Week 2020-52: The Art of War (Tactics vs. Strategy)

Disclaimer: The following quotes were consider only in respect to people's understanding about strategy and tactics over time, as best exemplification for understanding the difference between the two concepts.

"What is of supreme importance in war is to attack the enemy's strategy." (Sun Tzu, "The Art of War", 5th century BC)

"Thus those skilled in war subdue the enemy's army without battle. [...] They conquer by strategy." (Sun Tzu, The Art of War, 5th century BC)

"The peak efficiency of knowledge and strategy is to make conflict unnecessary."(Sun Tzu, The Art of War, 5th century BC)

"In warfare, there are no constant conditions. He who can modify his tactics in relation to his opponent will succeed and win." (Sun Tzu, The Art of War, 5th century BC)

"All men can see these tactics whereby I conquer, but what none can see is the strategy out of which victory is evolved." (Sun Tzu, The Art of War, 5th century BC)

"When conventional tactics are altered unexpectedly according to the situation, they take on the element of surprise and increase in strategic value." (Sun Bin, Art of War, cca 4th century BC)

"Everything can collapse. Houses, bodies, and enemies collapse when their rhythm becomes deranged. [...] In large-scale strategy, when the enemy starts to collapse you must pursue him without letting the chance go. If you fail to take advantage of your enemies' collapse, they may recover." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"In strategy it is important to see distant things as if they were close and to take a distanced view of close things. It is important in strategy to know the enemy's sword and not to be distracted by insignificant movements of his sword. You must study this. The gaze is the same for single combat and for large-scale combat." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"In all forms of strategy, it is necessary to maintain the combat stance in everyday life and to make your everyday stance your combat stance. You must research this well." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"In contests of strategy it is bad to be led about by the enemy. You must always be able to lead the enemy about." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"In strategy your spiritual bearing must not be any different from normal. Both in fighting and in everyday life you should be determined though calm. Meet the situation without tenseness yet not recklessly, your spirit settled yet unbiased. Even when your spirit is calm do not let your body relax, and when your body is relaxed do not let your spirit slacken." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"In large-scale strategy, it is beneficial to strike at the corners of the enemy's force, If the corners are overthrown, the spirit of the whole body will be overthrown." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"Many things can cause a loss of balance. One cause is danger, another is hardship, and another is surprise. You must research this.

In large-scale strategy it is important to cause loss of balance. Attack without warning where the enemy is not expecting it, and while his spirit is undecided follow up your advantage and, having the lead, defeat him." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"Speed is not part of the true Way of strategy. Speed implies that things seem fast or slow, according to whether or not they are in rhythm. Whatever the Way, the master of strategy does not appear fast." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"Strategy is different from other things in that if you mistake the Way even a little you will become bewildered and fall into bad ways." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"There is timing in everything. Timing in strategy cannot be mastered without a great deal of practice." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"The important thing in strategy is to suppress the enemy's useful actions but allow his useless actions." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"The principles of strategy are written down here in terms of single combat, but you must think broadly so that you attain an understanding for ten-thousand-a-side battles." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"The wisdom of strategy is different from other things. On the battlefield, even when you are hard-pressed, you should ceaselessly research the principles of strategy so that you can develop a steady spirit." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"There is timing in the whole life of the warrior, in his thriving and declining, in his harmony and discord. Similarly, there is timing in the Way of the merchant, in the rise and fall of capital. All things entail rising and falling timing. You must be able to discern this. In strategy there are various timing considerations. From the outset you must know the applicable timing and the inapplicable timing, and from among the large and small things and the fast and slow timings find the relevant timing, first seeing the distance timing and the background timing. This is the main thing in strategy. It is especially important to know the background timing, otherwise your strategy will become uncertain." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"To attain the Way of strategy as a warrior you must study fully other martial arts and not deviate even a little from the Way of the warrior. With your spirit settled, accumulate practice day by day, and hour by hour. Polish the twofold spirit heart and mind, and sharpen the twofold gaze perception and sight. When your spirit is not in the least clouded, when the clouds of bewilderment clear away, there is the true void." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"'To move the shade' is used when you cannot see the enemy's spirit.

In large-scale strategy, when you cannot see the enemy's position, indicate that you are about to attack strongly, to discover his resources. It is easy then to defeat hin with a different method once you see his resources." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"When you have attained the way of strategy there will be nothing that you cannot understand. You will see the way in everything." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"With your spirit open and unconstricted, look at things from a high point of view. You must cultivate your wisdom and spirit. Polish your wisdom: learn public justice, distinguish between good and evil, study the Ways of different arts one by one. When you cannot be deceived by men you will have realised the wisdom of strategy." (Miyamoto Musashi, "Go Rin No Sho" ["The Book of Five Rings"], 1645)

