Shams Tabrizi quotes:

The real dirt is not outside, but inside, in our hearts. We can wash all stains with water. The only one we can't remove is the grudge and the bad intentions sticking to our hearts.

You can study God through everything and everyone in the universe, because God is not confined in a mosque, synagogue or church. But if you are still in need of knowing where exactly His abode is, there is only one place to look for Him: in the heart of a true lover.

Surrendering is not a weakness. At the contrary it is strength. The surrender stops living in boiling water and starts living in a secure place.

To get closer to Truth and Right, we need a beautiful and soft heart. Every human learns one day or another to become softer. Some accidentally, some because of disease, some suffer from human loss, some other from material loss ... We all face these situations, but we can either see the good in it and open our hearts, or unfortunately see an another occasion to lock it forever.

You can be everything in life but the important thing is to be a good person.

Be sure that someday you'll praise and thank God for your unanswered prayers that once you had wept for them.

You have to live with the people in hypocrisy for them to stay happy with you.

Wherever you go, east, west, north or south, think of it as a journey into yourself! The one who travels into itself travels the world.

A life without love is a waste. 'Should I look for spiritual love, or material, or physical love?', don't ask yourself this question. Discrimination leads to discrimination. Love doesn't need any name, category or definition. Love is a world itself. Either you are in, at the center... either you are out, yearning.

If you look around, you can find a face of God in each thing, because He is not hidden in a church, in a mosque, or a synagogue, but everywhere. As there is no one who lives after seeing him, there is also no one dying after seeing him. Who finds Him, stays forever with him.

To get closer to Truth and Right, we need a beautiful and soft heart.

What does patience mean? It means to look at the thorn and see the rose, to look at the night and see the dawn. Impatience means to be short sighted as to not be able to see the outcome. The lovers of God never run out of patience, for they know that time is needed for the crescent moon to become full.

Intellect takes you to the door, but it doesn't take you into the house.

Nothing kills the soul that commands to evil (Nafs al Ammarra) like seeing the beauty of the heart.

The quest for Love changes us. There is no seeker among those who search for Love who has not matured on the way. The moment you start looking for Love, you start to change within and without.

For anew Self to be born, hardship is necessary. Just as clay needs to go through intense heat to become strong, Love can only be perfected in pain.

Do not worry about tricks and cheaters. If some people are trying to trap and hurt you, Allah is also trapping them. Hole diggers will always fall in their holes. No bad remains unpunished, and no good remains without being awarded, so have faith in justice and let the rest be.

Alms in secret extinguish the wrath of the Lord means you are so immersed in sincerity and in preserving that sincerity that you have no pleasure in giving alms.

Being the companion of the folk of this world is fire. There must be an Abraham if the fire is not going to burn [you].

When everyone is trying to be something, be nothing. Range with emptiness. Human should be like a pot. As the pot is hold by its emptiness inside, human is hold by the awareness of his nothingness.

Don't search for heaven and hell in the future. Both are now present. Whenever we manage to love without expectations, calculations, negotiations, we are indeed in heaven. Whenever we fight, hate, we are in hell.

The words we use for the Creator are a reflect of ourselves. If we think of God as fear and shame, we are scared and have something to be ashamed of ... But if we see love, compassion and kindness, it is because we possess these qualities.

The salat can be made up for, but there is no making up for false show or outward worship without presence.

The path to the Truth is a labour of the heart, not of the head. Make your heart your primary guide! Not your mind. Meet, challenge and ultimately prevail over your nafs with your heart. Knowing your ego will lead you to the knowledge of God.

A good man complains of no one; he does not look to faults.

Be grateful! It is easy to thank after obtaining what you want, thank before having what you want.

God is busy with the completion of your work, both outwardly and inwardly. He is fully occupied with you. Every human being is a work in progress that is slowly but inexplicably moving toward perfection. We are each an unfinished work of art both waiting and striving to be completed. God deals with each of us separately because humanity is a fine art of skilled penmanship where every single dot is equally important for the entire picture.

If a person claims that he really loves someone, evidence is asked from him. And that evidence is the giving away of possessions, the granting of favors. Just as when Mevlana claimed that he loved me, when I came he granted me thousands of favors and protected me. I regard these all as a grace from God.

If parts are always changing, the whole remains the same. A dead good man is replaced by a good man, a dead bad man is replaced by a bad man. While the whole remains the same, every day is different.

If the human being is a proud and honorable creature, he shouldn't forget to act that way, even if he falls, even if the whole world is against him, even if he ends as a slave.

If you are insulted, if you are accused, if they gossip about you, don't say anything bad. Don't be the one who sees the shame, be the one who corrects it.

