
“Pain is a treasure, for it contains mercies.”
“Your heart is the size of an ocean. Go find yourself in its hidden depths.”
“Give your weakness to one who helps.” 