"According to our classification, then, tactics teaches the use of armed forces in the engagement; strategy, the use of engagements for the object of the war." (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"But when one comes to the effect of the engagement, where material successes turn into motives for further action, the intellect alone is decisive. In brief, tactics will present far fewer difficulties to the theorist than will strategy." (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"In a tactical situation one is able to see at least half the problem with the naked eye, whereas in strategy everything has to be guessed at and presumed." (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"Many readers no doubt will consider it superfluous to make such a careful distinction between two things so closely related as tactics and strategy, because they do not directly affect the conduct of operations. Admittedly only the rankest pedant would expect theoretical distinctions to show direct results on the battlefield." (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"Tactics and strategy are two activities that permeate one another in time and space but are nevertheless essentially different. Their inherent laws and mutual relationship cannot be understood without a total comprehension of both." (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"The art of war in the narrower sense must now in its turn be broken down into tactics and strategy. The first is concerned with the form of the individual engagement, the second with its use. Both affect the conduct of marches, camps, and billets only through the engagement; they become tactical or strategic questions insofar as they concern either the engagement’s form or its significance. (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"The conduct of war, then, consists in the planning and conduct of fighting. If fighting consisted of a single act, no further subdivision would be needed. However, it consists of a greater or lesser number of single acts, each complete in itself, which [...] are called ‘engagements’ and which form new entities. This gives rise to the completely different activity of planning and executing these engagements themselves, and of coordinating each of them with the others in order to further the object of the war. One has been called tactics, and the other strategy." (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"The distinction between tactics and strategy is now almost universal, and everyone knows fairly well where each particular factor belongs without clearly understanding why. Whenever such categories are blindly used, there must be a deep-seated reason for it. We have tried to discover the distinction, and have to say that it was just this common usage that led to it. We reject, on the other hand, the artificial definitions of certain writers, since they find no reflection in general usage." (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"The theory of major operations (strategy, as it is called) presents extraordinary difficulties, and it is fair to say that very few people have clear ideas about its details - that is, ideas which logically derive from basic necessities." (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"We have divided the conduct of war into the two fields of tactics and strategy. The theory of the latter, as we have already stated, will unquestionably encounter the greater problems since the former is virtually limited to material factors, whereas for strategic theory, dealing as it does with ends which bear directly on the restoration of peace, the range of possibilities is unlimited. As these ends will have to be considered primarily by the commander-in-chief, the problems mainly arise in those fields that lie within his competence. In the field of strategy, therefore, even more than in tactics, theory will be content with the simple consideration of material and psychological factors, especially where it embraces the highest of achievements." (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"Such cases also occur in strategy, since strategy is directly linked to tactical action. In strategy too decisions must often be based on direct observation, on uncertain reports arriving hour by hour and day by day, and finally on the actual outcome of battles. It is thus an essential condition of strategic leadership that forces should be held in reserve according to the degree of strategic uncertainty." (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"Thus, while a tactical reserve is a means not only of meeting any unforeseen manoeuvre by the enemy but also of reversing the unpredictable outcome of combat when this becomes necessary, strategy must renounce this means, at least so far as the overall decision is concerned. Setbacks in one area can, as a rule, be offset only by achieving gains elsewhere, and in a few cases by transferring troops from one area to another. Never must it occur to a strategist to deal with such a setback by holding forces in reserve." (Carl von Clausewitz, "On War", 1832)

"As regards tactics, the principal thing to be attended to is the choice of the most suitable order of battle for the object in view. When we come to consider the action of masses on the field, the means to be used may be an opportune charge of cavalry, a strong battery put in position and unmasked at the proper moment, a column of infantry making a headlong charge, or a deployed division coolly and steadily pouring upon the enemy a fire, or they may consist of tactical maneuvers intended to threaten the enemy’s flanks or rear, or any other maneuver calculated to diminish the confidence of the adversary. Each of these things may, in a particular case, be the cause of victory. To define the cases in which each should be preferred is simply impossible." (Antoine-Henri Jomini, "The Art of War", 1838)

"Every strategic line of defense should always possess a tactical point upon which to rally for defense should the enemy cross the strategic front. (Antoine-Henri Jomini, "The Art of War", 1838)

"Grand tactics is the art of making good combinations preliminary to battles, as well as during their progress. The guiding principle in tactical combinations, as in those of strategy, is to bring the mass of the force in hand against a part of the opposing army, and upon that point the possession of which promises the most important results. (Antoine-Henri Jomini, "The Art of War", 1838)

"Strategy, or the art of properly directing masses upon the theater of war, either for defense or for invasion. […] Strategy is the art of making war upon the map, and comprehends the whole theater of operations. Grand Tactics is the art of posting troops upon the battle-field according to the accidents of the ground, of bringing them into action, and the art of fighting upon the ground, in contradistinction to planning upon a map. Its operations may extend over a field of ten or twelve miles in extent. Logistics comprises the means and arrangements which work out the plans of strategy and tactics. Strategy decides where to act; logistics brings the troops to this point; grand tactics decides the manner of execution and the employment of the troops." (Antoine-Henri Jomini, "The Art of War", 1838)

"Strategy embraces the following points, viz.:– 

1. The selection of the theater of war, and the discussion of the different combinations of which it admits.

2. The determination of the decisive points in these combinations, and the most favorable direction for operations.

3. The selection and establishment of the fixed base and of the zone of operations.

4. The selection of the objective point, whether offensive or defensive.

5. The strategic fronts, lines of defense, and fronts of operations.

6. The choice of lines of operations leading to the objective point or strategic front.

7. For a given operation, the best strategic line, and the different maneuvers necessary to embrace all possible cases.

8. The eventual bases of operations and the strategic reserves.

9. The marches of armies, considered as maneuvers.

10. The relation between the position of depots and the marches of the army.

11. Fortresses regarded as strategical means, as a refuge for an army, as an obstacle to its progress: the sieges to be made and to be covered.

12. Points for intrenched camps, tétes de pont, &c.

13. The diversions to be made, and the large detachments necessary.

The maneuvering of an army upon the battle-field, and the different formations of troops for attack, constitute Grand Tactics. Logistics is the art of moving armies. It comprises the order and details of marches and camps, and of quartering and supplying troops; in a word, it is the execution of strategical and tactical enterprises." (Antoine-Henri Jomini, "The Art of War", 1838)

"[…] the art of war consists of six distinct parts:– 

1. Statesmanship in its relation to war.

2. Strategy, or the art of properly directing masses upon the theater of×war, either for defense or for invasion.

3. Grand Tactics.

4. Logistics, or the art of moving armies.

5. Engineering,–the attack and defense of fortifications.

6. Minor Tactics." (Antoine-Henri Jomini, "The Art of War", 1838)

"The science of strategy consists, in the first place, in knowing how to choose well a theater of war and to estimate correctly that of the enemy. To do this, a general must accustom himself to decide as to the importance of decisive points […]." (Antoine-Henri Jomini, "The Art of War", 1838)

"The study of the principles of strategy can produce no valuable practical results if we do nothing more than keep them in remembrance, never trying to apply them, with map in hand, to hypothetical wars, or to the brilliant operations of great captains. By such exercises may be procured a rapid and certain strategic coup-d’oeil,–the most valuable characteristic of a good general, without which he can never put in practice the finest theories in the world." (Antoine-Henri Jomini, "The Art of War", 1838)

"Strategy is the most important department of the art of war, and strategical skill is the highest and rarest function of military genius. (George S Hillard, "Life and Campaigns of George B. McClellan, Major-general U. S. Army", 1864)

"The tactical result of an engagement forms the base for new strategic decisions because victory or defeat in a battle changes the situation to such a degree that no human acumen is able to see beyond the first battle." (Helmuth von Moltke, "Über Strategie" ["On Strategy"], 1871)

