Swami Vivekananda's Quotes On Witness Or Witnessing ~ Swami Vivekananda Quotes

Be the witness. Learn never to react.

—Swami Vivekananda

Witnessing is an important and interesting part in the part in the teachings of Swami Vivekaannda. Vivekananda described "God" or "Brahman" as "witness". He also suggested to consider self as witness. In this article we'll make a collection of Swami Vivekananda's quotes on witness or witnessing.

All lives belong to us as leaves to a book; but we are unchanged, the Witness, the Soul, upon whom the impression is made, as when the impression of a circle is made upon the eyes when a firebrand is rapidly whirled round and round.^[Source]
Be the Witness.^[Source]
Be the witness. Learn never to react.^[Source]
Be the Witness only, then you can admire the picture of the universe undisturbed.^[Source]
Control the brain and do not let it read the record; be the witness and do not react, only thus can you be happy.^[Source]
Do not mix in the fray, hold yourself as a witness and go on working.^[Source]
Even misery can be enjoyed when there is no selfishness, when we have become the witness of our own lives.^[Source]
Even to imagine my own annihilation I shall have to stand by and look on as a witness.^[Source]
"Everything is evanescent, everything is changeful" — knowing this, the sage gives up both pleasure and pain and becomes a witness of this panorama (the universe) without attaching himself to anything.^[Source]
God has not left Himself without a witness in any heart.^[Source]
God is known to us as Sâkshi, the Witness of the universe.^[Source]
God is more than known. This chair is known, but God is intensely more than that because in and through Him we have to know this chair itself. He is the Witness, the eternal Witness of all knowledge.^[Source]
Hold fast to the idea, "I am the witness watching my mind drifting. The mind is not I.^[Source]
I am the witness, and through my witnessing, nature is producing; all that is sentient and all that is insentient.^[Source]
I am the witness. I look on. When health comes I am the witness. When disease comes I am the witness.^[Source]
I am the witness, the same eternal witness of all. I see, therefore nature exists. I do not see, therefore she does not. Not one of us could see or speak if this infinite unity were broken for a moment.^[Source]
Knowledge is a limitation, knowledge is objectifying. He is the eternal subject of everything, the eternal witness in this universe, your own Self.^[Source]
Learn to be the witness. If two dogs are fighting on the street and I go out there, I get mixed up in the fight; but if I stay quietly in my room, I witness the fight from the window. So learn to be the witness.^[Source]
Let the mind run on and do not restrain it; but keep watch on your mind as a witness watching its action.^[Source]
No breathing, no physical training of Yoga, nothing is of any use until you reach to the idea, "I am the Witness." Say, when the tyrant hand is on your neck, "I am the Witness! I am the Witness!" Say, "I am the Spirit! Nothing external can touch me." When evil thoughts arise, repeat that, give that sledge-hammer blow on their heads, "I am the Spirit! I am the Witness, the Ever-Blessed! I have no reason to do, no reason to suffer, I have finished with everything, I am the Witness. I am in my picture gallery — this universe is my museum, I am looking at these successive paintings. They are all beautiful. Whether good or evil. I see the marvellous skill, but it is all one. Infinite flames of the Great Painter!"^[Source]
Seek no help from high or low, from above or below. Desire nothing — and look upon this vanishing panorama as a witness and let it pass.^[Source]
Stand as a witness, as a student, and observe the phenomena of nature.^[Source]
The Atman never changes, never goes nor comes. It is the eternal Witness of all Its own manifestations.^[Source]
The first step is to let the mind drift; watch it; see what it thinks; be only the witness. Mind is not soul or spirit. It is only matter in a finer form, and we own it and can learn to manipulate it through the nerve energies.^[Source]
The mind brings before us all our delusions -- body, sex, creed, caste, bondage; so we have to tell the truth to the mind incessantly, until it is made to realise it. Our real nature is all bliss, and all the pleasure we know is but a reflection, an atom, of that bliss we get from touching our real nature. That is beyond both pleasure and pain. It is the "witness" of the universe, the unchanging reader before whom turn the leaves of the book of life.^[Source]
The practice of Yoga leads to discriminating power, to clearness of vision. The veil drops from the eyes, and we see things as they are. We find that nature is a compound, and is showing the panorama for the Purusha, who is the witness; that nature is not the Lord, that all the combinations of nature are simply for the sake of showing these phenomena to the Purusha, the enthroned king within. When discrimination comes by long practice, fear ceases, and the mind attains isolation.^[Source]
The Sankhyas say that consciousness is a compound, and beyond that, the last analysis gives us the Purusha, Witness.^[Source]
The soul has neither pleasure nor pain; it is the witness of everything, the eternal witness of all work, but it takes no fruits from any work.^[Source]
This mind is thus divided into two—the player and the witness. Now strengthen the witnessing part and do not waste time in restraining your wanderings. The mind must think; but slowly and gradually, as the witness does its part, the player will come more and more under control, until at last you cease to play or wander.^[Source]
The Purusha is not the doer but the witness.^[Source]
These bodies are coming and going by the laws of nature, but we are free, standing as witness.^[Source]
When we begin to deny, all must go until we reach what cannot be thrown away or denied, which is the real "I". That "I" is the witness of the universe, it is unchangeable, eternal, infinite. Now, layer after layer of ignorance covers it from our eyes, but it remains ever the same.^[Source]
When you are outside of it simply as a witness and as a student, you will be able to see that there are millions and millions of channels in which God is manifesting Himself as Love.^[Source]
Who is a true witness? He is a true witness to whom the thing said is a direct perception.^[Source]
You are living through Him, and He is the Eternal Witness of the universe.^[Source]
You are the soul, the pure, the free, all the time; you are the Witness.^[Source]