If you expect respect from others, show it first to yourself. You can't expect from others what you don't give to yourself.

If you want to change the way others treat you, you should first change the way you treat yourself. Unless you learn to love yourself, fully and sincerely, there is no way you can be loved. Once you achieve that stage, however, be thankful for every thorn that others might throw at you. It is a sign that you will soon be showered in roses.

It is easy to love perfection. The difficulty consists in loving the human with his good and bad. We mostly know as much as we love. Only loving God but not its creatures, you can never really know, neither really love.

It is never late to ask yourself "Am I ready to change my life, am I ready to change myself?". However old we are, whatever we went through, it is always possible to reborn. If each day is a copy of the last one, what a pity! Every breath is a chance to reborn. But to reborn into a new life, you have to die before dying.

It is pointless trying to know where the way leads. Think only about your first step, the rest will come.

Love is a travel. All travelers whether they want or not are changed. No one can travel into love and remain the same.

Most of conflicts and tensions are due to language. Don't pay so much attention to the words. In love's country, language doesn't have its place. Love's mute.

Most of the problems of the world stems from linguistic mistakes and simple misunderstandings. Don't ever take words at face value. When you step into the zone of love, language as we know it becomes obsolete. That which cannot be put into words can only be grasped through silence.

No matter what people call you, you are just who you are. Keep to this truth. You must ask yourself how is it you want to live your life. We live and we die, this is the truth that we can only face alone. No one can help us. So consider carefully, what prevents you from living the way you want to live your life?

Patience is not sitting and waiting, it is foreseeing. It is looking at the thorn and seeing rose, looking at the night and seeing the day. Lovers are patient and know that the moon needs time to become full.

Remove all the walls and curtains so you can get closer and purely love. Have principles but do not use them to exclude or to judge the others. Stay far from idols, specially from those you made from your own principles. Have a powerful faith, but do not play the powerful.

The chemistry of mind is different from the chemistry of love. The mind is careful, suspicious, he advances little by little. He advises "Be careful, protect yourself" Whereas love says "Let yourself, go!" The mind is strong, never falls down, while love hurts itself, falls into ruins. But isn't it in ruins that we mostly find the treasures? A broken heart hides so many treasures.

The life we live is just a colourful and deposit toy. Some of us take it so seriously and fight and cry for it. Some of us break and throw it. Either we give extreme importance, either not enough. Better to stay far from extremes.

The past is a fog on our minds. The future? A complete dream. We can't neither guess the future, neither change the past.

The past is an interpretation. The future is on illusion. The world does not more through time as if it were a straight line, proceeding from the past to the future. Instead time moves through and within us, in endless spirals. Eternity does not mean infinite time, but simply timelessness. If you want to experience eternal illumination, put the past and the future out of your mind and remain within the present moment.

The universe is a complete unique entity. Everything and everyone is bound together with some invisible strings. Do not break anyone's heart; do not look down on weaker than you. One's sorrow at the other side of the world can make the entire world suffer; one's happiness can make the entire world smile.

The whole universe is sum up in the Human Being. Devil is not a monster waiting to trap us, He is a voice inside. Look for Your Devil in Yourself, not in the Others. Don't forget that the one who knows his Devil, knows his God.

There are more fake guides, teachers in the world than stars. The real guide is the one who makes you see your inner beauty, not the one who wants to be admired and followed.

There may be one fault in a man that conceals a thousand qualities, or one excellence that conceals a thousand faults. The little indicates much.

This world is like a mountain. Your echo depends on you. If you scream good things, the world will give it back. If you scream bad things, the world will give it back. Even if someone says badly about you, speak well about him. Change your heart to change the world.

We can only learn and advance with contradictions. The faithful inside should meet the doubtful. The doubtful should meet the faithful. Human slowly advances and becomes mature when he accepts his contradictions.

Whatever happens in your life, no matter how troubling things might seem, do not enter the neighbourhood of despair. Even when all doors remained closed, God will open up a new path only for you. Be thankful! It is easy to be thankful when all is well. A Sufi is thankful not only for what he has been given but also for all that he has been denied.

When a sincere woman begins to dance, the seven heavens, the earth, and all creatures begin to dance.

When everyone is trying to be something, be nothing. Range with emptiness.

When you oppose the shaykh, it's like the slave who kills himself over a quarrel with his master. Hey, why are you killing yourself over a quarrel?He says, So my master will suffer loss.

While the parts change, the whole always remains the same. For every thief who departs this world, a new one is born. And every decent person who passes away is replaced by a new one. In this way not only does nothing remain the same but also nothing ever really changes.

Whoever lives as he sees fit will not die as he sees fit.

You learn by reading but understand by LOVE.