"The world is a multiplicity, a harvest-field, a battle-ground; and thence arises through human contact ways of numbering, or mathematics, ways of tillage, or agriculture, ways of fighting, or military tactics and strategy, and these are incorporated in individuals as habits of life." (George Edward Woodberry, "The Torch, and Other Lectures and Addresses", 1920)

"Nine-tenths of tactics are certain, and taught in books: but the irrational tenth is like the kingfisher flashing across the pool, and that is the test of generals. It can only be ensured by instinct, sharpened by thought practicing the stroke so often that at the crisis it is as natural as a reflex." (Thomas E Lawrence, "The Evolution of A Revolt", 1920)

"In a physical contest on the field of battle it is allowable to use tactics and strategy, to retreat as well as advance, to have recourse to a ruse as well as open attack; but in matters of principle there can be no tactics, there is one straight forward course to follow and that course must be found and followed without swerving to the end." (Terence MacSwiney, "Principles of Freedom", 1921)

"The field of consciousness is tiny. It accepts only one problem at a time. Get into a fist fight, put your mind on the strategy of the fight, and you will not feel the other fellow's punches." (Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, "Flight to Arras", 1942)

"Keep the pressure on, with different tactics and actions, and utilize all events of the period for your purpose." (Saul Alinsky, "Thirteen Tactics for Realistic Radicals: from Rules for Radicals", 1971)

"It is necessary to develop a strategy that utilizes all the physical conditions and elements that are directly at hand. The best strategy relies upon an unlimited set of responses." (Morihei Ueshiba, "The Art of Peace", 1991)

"Grand strategy is the art of looking beyond the present battle and calculating ahead. Focus on your ultimate goal and plot to reach it." (Robert Greene, "The 33 Strategies of War", 2006)

Week 2020-51: Suzuki Shosan - Collected Quotes

"Be aware of yourself and know yourself. No matter how much you have learned and how much you know, if you don't know yourself you don't know anything." (Suzuki Shosan)

"Beginners should by all means strive for Truth. You must not force yourself to train or do zazen too vigorously before you realize the Truth. If you forcefully let out energy and practice Zen in violent ways, you will become fatigued, lose your energy, and it will all be of no use." (Suzuki Shosan)

"Do your job with your mind as taut as an iron bow strung with wire. This is the same as Zen meditation." (Suzuki Shosan)

"Look! This is the exercised power of Zen concentration. But a swordsman only exercises his power of concentration when he manipulates his sword. When he is without his sword, he loses his power of concentration. This is no good. On the contrary, the Zen man exercises his power of concentration all the time. That is why he is never defeated in doing anything." (Suzuki Shosan)

"Remember such a stable and firm attitude is itself meditation practice. There is no other method of concentration to seek. Buddhism itself is about applying full attention steadily, without being disturbed by external things. Developing a confident attitude that is never pained or vexed or worried or saddened or altered or frightened is called attaining Buddhahood." (Suzuki Shosan)

"Since you cannot do real zazen no matter how much I teach you, I think I’ll show you from now on how to use the vigorous energy you have when you are angry." (Suzuki Shosan)

"The strongest men and the greatest martial arts masters are born that way, so no effort can attain that; but when it comes to exerting our whole heart and disregarding our lives, to whom should we be inferior? No one should think he’ll lose, even to the greatest warriors. Why is that? Because if you back off such a person, who will back off you?" (Suzuki Shosan)

"There are myriad different methods of practice, but essentially they amount to no more than overcoming thoughts of yourself. The source of suffering is ego, the thought of self. To know this is reason. Once you know the reason for suffering, your sense of duty evokes effort to extinguish the thought of self with a genuine courageous mind. Fools can’t understand the source of misery and happiness; people without a sense of duty cannot break the bonds of life and death." (Suzuki Shosan)

"There are those who discuss the amount of rewards and size of entitlement of those who have exercised considerable military ability, put their lives on the line, ground down their bones, and become famous. They are foolish! Why not do a warrior’s deed, costly though it be, for the sake of loyalty? People who think of rewards are nothing but military merchants." (Suzuki Shosan)

"There is a practice designed to enter the Way of Buddha by means of your profession. You should apply this idea, that a man born in a house of valor, polishing a sword and sporting a bow, should always exert the strongest attention, as if he were marching right into an army of ten million men." (Suzuki Shosan)

"Those who have no prejudices in themselves do not reject people, and therefore people do not reject them." (Suzuki Shosan)

"Thus consider that you are always on duty, required to firmly apply your full attention. If you slack off, you’re useless." (Suzuki Shosan)

"Use your mind strongly even when you walk down the street, such that you wouldn’t even blink if someone unexpectedly thrust a lance at your nose. All warriors should at all time be in such state of mind in everyday life." (Suzuki Shosan)

"You seem to practice 'Empty Shell Zazen' and think that not thinking of anything is 'no-thought, no-mind'. You even start to feel good sitting vacantly. But if you do that kind of zazen you’ll lose your vigorous energy and become sick or go crazy. True 'no-thought, no-mind' zazen is just one thing - to have a dauntless mind." (Suzuki Shosan)

Week 2020-28

"Every now and then a man's mind is stretched by a new idea or sensation, and never shrinks back to its former dimensions." (Oliver W Holmes Sr., "The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table", 1858) 

"The more a man thinks the better adapted he becomes to thinking, and education is nothing if it is not the methodical creation of the habit of thinking. Precisely. Theoretically, education is a mental training aiming at greater intellectual elasticity, but the question is whether education does not often strain, instead of train, a mind." (Ernest Dimnet, "The Art of Thinking", 1928)

"Most mistakes in philosophy and logic occur because the human mind is apt to take the symbol for the reality." (Albert Einstein, "Cosmic Religion: With Other Opinions and Aphorisms" , 1931) 

"Peace of mind is that mental condition in which you have accepted the worst." (Lin Yutang, "The Importance of Living", 1937)

"The limits of thought are not so much set from outside, by the fullness or poverty of experiences that meet the mind, as from within, by the power of conception, the wealth of formulative notions with which the mind meets experiences." (Susanne Langer, "Philosophy in a New Key: A Study in the Symbolism of Reason, Rite, and Art", 1942) 

"Meditation is the direct means of eradicating the very cause of the majority of diseases, both mental and physical." (Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, "Meditation", 1962)

