Rumi (30 September 1207 – 17 December 1273), was a 13th-century Persian poet, Islamic scholar, theologian, and Sufi mystic originally from Greater Khorasan.

“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.” – Rumi

“Be like a tree and let the dead leaves drop.” – Rumi

“I have been a seeker and I still am, but I stopped asking the books and the stars. I started listening to the teaching of my Soul.” – Rumi

“It’s your road and yours alone. Others may walk it with you, but no one can walk it for you.” – Rumi

“Maybe you are searching among the branches, for what only appears in the roots.” – Rumi

“I want to sing like the birds sing, not worrying about who hears or what they think.” – Rumi

“These pains you feel are messengers. Listen to them.” – Rumi

“There is a voice that doesn’t use words, listen.” – Rumi

“The message behind the words is the voice of the heart.” – Rumi

“I am not this hair, I am not this skin, I am the soul that lives within.” – Rumi

“Love is the bridge between you and everything.” – Rumi

“We carry inside us the wonders we seek outside us.” – Rumi

“Your heart knows the way. Run in that direction.” – Rumi

“What you seek is seeking you.” – Rumi

“Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” – Rumi

“Very little grows on jagged rock. Be ground. Be crumbled, so wild flowers will come up where you are.” – Rumi

“The lion is most handsome when looking for food.” – Rumi

“Let yourself be silently drawn by the stronger pull of what you really love.” – Rumi

“Raise your words, not voice. It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder.” – Rumi

“Life is balance of holding on and letting go.” – Rumi

“If light is in your heart, you will find your way home.” – Rumi

“Set your life on fire. Seek those who fan your flames.” – Rumi

“As you start to walk on the way, the way appears.” – Rumi

“Be an empty page, untouched by words.” – Rumi

“What hurts you, blesses you. Darkness is your candle.” – Rumi

“Look at the moon in the sky, not the one in the lake.” – Rumi

“If you are irritated by every rub, how will your mirror be polished?” – Rumi

“Why do you stay in prison when the door is so wide open?” – Rumi

“The soul has been given its own ears to hear things mind does not understand.” – Rumi

“Inside any deep asking is the answering.” – Rumi

“Wisdom tells us we are not worthy; love tells us we are. My life flows between the two.” – Rumi

“The time has come to turn your heart into a temple of fire.” – Rumi

“Open your hands if you want to be held.” – Rumi

“The world is a mountain, in which your words are echoed back to you.” – Rumi

“When you seek love with all your heart you shall find its echo in the universe.” – Rumi

“When you lose all sense of self, the bonds of a thousand chains will vanish.” – Rumi

“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.” – Rumi

“When you feel a peaceful joy, that’s when you are near truth.” – Rumi

“I learned that every mortal will taste death. But only some will taste life.” – Rumi

“If you want money more than anything, you’ll be bought and sold your whole life.” – Rumi

“Why struggle to open a door between us when the whole wall is an illusion?” – Rumi

“The wound is the place where the light enters you.” – Rumi

“Our greatest strength lies in the gentleness and tenderness of our heart.” – Rumi

“Do not feel lonely, the entire universe is inside you.” – Rumi

“Let the waters settle and you will see the moon and the stars mirrored in your own being.” – Rumi

“In order to understand the dance one must be still. And in order to truly understand stillness one must dance.” – Rumi

“Always remember you are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, smarter than you think and twice as beautiful as you’d ever imagined.” – Rumi

“If in thirst you drink water from a cup, you see God in it. Those who are not in love with God will see only their own faces in it.” – Rumi

“I was dead, then alive.

Weeping, then laughing.

The power of love came into me,

and I became fierce like a lion,

then tender like the evening star.” – Rumi

“I’ve been looking for a long, long time,

for this thing called love,

I’ve ridden comets across the sky,

and I’ve looked below and above.

Then one day I looked inside myself,

and this is what I found,

a golden sun residing there,

beaming forth God’s light and sound.” – Rumi

“Doing as others told me, I was blind.

Coming when others called me, I was lost.

Then I left everyone, myself as well.

Then I found everyone, myself as well.” – Rumi

“I died to the mineral state and became a plant,

I died to the vegetal state and reached animality,

I died to the animal state and became a man,

Then what should I fear? I have never become less from dying.

At the next charge (forward) I will die to human nature,

So that I may lift up (my) head and wings (and soar) among the angels,

And I must (also) jump from the river of (the state of) the angel,

Everything perishes except His Face,

Once again I will become sacrificed from (the state of) the angel,

I will become that which cannot come into the imagination,

Then I will become non-existent; non-existence says to me (in tones) like an organ,

Truly, to Him is our return.” – Rumi