Sam Harris

Being mindful is not a matter of thinking more clearly about experience; it is the act of experiencing more clearly, including the arising of thoughts themselves.

The problem is not thoughts themselves but the state of thinking without knowing that we are thinking.

Children need to become autonomous, confident, and self-aware in order to form healthy relationships.

We manage to avoid being happy while struggling to become happy

As a consequence, we spend our lives being far less content than we might otherwise be.

We crave experiences, objects, relationships, only to grow bored with them. And yet the craving persists.

it takes some training to distinguish between being lost in thought and seeing thoughts for what they are.

The change comes when we experience the present moment prior to the arising of thought.

likens this shift in awareness to the experience of being fully immersed in a film and then suddenly realizing that you are sitting in a theater watching a mere play of light on a wall.

the problem is not thoughts themselves but the state of thinking without being fully aware that we are thinking.