"The discipline of Zen consists in opening the mental eye in order to look into the very reason of existence." (D. T. Suzuki, "An Introduction to Zen Buddhism", 1964)

"The unknown, our own true nature, has the capacity to wake itself up when you start to fall in love with letting go of all the mental structures you hold onto. Contemplate this: there is no such thing as a true belief." (Steven Gray [Adyashanti], "Emptiness Dancing" , 2004)

"Integral wisdom involves a direct participation in every moment: the observer and the observed are dissolved in the light of pure awareness, and no mental concepts or attitudes are present to dim that light." (Lao Tzu) 

"The changes in our life must come from the impossibility to live otherwise than according to the demands of our conscience not from our mental resolution to try a new form of life." (Leo Tolstoy, [letter]) 

Week 2020-22

"It is not enough to contemplate ourselves objectively; we must also treat ourselves objectively." (Ernst, Baron von Feuchtersleben, "The Dietetics of the Soul; Or, True Mental Discipline", 1838) 

"The soul does not give itself up to despair until it has exhausted all illusions." (Victor Hugo, "Les Misérables", 1862)

"Diamonds are to be found only in the darkness of the earth, and truth in the darkness of the mind." (Victor Hugo, "Les Misérables, 1862)

"The thing that is important is the thing that is not seen." (Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, "The Little Prince", 1943)

"To become different from what we are, we must have some awareness of what we are." (Eric Hoffer, "The Passionate State of Mind, and Other Aphorisms", 1955)

"The untrapped mind is open enough to see many possibilities, humble enough to learn from anyone and anything, forbearing enough to forgive all, perceptive enough to see things as they really are, and reasonable enough to judge their true value." (Matsushita Konosuke, "Nurturing Dreams: My Path in Life", 1989) 

"Each day of human life contains joy and anger, pain and pleasure, darkness and light, growth and decay. Each moment is etched with nature's grand design - do not try to deny or oppose the cosmic order of things." (Morihei Ueshiba, "The Art of Peace", 1991)

"When you listen to a thought, you are aware not only of the thought but also of yourself as the witness of the thought. A new dimension of consciousness has come in." (Eckhart Tolle, "The Power of Now", 1997)

"The mind is something that happens within you. Thinking is something that happens within what you are. Thinking does not define what you are. Thinking doesn't define anything." (Adyashanti, "The Basic Teachings - Part 1: Principles of the Teaching", 2009)

"Perhaps the most important element of any spiritual teaching is what we bring to it, because this dictates what the teaching will reveal within ourselves." (Adyashanti, "Orientation to the Teaching", 2010) 

Week 2020-13

"The sublime must always be great; the beautiful can also be small. The sublime must be simple; the beautiful can be adorned or ornamented. A great height is just as sublime as a great depth, except that the latter is accompanied with the sensation of shuddering, the former with one of wonder. Hence the latter feeling can be the terrifying sublime, and the former the noble." (Immanuel Kant, "Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime", 1764)

"Those who are at war with others are not at peace with themselves." (William Hazlitt, "Criticisms on Art", 1844)
 
"Nature never appeals to intelligence until habit and instinct are useless. There is no intelligence where there is no need of change." (Herbert G Wells, "The Time Machine", 1895)

"Given a fair chance, human beings can govern themselves, and govern themselves better." (Aldous Huxley, "Brave New World Revisited", 1932)

"The ultimate metaphysical secret, if we dare state it so simply, is that there are no boundaries in the universe. Boundaries are illusions, products not of reality but of the way we map and edit reality. And while it is fine to map out the territory, it is fatal to confuse the two." (Ken Wilber, "No Boundary: Eastern and Western Approaches to Personal Growth", 1979)

"In everyday life, you will find that your boss, your lover, or your government often try to manipulate you. They propose to you a ‘game’ in the form of a choice in which one of the alternatives appears definitely preferable. Having chosen this alternative, you are faced with a new game, and very soon you find that your reasonable choices have brought you to something you never wanted: you are trapped. To avoid this, remember that acting a bit erratically may be the best strategy. What you lose by making some suboptimal choices, you make up for by keeping greater freedom." (David Ruelle, "Chance and Chaos", 1991)

"The presence of those seeking the truth is infinitely to be preferred to the presence of those who think they’ve found it. " (Terry Pratchett, "Monstrous Regiment", 2004)

"There are no maps to guide our most important searches; we must rely on hope, chance, intuition, and a willingness to be surprised." (Gordon Livingston, "Too Soon Old, Too Late Smart: Thirty True Things You Need to Know Now", 2009)

"Learn to limit yourself, to content yourself with some definite thing and some definite work; dare to be what you are, and learn to resign with a good grace all you are not, and to believe in your own individuality." (Henri-Frédéric Amiel)

"We are generally more effectually persuaded by reasons we have ourselves discovered than by those which have occurred to others."(Blaise Pascal)

Week 2020-12

"When men are pure, laws are useless; when men are corrupt, laws are broken." (Benjamin Disraeli, "Contarini Fleming", 1832)

"Every human perfection is linked to an error which it threatens to become." (Arthur Schopenhauer, "Parerga and Paralipomena", 1851)

"We are responsible to ourselves for our own existence; consequently we want to be the true helmsman of this existence and refuse to allow our existence to resemble a mindless act of chance." (Friedrich Nietzsche, "Untimely Meditations", 1873)

"[The] restoration of the past is one of the most astonishing adventures of the human mind." (Herbert G Wells, "The Grisly Folk", Storyteller Magazine, 1921)

"There is a special sadness in achievement, in the knowledge that a long-desired goal has been attained at last, and that life must now be shaped toward new ends." (Arthur C Clarke, "The City And The Stars", 1956)

"The more a man knows about himself in relation to every kind of experience, the greater his chance of suddenly, one fine morning, realizing who in fact he is [...]" (Aldous Huxley, "Island", 1962)

"All truly wise thoughts have been thought already thousands of times; but to make them truly ours, we must think them over again honestly, till they take root in our personal experience." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)

"Happiness depends more on the inward disposition of mind than on outward circumstances." (Benjamin Franklin)

"Many people dedicate their lives to actualizing a concept of what they should be like, rather than actualizing themselves. This difference between self-actualization and self-image actualization is very important. Most people live only for their image." (Bruce Lee)

