Powerful Rumi Quotes on Life, Love, Religion, Healing and Happiness That Will Inspire You

Last Updated January 25, 2022

Although Rumi lived in the 13^th century, his poetry and spiritual teachings have been translated into many languages worldwide. Today, he is one of the most widely read poets, especially in the United States, and he is considered one of the best-selling poets. Rumi’s quotes are well known for being powerful, thought-provoking, and wise. His timeless words and spiritual legacy resonate to this day, so please enjoy over 300 of the best Rumi quotes that will transform your life and make you see your own power and beauty.

Quick Facts about Rumi

Real name: Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī
Nickname: Molānā
Born in 1207
Rumi was a theologian, Persian poet, Islamic scholar, Sufi mystic, and faqih
Find more information on Wikipedia

50 of the Best and Most Powerful Rumi Quotes

Be like a tree and let the dead leaves drop.
Raise your words, not voice. It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder.
Don’t get lost in your pain; know that one day your pain will become your cure.
You were born with wings; why prefer to crawl through life?
Don’t be satisfied with stories, how things have gone with others. Unfold your own myth.
As you start to walk, on the way, the way appears.
Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.
Your heart is the size of an ocean. Go find yourself in its hidden depths.
Be full of sorrow, that you may become hill of joy; weep, that you may break into laughter.
By God, when you see your beauty, you will be the idol of yourself.

Dance when you’re broken open. Dance if you’ve torn the bandage off. Dance in the middle of the fighting. Dance in your blood. Dance when you’re perfectly free.
Don’t grieve. Anything you lose comes round in another form.
Everything in the universe is within you. Ask all from yourself.
Everything that is made beautiful and fair and lovely is made for the eye of one who sees.
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.
I am not this hair, I am not this skin, I am the soul that lives within.
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.
I know you’re tired but come, this is the way.
I searched for God and found only myself. I searched for myself and found only God.
I should be suspicious of what I want.
If you are irritated by every rub, how will your mirror be polished?
Ignore those that make you fearful and sad, that degrade you back towards disease and death.
In silence, there is eloquence. Stop weaving and see how the pattern improves.
In the blackest of your moments, wait with no fear.
It’s your road and yours alone. Others may walk it with you, but no one can walk it for you.
Let silence take you to the core of life.

Let yourself be silently drawn by the strange pull of what you really love. It will not lead you astray.
Maybe you are searching among the branches for what only appears in the roots.
My soul is from elsewhere, I’m sure of that, and I intend to end up there.
Not only do the thirsty seek the water, the water as well seeks the thirsty.
Only from the heart can you touch the sky.
Our greatest strength lies in the gentleness and tenderness of our hearts.
The reason is powerless in the expression of love.
Shine like the whole universe is yours.

Take someone who doesn’t keep score, who’s not looking to be richer or afraid of losing, who has not the slightest interest even in his own personality: he’s free.
The lion is most handsome when looking for food.
The only lasting beauty is the beauty of the heart.
The spirit is so near that you can’t see it! But reach for it… don’t be a jar, full of water, whose rim is always dry. Don’t be the rider who gallops all night and never sees the horse that is beneath him.
The whole universe is contained within a single human being – you.
The wound is the place where the light enters you.
There is a candle in your heart, ready to be kindled. There is a void in your soul, ready to be filled. You feel it, don’t you?

There is a voice that doesn’t use words; listen.
These pains you feel are messengers. Listen to them.
Very little grows on jagged rock. Be ground. Be crumbled, so wildflowers will come up where you are.
What matters is how quickly you do what your soul directs.
What you seek is seeking you.
Whatever lifts the corners of your mouth, trust that.
Whatever purifies you is the right path; I will not try to define it.
When the world pushes you to your knees, you’re in the perfect position to pray.
When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy.
When you feel a peaceful joy, that’s when you are near the truth.
Words are a pretext. It is the inner bond that draws one person to another, not words.
You are the truth from foot to brow. Now, what else would you like to know?
You have to keep breaking your heart until it opens.

30 Rumi Love Quotes

Every moment is made glorious by the light of love.
Every story is us.
Let your teacher be love itself.
Laugh as much as you breathe. Love as long as you live.
Close your eyes, fall in love, stay there.
A mountain keeps an echo deep inside. That’s how I hold your voice.
A thousand half-loves must be forsaken to take one whole heart home.
Close your eyes, fall in love, stay there. You had better run from me. My words are fire.
I closed my mouth and spoke to you in a hundred silent ways.
I don’t want learning, or dignity, or respectability. I want this music, and this dawn, and the warmth of your cheek against mine.

