Byron Katie > Quotes

“It's not your job to like me - it's mine”
― Byron Katie

“Life is simple. Everything happens for you, not to you. Everything happens at exactly the right moment, neither too soon nor too late. You don't have to like it... it's just easier if you do.”
― Byron Katie

“As long as you think that the cause of your problem is “out there”—as long as you think that anyone or anything is responsible for your suffering—the situation is hopeless. It means that you are forever in the role of victim, that you’re suffering in paradise.”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

“A thought is harmless unless we believe it. It’s not our thoughts, but our attachment to our thoughts, that causes suffering. Attaching to a thought means believing that it’s true, without inquiring. A belief is a thought that we’ve been attaching to, often for years.”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

“I am a lover of what is, not because I'm a spiritual person, but because it hurts when I argue with reality.”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

“Don't believe every thing you think.”
― Byron Katie

“All I have is all I need and all I need is all I have in this moment.”
― Byron Katie

“How do you react when you think you need people's love? Do you become a slave for their approval? Do you live an inauthentic life because you can't bear the thought that they might disapprove of you? Do you try to figure out how they would like you to be, and then try to become that, like a chameleon? In fact, you never really get their love. You turn into someone you aren't, and then when they say "I love you," you can't believe it, because they're loving a facade. They're loving someone who doesn't even exist, the person you're pretending to be. It's difficult to seek other people's love. It's deadly. In seeking it, you lose what is genuine. This is the prison we create for ourselves as we seek what we already have.”
― Byron Katie

“Placing the blame or judgment on someone else leaves you powerless to change your experience; taking responsibility for your beliefs and judgments gives you the power to change them”
― Byron Katie

“Our parents, our children, our spouses, and our friends will continue to press every button we have, until we realize what it is that we don't want to know about ourselves, yet. They will point us to our freedom every time.”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

“When they attack you and you notice that you love them with all your heart, your Work is done.”
― Byron Katie

“If you put your hand into a fire, does anyone have to tell you to move it? Do you have to decide? No: When your hand starts to burn, it moves. You don’t have to direct it; the hand moves itself. In the same way, once you understand, through inquiry, that an untrue thought causes suffering, you move away from it.”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

“Nothing comes ahead of its time, and nothing ever happened that didn't need to happen.”
― Byron Katie

“Peace doesn't require two people; it requires only one. It has to be you. The problem begins and ends there.”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

“all the advice you ever gave your partner is for you to hear”
― Byron Katie, Question Your Thinking, Change The World: Quotations from Byron Katie

“Seeking love keeps you from the awareness that you already have it—that you are it.”
― Byron Katie

“The miracle of love comes to you in the presence of the uninterpreted moment. If you are mentally somewhere else, you miss real life.”
― Byron Katie

“You are your only hope, because we're not changing until you do. Our job is to keep coming at you, as hard as we can, with everything that angers, upsets, or repulses you, until you understand. We love you that much, whether we're aware of it or not. The whole world is about you.”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

“Don't be careful. You could hurt yourself.”
― Byron Katie

“When we stop opposing reality, action becomes simple, fluid, kind, and fearless.”
― Byron Katie

“When you argue with reality, you lose, but only 100% of the time.”
― Byron Katie

“You move totally away from reality when you believe that there is a legitimate reason to suffer".”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

“Hurt feelings or discomfort of any kind cannot be caused by another person. No one outside me can hurt me. That's not a possibility. It's only when I believe a stressful thought that I get hurt. And I'm the one who's hurting me by believing what I think. This is very good news, because it means that I don't have to get someone else to stop hurting me. I'm the one who can stop hurting me. It's within my power.

What we are doing with inquiry is meeting our thoughts with some simple understanding, finally. Pain, anger, and frustration will let us know when it's time to inquire. We either believe what we think or we question it: there's no other choice. Questioning our thoughts is the kinder way. Inquiry always leaves us as more loving human beings.”
― Byron Katie, I Need Your Love - Is That True?: How to Stop Seeking Love, Approval, and Appreciation and Start Finding Them Instead

“Since the beginning of time, people have been trying to change the world so that they can be happy. This hasn’t ever worked, because it approaches the problem backward. What The Work gives us is a way to change the projector—mind—rather than the projected. It’s like when there’s a piece of lint on a projector’s lens. We think there’s a flaw on the screen, and we try to change this person and that person, whomever the flaw appears on next. But it’s futile to try to change the projected images. Once we realize where the lint is, we can clear the lens itself. This is the end of suffering, and the beginning of a little joy in paradise.”
― Byron Katie

“Being present means living without control and always having your needs met.”
― Byron Katie, On Work and Money

“An unquestioned mind is the world of suffering.”
― Byron Katie

“We don't attach to people or to things; we attach to uninvestigated concepts that we believe to tbe true in the moment.”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

“It is easy to be swept away by some overwhelming feeling, so it’s helpful to remember that any stressful feeling is like a compassionate alarm clock that says, “You’re caught in the dream.” Depression, pain, and fear are gifts that say, “Sweetheart, take a look at your thinking right now. You’re living in a story that isn’t true for you.”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

“In my experience, we don't make thoughts appear, they just appear. One day, I noticed that their appearance just wasn't personal. Noticing that really makes it simpler to inquire.”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life

“Isn’t it marvelous to discover that you’re the one you’ve been waiting for? That you are your own freedom?”
― Byron Katie, Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life