"Wisdom is the only thing which can relieve us from the sway of the passions and the fear of danger, and which can teach us to bear the injuries of fortune itself with moderation, and which shows us all the ways which lead to tranquility and peace." (Cicero Marcus Tullius)

Week 2019-25

"To a mind that is still the whole universe surrenders." (Lao Tzu)

"Flow with whatever may happen and let your mind be free. Stay centered by accepting whatever you are doing. This is the ultimate." (Chuang-tzu)

"It is in virtue that happiness consists, for virtue is the state of mind which tends to make the whole of life harmonious." (Zeno)

"Mind alone is the seed of everything.” (Saraha)

"All phenomena are mind itself, because appearances are reflections." (Mahasiddha Birwapa)

"All outer and inner phenomena are designations of the mind. Except in the mind, they exist nowhere else." (Sambuti)

"The transmigration of life takes place in one’s mind. Let one therefore keep the mind pure, for what a man thinks, so he becomes." (Upanishads)

"We are shaped by our thoughts;
we become what we think." (Gautama Buddha, "Dhammapada")

"Absolute truth is not an object of the mind;
Mind is relative truth." (Shantideva)

"The universality of change, when completely understood, is the seeing into the heart of all things, and the mind that thus understands is the mind that truly seeks the way." (Nagarjuna)

Week 2019-22

"There is no arithmetician like him who hath learned to number his days, and to apply his heart unto wisdom." (George Swinnock, "The Epistle Dedicatory", 1868)

"The weakness of a soul is proportionate to the number of truths that must be kept from it." (Eric Hoffer, "The Passionate State of Mind", 1955)

"A man can only rise, conquer, and achieve by lifting up his thoughts. He can only remain weak, and abject, and miserable by refusing to lift up his thoughts." (James Allen, "As a Man Thinketh", 1903)

"The helps offered to improve the mind consist in certain ways of thinking which facilitate thinking." (Gottfried W Leibniz)

"Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in a while, or the light won't come in.” (Isaac Asimov)

"One must talk about everything according to its nature, how it comes to be and how it grows. Men have talked about the world without paying attention to the world of their own minds, as if they were asleep or absent-minded." (Heraclitus)

"If you want truly to understand something, try to change it." (Kurt Lewin)

"Those who can win a war well can rarely make a good peace and those who could make a good peace would never have won the war." (Sir Winston Churchill)

"This terror then and darkness of mind must be dispelled not by the rays of the sun and glittering shafts of light, but by the aspect and law of nature." (Lucretius)

"One must talk about everything according to its nature, how it comes to be and how it grows. Men have talked about the world without paying attention to the world of their own minds, as if they were asleep or absent-minded." (Heraclitus)

Week 2019-24

[#belief, #action]
“Every belief that you hold manifests itself in some manner by either causing you to take some form of action or by preventing you from taking action. If you don't believe something is possible, you won't even attempt it.” (Chris Prentiss, “Zen and the Art of Happiness”, 2006)

[#truth, #expectations]
"An ignorant man believes that the whole universe only exists for him: as if nothing else required any consideration. If, therefore, anything happens to him contrary to his expectation, he at once concludes that the whole universe is evil. If, however, he would take into consideration the whole universe, form an idea of it, and comprehend what a small portion he is of the Universe, he will find the truth." (Maimonides, "Guide for the Perplexed", cca. 1190)

[#limits, #creativity]
"I dislike frontiers, political or intellectual, and I find that ignoring them is an essential catalyst for creative thought. Ideas should flow without hindrance in their natural course." (Michael Atiyah)

[#models, #growth]
“Human nature is not a machine to be built after a model, and set to do exactly the work prescribed for it, but a tree, which requires to grow and develop itself on all sides, according to the tendency of the inward forces which make it a living thing.” (John Stuart Mill)

[#experience, #perception]
"We choose our joys and sorrows long before we experience them." (Kahlil Gibran)

[#growth, #life]
"It's the sides of the mountain which sustain life, not the top. Here's where things grow." (Robert Pirsig, "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance", 1974)

[#vision, #dreams]
"Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakens." (Carl Gustav Jung)

[#happiness, #self]
"The great majority of spiritual teachings are based on the idea of seeking happiness while standing in afixated self, whereas Zen states that happiness comes through dissolving and unfixating that self. In other words, by dissolving we mean that act oj true love which is the total giving of one's being to the so called other." (Joshu Sasaki Roshi)

[#knowledge, #self]
"Knowledge of the self is the mother of all knowledge. So it is incumbent on me to know my self, to know it completely, to know its minutiae, its characteristics, its subtleties, and its very atoms." (Khalil Gibran)

[#learning, #mastery]
"It is known that, when we learn or train in something, we pass through the stages of shu, ha, and ri. These stages are explained as follows. In shu, we repeat the forms and discipline ourselves so that our bodies absorb the forms that our forebears created. We remain faithful to these forms with no deviation. Next, in the stage of ha, once we have disciplined ourselves to acquire the forms and movements, we make innovations. In this process the forms may be broken and discarded. Finally, in ri, we completely depart from the forms, open the door to creative technique, and arrive in a place where we act in accordance with what our heart/mind desires, unhindered while not overstepping laws." (Endō Seishirō)

Week 2019-23

"All differences in this world are of degree, and not of kind, because oneness is the secret of everything." (Swami Vivekananda)

"What I have learned, above all, is to keep marching forward because the best news is that since chance does play a role, one important factor in success is under our control: the number of at bats, the number of chances taken, the number of opportunities seized." (Leonard Mlodinow, "The Drunkard's Walk", 2008)

“There is a life and there is a death, and there are beauty and melancholy between.” (Albert Camus)

"In other living creatures the ignorance of themselves is nature, but in men it is a vice." (Boethius)

“Nature is filled with tendencies and obstructions. Extremes beget limitations, even as a river by its own swiftness creates obstructions for itself.” (Robert G Ingersoll)

"No great thing comes without a curse" (Sophocles)

"All truth is a shadow except the last. But every truth is substance in its own place, though it be but shadow in another place. And the shadow is a true shadow, as the substance is a true substance." (Isaac Pennington)

"There is no arithmetician like him who hath learned to number his days, and to apply his heart unto wisdom." (George Swinnock, "The Epistle Dedicatory", 1868)

"The weakness of a soul is proportionate to the number of truths that must be kept from it." (Eric Hoffer, "The Passionate State of Mind", 1955)

