Founder of The Art of Living, a non-profit organization, Gurudev offers programs globally, empowering individuals to eliminate stress and enhance well-being. In 1982, Sri Sri Ravi Shankar embarked on a 10-day silence, emerging as an enlightened master. From that moment, his life’s purpose crystallized — to guide others in the art of living.
His teachings, a unique blend of spiritual insights and practical wisdom, attract people from all walks of life. Sri Sri Ravi Shankar’s commitment to fostering a world where love and wisdom prevail is reflected in these 140 inspirational quotes on love, happiness, and life.
Quotes on Love by Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Even if you win in ego it is a loss. Even if you lose in love it is a victory. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Love is giving everything and taking nothing. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Love is not an emotion. It is your very existence. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Everywhere you see in creation there is Divine love. Love is the highest force, the greatest force, and the simplest. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Find the love you seek, by first finding the love within yourself. Learn to rest in that place within you that is your true home. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
If you are a taker of happiness you get misery, if you are a giver of happiness you get joy and love. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
If you ever feel lonely and feel that no one loves you and cares for you – remember me. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
In true love there is no heart break. A broken heart means broken demands, broken expectations and broken hopes. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Love is preserved by wisdom. Destroyed by demand, tested by doubt, nourished by longing. It blossoms with faith and grows with gratitude. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Love is the essence of the universe,. Love in action is service. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Nature loves you ten times more than a mother loves her newborn. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The path of love is not a tedious path. It’s a path of joy. It’s a path of singing and dancing. It’s not a desert. It is a valley of flowers.
– Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Either a princess or a pauper can feel generous. Generosity is the quality of the spirit. When you feel generous your life becomes, abundant full of compassion and love. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The criteria for success: you are free, you live in the present moment, you are useful to the people around you, and you feel love for all humanity. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The fire of love or fire of knowledge creates unpleasantness or a sense of longing in the beginning, but it moves on to the blossoming of bliss, the blossoming of fullness. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The visible sign of utter love is an undying smile. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
To grow in unconditional love and in beauty is spirituality. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
To love someone whom you like is insignificant. To love someone because they love you is of no consequence. To love someone whom you do not like means you have learned a lesson in life. To love someone who blames you for no reason shows that you have learned the art of living. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When a bud breaks it becomes a flower, when a heart breaks it becomes divine. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When the energy is high and when there is love, healing happens automatically! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Worry is the enemy of love. You cannot be in love and be worried at the same time. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
What puts you on the road is your desire to enjoy. What brings you home is being in love. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When heart speaks and heart listens, harmony is produced. When head talks and head listens, argument is produced. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Worldly love can be like an ocean, yet an ocean has a bottom. Divine love is like the sky – limitless, infinite. From the bottom of the ocean soar into the vast sky. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Your love is unique. Let love remain love, don’t give it any name. The love that is defined by a relationship is limited. The love that is beyond relationships, that is true love. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Whatever is needed for you and your body will be taken care of, when you know this the lack will disappear from your life. When you realise ISHA permeates your everything, you relax and are at ease – that is when things happen. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Inspirational Quotes on Happiness by Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Joy is never tomorrow, it’s always now! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
You should be ready for any challenge. This readiness will make you happy. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Be light. Smile. Drop. Learn the tendency to drop and smile and move through. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The rush to enjoy robs the joy from life and only denies the happiness and freedom of here and now. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Any fool can be unhappy when things are not okay. But it takes courage and to be happy even when things are falling apart. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Do everything happily. Walk, talk, sit happily; even if you complain against somebody, do it happily. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Don’t postpone your happiness until some perfect future date. Be happy now, tomorrow will take care of itself. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Events bring you small joy, while existence brings you bliss. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Happiness depends only on your mind. When the mind is free of past impressions and future cravings, happiness is there. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
If you do not want to be unhappy, no one else can make you unhappy. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
In joy, in peace, in that soothing inner state, you will find happiness. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Make your smile cheaper and anger expensive! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Nothing stays forever. Good as well as bad times go away. Be happy. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The best form of worship is to be happy, to be grateful. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When you can feel ‘I am not the doer,’ when this confidence, this faith dawns on you, that is nectar. With that, you will become happy.
– Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When you are unhappy, you are just coming in touch with your own boundaries. Turn the whole situation into a prayer & you will walk through it. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Don’t look for happiness in that which is temporary, that which is fleeting and changing. Joy and happiness is only in that which does not change. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Regardless of the events or circumstances that are happening, remain steady and established in the Self. Then you can be truly happy and blissful. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The world is full of paradoxes and life is full of opposites. The art is to embrace the opposites, accommodate the paradoxes and live with a smile. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Pleasure simply brings more craving, but the problem is that we try to get contentment through pleasure. True contentment can only come through service. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Life teaches you the art of letting go in every event. When you have learnt to let go, you will be joyful and as you start being joyful, more will be given to you. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Purpose of words is to create silence. Purpose of action is to bring deep rest. Purpose of deep rest is to bring you fulfillment. In fulfillment you find joy, bliss. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Space and silence are synonymous. Joy, fulfillment brings the silence. Desire brings noise. Silence is the cure, because in silence you come back to the source, and that creates joy. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
If you are unhappy, even the moon irritates you, sweet things nauseate, music disturbs. When you are calm and centered inside, noise is musical, clouds are magical, rain is liquid love. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
I tell you, deep inside you is a fountain of bliss, a fountain of joy. Deep inside your center core is truth, light, love, there is no guilt there, there is no fear there. Psychologists have never looked deep enough. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Your sadness is because of the thorn of desire in your heart. If you do not take notice of this, it will turn into cynicism, frustration and anger. You need to pull it out and throw it. Then you will feel uplifted and happy. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
You sell your happiness for peanuts! You sell your smile for pennies! I tell you, it’s not worth it. The entire world is not worth your smile. Even if you are made the king or the emperor of the world, it’s not worth giving away your smile. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Being unconditionally happy is a practice: Come what may, today I’m going to smile. Anyway, everything is going to die! Everything is going to vanish and disappear-so what! Who cares! Let me at least be happy, smile this moment, enjoy my very breath. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar’s Quotes on Life
Existence is a Fact, Living is an Art. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Feel indebted. Feel grateful. Then abundance grows. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Everything in this creation is a sign of celebration. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When you are totally defenseless, that’s when you’ll be strong. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Let your smile change the world! Never let the world change your smile! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
There is nothing for you to take away from this world. You have come to give. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When you wish good for others, good things come back to you. This is the law of nature. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Your life is perfect, it is a perfect plan; it is a spontaneous miracle. It is both every moment. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
No emotions are bad. But if they stay for long, then it is bad. Emotions should be like a line drawn on the surface of water. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When all doors are shut and you have nowhere to go, that is when you go within. Every crisis is an opportunity and you are the beginning. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Do not hurt anyone with your speech, for the Divine dwells in every heart. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Don’t be over complacent or too feverish, take a middle path. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Effort is the key in the relative; effortlessness is the key to the Absolute. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
How far to heaven? Just open your eyes and look. You are in heaven. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
In the present moment, we are all innocent. Wake up! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Just an intention to be free makes you immediately free! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Patience in the mind and dynamism in action is the right formula. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Talk less, but with more awareness. Every word you use, use purposefully. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Have a big vision. The bigger our vision for the world, the less personal worries we have. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
There are four sources of energy – food, sleep, breath and a calm mind. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
To whatever degree we are alert, aware, to that degree we are living. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
We communicate much more through our presence than the words. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When your intentions are very pure and clear, nature brings support to you. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Why do you think you are weak? Wake up and see you have all the strength. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
You are always a winner. Sometimes you win, sometimes you make others win. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
You should have desires, but the desires should not have you. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Your richness is on your ability to share and not in how much you have. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Health is not the mere absence of disease, it is the dynamic expression of life. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
A goal or cause in life, will help you come out of your hunger for insatiable desires. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The more you give, the more you will get. Then life will become a sheer dance of love.
– Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
There is freedom when you realize that you are just a witness to all that is happening. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Even stupid people have a role to play in your life. They make you wiser and more patient. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
If you follow fun, misery follows you. If you follow knowledge, happiness will follow you. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
If people are not inspired from within, it will not be possible to build a good work ethic. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
If you see long term benefit in doing something, but short term pain then you should do it. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Acceptance does not mean inaction; acceptance is actually acknowledging the present situation. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
One who can learn to flow with the current as well as manage the current is the successful one. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When you become content in life, you gain the power to bless others. This is the law of nature. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When you see events as just ‘happenings’, rather than as ‘doings’, you are liberated right away. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
It is the inner peace that can bring peace in our family, in society and ultimately, in the world. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
See the possibility that people and things can change at any time and don’t hold on to judgements. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Even in moments of utter danger, a person like Mahatma Gandhi remained totally involved in his work. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Walk lightly on this planet and yet leave such a footprint that cannot be erased for thousands of years! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Life is a combination of destiny and free will. Rain is destiny; whether you get wet or not is free will! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Favorable and unfavorable conditions are part of living but smiling through them all is the Art of Living. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The positive aspect of competition in a business scenario is it helps you to be more alert and innovative. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Much energy is wasted in trying to charm others. And in wanting to charm – I tell you, the opposite happens. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Life is nothing to be very serious about. Life is a ball in your hands to play with. Don’t hold on to the ball. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When everything is in abundance, dispassion happens. And when dispassion is there, everything comes in abundance. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
If you make someone feel guilty about their mistake, then you have not forgiven them. That guilt is itself punishment. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Life works on strange laws of nature (Karma). One never knows when a friend turns enemy & vice-versa. Rely on your Self. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Do not be feverish about success, if your aim is clear and you have patience to move towards it, nature will support you. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Boredom is a blessing when it leads you to wisdom. And boredom is a curse when it leads you to frustration and depression. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Difference between motivation and inspiration – Motivation is external and short lived. Inspiration is internal and lifelong. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When every action of yours is preceded by witnessing, then every move you make in this world becomes perfect and significant. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Look at your life in contrast with the magnitude of creation, space and time. Your life becomes insignificant. Ego disappears. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
You need to see your life in context of time and space – how vast creation is, how big the universe is and how small your life is.
– Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Do not make an effort to impress others. When you come from the self, your expression is perfect and your impression lasts for ages. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Nature will never confront you with a problem you can’t solve. You already have the answer, that is why the question appears before you. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Every moment you spend on this planet, remember that you are here for a unique purpose & cause, far greater than to just eat, sleep & talk. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Your desire for consistency itself will set you on the right path. As long as you keep going up, never mind if you come down once or twice. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
A successful man has the following qualities: A smile that doesn’t die; patience; fearless mind; love; self- confidence; love for everybody. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
If you’re saddened by another’s sorrow, then sorrow will never come to you. If you are happy at another’s joy then joy will never leave you. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Take some time off to go within, in silence. With that, your charm becomes eternal, your love becomes unconditional & great strength arises. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Never underestimate your life. It is most precious. You never know what talents are hidden within you and what you have to offer to the world! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Don’t focus on what others want. See what it is that you want. When you stop looking inside and look at others, that is when you miss the boat. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Creativity can only come from silence. If we maintain two minutes of silence every day, then we will see that a whole new dimension of life opens up. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Celebrate Life. Care for others and share whatever you have with those less fortunate than you. Broaden your vision, for the whole world belongs to you. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Ego is just a feeling of having a wall between you and others. There is no wall. You belong to me and I belong to you. You are accepted the way you are. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Foolishness is giving up without any effort or not giving up after putting in all your effort. Secret of freedom is putting all your effort and giving up! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
With charity, money is purified. By service, our actions are purified. With music, our emotions are purified and with knowledge our intellect is purified. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Make the whole life a game. There is no purpose there is no aim, nothing. Just take it lightly, easily. Play the game. That is worship, which is celebration. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Accept people and situations as they are in life and then take action. The moment you do this, you’ll see you are out of the confusion about anything in life. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Human rights means protecting another’s freedom, seeing that the other person is also like oneself. Human rights is giving others security, letting them live. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Have a goal in life. When water is everywhere, it is a flood, but if it is in between banks, it is a river. It is nice to have a goal, so your life force gets channelized! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
When there is a fountain of colours, they add charm to your life. In ignorance, emotions are a bother; in knowledge, the same emotions add colours.. enjoy the day with Wisdom! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Human evolution has two steps – from being somebody to being nobody; and from being nobody to being everybody. This knowledge can bring sharing and caring throughout the world. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Dream the impossible. Know that you are born in this world to do something wonderful and unique; don’t let this opportunity pass by. Give yourself the freedom to dream and think big. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Success means crossing a limit. To cross a limit you need to assume that you have a limit. Assuming a limit is underestimating yourself. If you have no boundaries then where is your success? – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Wise is the one who learns from another´s mistakes. Less wise is the one who learns only from his own mistakes. The fool keeps making the same mistakes again and again and never learns from them. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The signs of good health are an intellect which is free from inhibition and arrogance, a heart which is full of compassion is healthy, a confusion-free mind, a trauma-free memory and a sorrow-free soul. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
I say, drop all your defenses. Anyone can make a mistake – even you. Do not defend your mistakes; just accept them and move on. When you are totally defenseless, that is when you will be completely strong. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The role of women in the development of society is of utmost importance. In fact, it is the only thing that determines whether a society is strong and harmonious, or otherwise. Women are the backbone of society.
– Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
A game is where you win and lose, and both are part of it. When there is more chance of losing, it is more charming. The game has value when it is tough. So some little problems that come in life are part of the whole game. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
Have this faith that someone is there to take away your weaknesses. Ok, you slipped once, twice, thrice. It does not matter. Keep moving ahead. People take vows never to commit mistakes again. Breaking the vows makes it worse. Surrendering is better. – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
The problems in the world were made so that you don’t get stuck and attached to this world. You get stuck with this world even though there are so many problems. Imagine if there are no problems, then you will never want to leave this material world! – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