If I love myself, I love you. If I love you, I love myself.
Love is the whole thing. We are only pieces.
In the house of lovers, the music never stops, the walls are made of songs & the floor dances.
In your light, I learned how to love. In your beauty, how to make poems. You dance inside my chest where no one sees you, but sometimes I do, and that sight becomes this art.
Love is the bridge between you and everything.
Is it really so that the one I love is everywhere?
Let the lover be disgraceful, crazy, absentminded. Someone sober will worry about things going badly. Let the lover be.

Let yourself be drawn by the stronger pull of that which you truly love.
Love comes with a knife, not some shy question, and not with fears for its reputation!
Love is not an emotion; it’s your very existence.
Love sometimes wants to do us a great favor: hold us upside down and shake all the nonsense out.
On the path of love, we are neither masters nor the owners of our lives. We are only a brush in the hand of the master painter.
The way you make love is the way God will be with you.
The minute I heard my first love story, I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere. They’re in each other all along.
This is love: to fly toward a secret sky, to cause a hundred veils to fall each moment. First to let go of life. Finally, to take a step without feet.

Whatever happens, just keep smiling and lose yourself in love.
Love risks everything and asks for nothing.
When I am with you, we stay up all night. When you’re not here, I can’t go to sleep. Praise God for those two insomnias! And the difference between them.
Whenever we manage to love without expectations, calculations, negotiations, we are indeed in heaven.
Wherever you are, and whatever you do, be in love.

30 Inspirational Rumi Quotes

Wherever you stand, be the soul of that place.
Achieve some perfection yourself so that you may not fall into sorrow by seeing the perfection in others.
Anyone who genuinely and consistently with both hands looks for something will find it.
Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder. Help someone’s soul heal. Then, walk out of your house like a shepherd.
Don’t turn away. Keep your gaze on the bandaged place. That’s where the light enters you.
If you wish to be a mine of jewels, open the deep ocean within your heart.
In each moment the fire rages, it will burn away a hundred veils. And carry you a thousand steps toward your goal.
Let the beauty we love be what we do.
Let the waters settle, and you will see the moon and the stars mirrored in your own being.
Let us carve gems out of our stony hearts and let them light our path to love.
Patience with small details makes perfect a large work, like the universe.
Seek the wisdom that will untie your knot. Seek the path that demands your whole being.

Start a huge, foolish project, like Noah… it makes absolutely no difference what people think of you.
The garden of the world has no limit except in your mind.
The message behind the words is the voice of the heart.
There is a life-force within your soul, seek that life. There is a gem in the mountain of your body, seek that mine. O traveller, if you are in search of that, don’t look outside, look inside yourself and seek that.
What hurts you blesses you. Darkness is your candle.
When I am silent, I fall into a place where everything is music.
When you seek love with all your heart, you shall find its echo in the universe.
Whether one moves slowly or with speed, the one who is a seeker will be a finder.
Whoever has heart’s doors wide open could see the sun itself in every atom.
With every breath, I plant the seeds of devotion; I am a farmer of the heart.
Keep digging your well. Water is there somewhere.
You are not meant for crawling, so don’t. You have wings. Learn to use them and fly.
You are not one you are a thousand. Just light your lantern.

15 Rumi Quotes about Grief, Death, Sadness, and Healing

Be patient where you sit in the dark. The dawn is coming.
Whenever sorrow comes, be kind to it. For God has placed a pearl in sorrow’s hand.
Your depression is connected to your insolence and refusal to praise.
This place is a dream. Only a sleeper considers it real. Then death comes like dawn, and you wake up laughing at what you thought was your grief.
Don’t dismiss the heart, even if it’s filled with sorrow. God’s treasures are buried in broken hearts.
Don’t be sad! Because God sends hope in the most desperate moments. Don’t forget, the heaviest rain comes out of the darkest clouds.
Sorrow… It pulls up the rotten roots so that new roots hidden beneath have room to grow. Whatever sorrow shakes from your heart, far better things will take their place.