"A man can only rise, conquer, and achieve by lifting up his thoughts. He can only remain weak, and abject, and miserable by refusing to lift up his thoughts." (James Allen, "As a Man Thinketh", 1903)

Week 2019-21

"The unknown, our own true nature, has the capacity to wake itself up when you start to fall in love with letting go of all the mental structures you hold onto. Contemplate this: there is no such thing as a true belief." (Adyashanti)

"Healing of the physical without the change in the mental and spiritual aspects brings little real help to the individual in the end. How true, because the mind and the body imprint and imitate each other. What we think, we become. What we become, we think. It's an insidious process that can predispose us to illness or it can lead us to health." (Edgar Cayce)

"The whole universe is composed of name and form. Whatever we see is either a compound of name and form, or simply name with form which is a mental image." (Swami Vivekananda)

"Imagination is the first step in creation whether in words or trifles. The mental pattern must always precede the material form." (William W Atkinson)

"Mental activity is like a deadly poisonous cobra. If we don't interfere with a cobra, how poisonous it may be, it simply goes its own away." (Ajahn Chah)

"To think that the world can ever change without changes in our mental models is folly." (Joseph Jaworski)

"Do not place hope in finding a secret technique. Polish the mind through ceaseless training; that is the key to effective techniques." (Kyuzo Mifune)

"Zen purposes to discipline the mind itself, to make it its own master, through an insight into its proper nature." (Daisetsu T Suzuki)

"The mind must always be in the state of 'flowing,' for when it stops anywhere that means the flow is interrupted and it is this interruption that is injurious to the well-being of the mind. In the case of the swordsman, it means death." (Takuan)

"A process cannot be understood by stopping it. Understanding must move with the flow of the process, must join it and flow with it." (Frank Herbert, "Dune", 1965)

Week 2018-21

[#thought, #belief]
"What we can or cannot do, what we consider possible or impossible, is rarely a function of our true capability. It is more likely a function of our beliefs about who we are." (Anthony Robbins, "Awaken the Giant Within")

[#identity, #quest]
"Seek out that particular mental attribute which makes you feel most deeply and vitally alive, along with which comes the inner voice which says, 'This is the real me,' and when you have found that attitude, follow it." (William James, "The Principles of Psychology")

[#limits, #imagination]
"To realize one's limitations marks the awakening of intellectual integrity, without which imagination, integrity and assiduity are barren." (Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin)

[#thought, #happiness]
"All that we are is made up of our thoughts; it is founded on our thoughts, it is made up of our thoughts. If a man speak or act with a pure thought, happiness will follow him, like a shadow that never leaves him." (Dhammapada)

[#human nature, #extremes]
"People want to hear about the extremes of human nature. They want things that are larger than their own lives, and more romantic, and not necessarily of their own experiences." (Richard Thompson)

[#truth, #meaning]
"Truth is something which can't be told in a few words. Those who simplify the universe only reduce the expansion of its meaning." (Anais Nin)

[#quest, #introspection]
“The nature of creation is that you have to go inside and dig out. The very nature of creation is not a performing glory on the outside, it’s a painful, difficult search within.” (Louise Nevelson)

[#emotions, #problem_solving]
"Emotions are far harder things to understand than algebra and geometry, yet we spend hours in elucidating mathematics and expect such a problem as that of human relationships to solve itself." (Frances G Wickes)

[#life, #perseverance]
"Life is not easy for any of us, but what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted in something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained." (Marie Curie)

[#time, #potential]
"The past, like the future, is indefinite and exists only as a spectrum of possibilities." (Stephen Hawking)

Week 2018-07

[#timing, #understanding]
"The developed structures at each point in the game are the past, and the possibilities existing in that situation are the future. Together they constitute the present. Properly understanding the past and future in this sense is the essence of good timing." (W. Cobb)

[#religion, #life]
"Every major question in history is a religious question. It has more effect in molding life than nationalism or a common language." (Hilaire Belloc)

[#opportunity, #action]
"The frog lives by the side of the fragrant lotus, but it is the bee who gets the honey." (Ramana Maharshi)

[#education]
"What a child doesn't receive he can seldom later give." (Phyllis D James)

[#sorrow, #joy]
"Find expression for a sorrow, and it will become dear to you. Find expression for a joy, and you will intensify its ecstasy." (Oscar Wilde)

[#hope, #wisdom]
"When hope is born, it is necessary to unite courage with wisdom. Only then is it possible to avoid violence." (Óscar Arias Sánchez)

[#reason, #control]
"Man is a rational animal who always loses his temper when called upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason." (George O Welles)

[#change, #habit]
"Nature never appeals to intelligence until habit and instinct are useless. There is no intelligence where there is no need of change." (Herbert G Wells)

[#truth, #experiment]
"Heresies are experiments in man's unsatisfied search for truth." (Herbert G Wells)

[#learning, #change]
"In times of change, the learner will inherit the earth while the learned are beautifully equipped for a world that no longer exists." (Eric Hoffer)

Week 2018-08: Aphorisms on Learning

"One of the things that limits our learning is our belief that we already know something." (L David Marquet, "Turn the Ship Around!", 2013)

“More important than learning how to recall things is finding ways to forget things that are cluttering the mind. “ (Eric Butterworth)

“We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake, not by mechanical aids, but by an infinite expectation of the dawn.” (Henry D Thoreau)

“No one has completed his education who has not learned to live with an insoluble problem.” (Edmund J Kiefer)

“A man eminent in learning has not even a little virtue if he fears to practice it. What precious things can be shown to a blind man when he holds a lamp in his hand?” (Hitopadesa)

“Learning dissipates many doubts, and causes things otherwise invisible to be seen, and is the eye of everyone who is not absolutely blind.” (Hitopadesa)

“He who has more learning than goodness is like a tree with many branches and few roots, which the first wind throws down; whilst he whose works are greater than his knowledge is like a tree with many roots and fewer branches, which all the winds of heaven cannot uproot.” (Talmud)

“We will discover the nature of our particular genius when we stop trying to conform to our own or to other people's models, learn to be ourselves, and allow our natural channel to open.” (Shakti Gawain)

“Learn to depend upon yourself by doing things in accordance with your own way of thinking.” (Grenville Kleiser)

“The trouble about man is twofold. He cannot learn truths which are too complicated; he forgets truths which are too simple.” (Dame Rebecca West)

“To learn new habits is everything, for it is to reach the substance of life. Life is but a tissue of habits.” (Henri Frederic)

"To learn in order to know is scandalous curiosity." (Bernard of Clairvaux, "Sermones in Cantica")

Week 2017-47

"A faith that cannot survive collision with the truth is not worth many regrets." (Arthur C. Clarke)

"Truth is not to be found outside. No teacher, no scripture can give it to you. It is inside you and if you wish to attain it, seek your own company. Be with yourself." (Osho)

"People tend to assume everyone else should think the same way they do, and this contributes to much human misery." (Keith Cowan)

"The one real object of education is to leave a man in the condition of continually asking questions." (Bishop Mandell Creighton)

"A wise man takes a step at a time; he establishes one foot before he takes up the other: an old place should not be forsaken recklessly." (Sanskrit saying)

“No man learns to know his inmost nature by introspection, for he rates himself sometimes too low, and often too high, by his own measurement. Man knows himself only by comparing himself with other men; it is life that touches his genuine worth.” (Goethe)

“Flow with whatever is happening and let your mind be free. Stay centered by accepting whatever you are doing. This is the ultimate.” (Chuang-Tzu)

“In order to improve the mind, we ought less to learn, than to contemplate.” (Rene Descartes)

“He is happiest, be he king or peasant, who finds peace in his home.” (Goethe)

“We all learn by experience, and your lesson this time is that you should never lose sight of the alternative.” (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, “The Return of Sherlock Holmes”, 1905)

Week 2017-46

[#happiness, #love]
"Happiness is like a kiss. You must share it to enjoy it." (Bernard Meltzer)

[#illusion, #solitude]
"Man has the illusion that he talks with the entire world from his computer. He is actually alone." (Octavian Paler)

[#happiness, #attachment]
"If your happiness depends on what somebody else does, I guess  you do have a problem."    (Richard Bach)

[#action, #growth]
"If you wish to move mountains tomorrow, you must start by lifting stones today." (African saying)

[#knowledge, #action]
"Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better." (Maya Angelou)

[#mastery, #growth]
"Unless you try to do something beyond what you have already mastered, you will never grow.” (Ronald E. Osborn)

[#love, #completeness]
"We love in others what we lack ourselves, and would be everything but what we are.” (Richard Henry Stoddard)

[#happiness, #timing]
"Plenty of people miss their share of happiness, not because they never found it, but because they didn’t stop to enjoy it.” (William Feather)

[#perception, #learning]
"Some people never learn the art of compromise. Everything is either black or white. They do not recognize, or will not concede, that the equally important color gray is a mixture of black and white.” (Waite Phillips)

[#hardship, #learning]
"Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass – it’s about learning to dance in the rain.” (Anon)

Week 2017-45

"In the end, we will conserve only what we love, we will love only what we understand, we will understand only what we are taught." (Baba Dioum)

"Humanity seeks self-sufficiency, while nature demands relationship. Humanity wants to be invulnerable, but nature reminds it that it is bonded to all other things." (Jeremy Rifkin)

"The whole secret of the study of nature lies in learning how to use one’s eyes." (George Sand)

"The wind blows over the lake and stirs the surface of the water. Thus, visible effects of the invisible are manifest." (I Ching)

"There is no end of craving. Hence contentment alone is the best way to happiness. Therefore be content." (Swami Sivananda)

"Happiness can exist only in acceptance." (George Orwell)

"People who pride themselves on their 'complexity' and deride others for being 'simplistic' should realize that the truth is often not very complicated. What gets complex is evading the truth." (Thomas Sowell)

"The soul that sees beauty may sometimes walk alone." (Goethe)

"If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you, and you'll never learn." (Ray Bradbury)

Week 2017-44

"The fact that logic cannot satisfy us awakens an almost insatiable hunger for the irrational." (A. N. Wilson)

"Education... has produced a vast population able to read but unable to distinguish what is worth reading." (G. M. Trevelyan)

"Some people study all their life, and at their death have learned everything but to think." (Demergu Dewar)

"A mind all logic is like a knife all blade. It makes the hand bleed that uses it." (Rabindranath Tagore)

"The great difficulty in education is to get experience out of ideas." (George Santayana)

"An educated mind is useless without a focused will, and dangerous without a loving heart." (Winfried Deijmann)

"A man should keep his little brain attic stocked with all the furniture that he is likely to use, and the rest he can put away in the lumber-room of his library, where he can get it if he wants it." (Arthur Conan Doyle)

"Between what is said and not meant, and what is meant and not said, most of love is lost." (Khalil Gibran)

"Confine yourself to observing and you always miss the point of your life. The object can be stated this way: Live the best life you can. Life is a game whose rules you learn if you leap into it and play it to the hilt. Otherwise, you are caught off balance, continually surprised by the shifting play. Non-players often whine and complain that luck always passes them by. They refuse to see that they can create some of their own luck." (Frank Herbert)

"One of the great dreams of man must be to find some place between the extremes of nature and civilization where it is possible to live without regret." (Barry Lopez)

Week 2017-43

"The essence of strategy is choosing what not to do." (Michael Porter)

"The greater is the circle of light, the greater is the boundary of the darkness by which it is confined." (Joseph Priestley)

"One of the elementary rules of nature is that, in the absence of a law prohibiting an event or phenomenon, it is bound to occur with some degree of probability. To put it simply and crudely: Anything that can happen does happen." (Kenneth W Ford)

"To choose a road, to stop habitually and ask whether you have not gone astray, that is the true method.” (Louis Pasteur)

"Responsibility is not doing as we are told, that's obedience. Responsibility is doing what is right.” (Simon Sinek)

"The adventurer is within us, and he contests for our favor with the social man we are obliged to be." (William Bolitho)

"We search for ways to see ourselves. The computer is a new mirror, the first psychological machine. Beyond its nature as an analytical engine lies its second nature as an evocative object." (Sherry Turkle)

"Iron rusts from disuse; stagnant water loses its purity and in cold weather becomes frozen; even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"Begin challenging your own assumptions. Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in awhile, or the light won’t come in." (Alan Alda)

“He who every morning plans the transaction of the day and follows out that plan, carries a thread that will guide him through the maze of the most busy life. But where no plan is laid, where the disposal of time is surrendered merely to the chance of incidence, chaos will soon reign." (Victor Hugo)