Grief can be the garden of compassion. If you keep your heart open through everything, your pain can become your greatest ally in your life’s search for love and wisdom.
Whoever finds love beneath hurt and grief disappears into emptiness with a thousand new disguises.
But listen to me. For one moment, quit being sad. Hear blessings dropping their blossoms around you.
Everyone is overridden by thoughts; that’s why they have so much heartache and sorrow.
One of the marvels of the world: The sight of a soul sitting in prison with the key in its hand.
Where there is ruin, there is hope for a treasure.
Suffering is a gift; in its hidden mercy.
Greed makes a man blind and foolish and makes him easy prey for death.

20 Rumi Quotes about Life, Joy, Worrying, and Happiness

Travel brings power and love back into your life.
Be grateful for your life, every detail of it, and your face will come to shine like a sun, and everyone who sees it will be made glad and peaceful.
Be kind and honest, and harmful poisons will turn sweet inside you.
Come out of the circle of time and into the circle of love.
Do not worry if all the candles in the world flicker and die. We have the spark that starts the fire.
Don’t make yourself miserable with what is to come or not to come.
I learned that every mortal will taste death. But only some will taste life.
If destiny comes to help you, love will come to meet you. A life without love isn’t a life.

If you want money more than anything, you’ll be bought and sold your whole life.
Joy lives concealed in grief.
Listen to the unstruck sounds and what sifts through that music.
My head is bursting with the joy of the unknown. My heart is expanding a thousandfold.
Tend to your vital heart, and all that you worry about will be solved.
The illuminated life can happen now, in the moments left. Die to your ego, and become a true human being.
There is a life in you; search that life, search the secret jewel in the mountain of your body.
Travelers, it is late. Life’s sun is going to set. So during these brief days that you have strength, be quick and spare no effort of your wings.
Why should I be unhappy? Every parcel of my being is in full bloom.
Why should I be weary when every cell of my body is bursting with life?
With life as short as a half-taken breath, don’t plant anything but love.

20 Short Rumi Quotes

Be soulful. Be kind. Be in love.
Become the sky. Take an ax to the prison wall. Escape.
Dance until you shatter yourself.
Grace comes to forgive and then forgive again.
Half-heartedness doesn’t reach into majesty.
If the light is in your heart, you will find your way home.
Let yourself become living poetry.
Look at the moon in the sky, not the one in the lake.
Patience is the key to joy.

Be an empty page, untouched by words.
Respond to every call that excites your spirit.
Set your life on fire. Seek those who fan your flames.
Sit, be still, and listen.
The source of now is here.
Be empty of worrying. Think of who created thought.
The wealth within you, your essence, is your kingdom.
To praise the sun is to praise your own eyes.
What is planted in each person’s soul will sprout.
You were born with wings. So why prefer to crawl through life?

20 Rumi Quotes about Religion, God, Spirituality

Silence is the language of God; all else is poor translation.
All religions. All this singing. One song. Peace be with you.
Each moment contains a hundred messages from God.
God turns you from one feeling to another and teaches by means of opposites so that you will have two wings to fly, not one
I am in the House of Mercy, and my heart is a place of prayer.
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.
Knock, and He’ll open the door. Vanish, and He’ll make you shine like the sun. Fall, and He’ll raise you to the heavens. Become nothing, and He’ll turn you into everything.
Love is the water of life. Everything other than love for the most beautiful God is the agony of the spirit, though it be sugar-eating. What is the agony of the spirit? To advance toward death without seizing hold of the water of life.
Now be silent. Let the One who creates the words speak. He made the door. He made the lock. He also made the key.

Sit quietly and listen for a voice that will say, Be more silent. As that happens, your soul starts to revive.
Stay in the spiritual fire. Let it cook you.
There is loneliness more precious than life. There is freedom more precious than the world. Infinitely more precious than life and the world is that moment when one is alone with God.
Till man destroys self, he is no true friend of God.
To become spiritual, you must die to self and come alive in the Lord. Only then will the mysteries of God fall from your lips. To die to self through self-discipline causes suffering but brings you everlasting life.
How did you get here? Close your eyes… and surrender!
Ways of worshipping are not to be ranked as better or worse than one another… It’s all praise, and it’s all right.
We are all the same… all the same… longing to find our way back… back to the One… back to the only One!
Why, when God’s world is so big, did you fall asleep in prison, of all places?
Would you become a pilgrim on the road of love? The first condition is that you make yourself humble as dust and ashes.

More Inspirational Quotes

Follow Us