"Nothing is more powerful for your future than being a gatherer of good ideas and information. That’s called doing your homework." (Jim Rohn)

Week 2017-42

"It is not enough to be busy. So are the ants. The question is: what are we busy about?" (Henry David Thoreau)

"I’ve learned through a series of trials and errors that the median space is actually what's missing in our daily walk." (Carlos Wallace)

"There is no such thing as a miracle which violates natural law. There are only occurrences which violate our limited knowledge of natural law." (Saint Augustine)

"The world is a projection of your mind. Good mind, good world. Bad mind, bad world. No mind, no world." (Swami Parthasarathy)

"There is always a well-known solution to every human problem - neat, plausible, and wrong." (H. L. Mencken)

"There is no abstract art. You must always start with something. Afterward you can remove all traces of reality." (Pablo Picasso)

"The future is nothing but a present to organize. You do not have to forecast it, but to allow it." ( Antoine de Saint-Exupéry)

"Keep some room in your heart for the unimaginable." (Mary Oliver)

"Man masters nature not by force but by understanding. This is why science has succeeded where magic failed: because it has looked for no spell to cast on nature." (Jacob Bronowski, Universities Quarterly, 1956)

"The hours when we are absorbed by beauty are the only hours when we really live [...] .These are the only hours that absorb the soul and fill it with beauty. This is real life, and all else is illusion, or mere endurance." ( Richard Jefferies )

Week 2017-41

"Don't limit a child to your own learning, for he was born in another time." (Rabindranath Tagore)

"The knowledge which lies behind is our natural help to that which lies before." (Peter M Latham)

"Seeing, contrary to popular wisdom, isn’t believing. It’s where belief stops, because it isn’t needed any more." (Terry Pratchett)

"Knowing what you know, be serene also, like a mountain; and do not be distressed by misfortune. Knowledge without serenity is an unlit candle; together they are honey-comb; honey without wax is a noble thing; wax without honey is only fit for burning." (Hakim Sanai)

"The basic tool for the manipulation of reality is the manipulation of words. If you can control the meaning of words, you can control the people who must use the words." (Philip K. Dick)

"The true measure of a man is not his intelligence or how high he rises in this freak establishment. No, the true measure of a man is this: how quickly can he respond to the needs of others and how much of himself he can give." (Philip K. Dick)

"Search a beautiful heart, not a beautiful face. Beautiful things are not always good, but good things are always beautiful." (Sufi saying)

"Sometimes surrender means giving up trying to understand and being comfortable with not knowing." (Eckhart Tolle)

"A vocabulary of truth and simplicity will be of service throughout your life." (Winston Churchill)

"He who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are closed." (Albert Einstein)

Week 2017-40

"It’s good to have an end in mind but in the end what counts is how you travel." (Orna Ross)

"What is laid down, ordered, factual, is never enough to embrace the whole truth: life always spills over the rim of every cup." (Boris Pasternak)

"The finest thing in the world is knowing how to belong to oneself." (Michel de Montaigne)

"Technical knowledge is not enough. One must transcend techniques so that the art becomes an artless art, growing out of the unconscious." (D. T. Suzuki)

"Happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance and order and rhythm and harmony." (Thomas Merton)

"Human beings do metamorphose. They change their identity constantly. However, each new identity thrives on the delusion that it was always in possession of the body it has just conquered." (Orson Scott Card, "Xenocide", 1991)

"Reality is negotiable. Outside of science and law, all rules can be bent or broken, and it doesn’t require being unethical." (Tim Ferriss)

"There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered." (Nelson Mandela)

"The ability to observe without evaluating is the highest form of intelligence." (Jiddu Krishnamurti)

"Once you realize that the road is the goal, and that you are always on the road, not to reach a goal but to enjoy its beauty and its wisdom, life ceases to be a task and becomes natural and simple. In itself an ecstasy." (Nisargadatta Maharaj

Week 2017-39

"[...] the truth is strength that lies in the interior of the warrior: in his heart, his mind and his spirit [.] The heart is essential in helping the intellect to understand the spirit." (Miyamoto Musashi, “Book of Five Rings”)

"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." ( Shams Tabrizi )

"It's the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting." (Paulo Coelho, “The Alchemist”)

"One is never so strong as when one is broken." (Hazrat Inayat Khan, “Thinking Like The Universe: The Sufi Path Of Awakening”)

"There is no greater power than the one others do not believe you possess." (Luis Marques, “Book of Orion”)

"I think knowing what you cannot do is more important than knowing what you can." ( Lucille Ball )

"If you go to thinking, take your heart with you. If you go to love, take your head with you. Love is empty without thinking, thinking hollow without love. (Carl Jung)

"Only love expands intelligence. To live in love is to accept the other and the conditions of his existence as a source of richness, not as opposition, restriction or limitation." (Humberto Maturana)

"Men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in their readiness to doubt." (H. L. Mencken)

"There are no shortcuts to any place worth going."  (Helen Keller)

Week 2017-38

"The universe is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper." (Eden Phillpotts, “A Shadow Passes”, 1918)

"Everyone takes the limits of his own vision for the limits of the world." (Schopenhauer)

"Fate loves to invent patterns and designs. Its difficulty lies in complexity. But life itself is difficult because of its simplicity. It has only a few things of a grandeur not fit for us." (Rainer Maria Rilke)

"The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart (Helen Keller )

"[Nansen:] The Way is not a matter of knowing or not knowing. Knowing is delusion; not knowing is confusion. When you have really reached the true Way beyond doubt, you will find it as vast and boundless as space. How can it be talked about on the level of right and wrong?" (Mumon Ekai, Mumonkan)

"The most inspiring leaders are not those who do their job, but those who pursue a calling." (Chris Gardner)

"If one advances confidently in the direction of their dreams and endeavors to live the life they have imagined, they will meet with a success ‘unexpected in common hours’." (Henry David Thoreau)

"The miracle is that the universe created a part of itself to study the rest of it, and that this part in studying itself finds the rest of the universe in its own natural inner realities." (John C. Lilly)

Week 2017-37

[#imagination, #human nature]
"Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not; a sense of humor to console him for what he is." (Francis Bacon)

[#life, #duality]
"There is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast. Nothing exists in itself." (Herman Melville)

[#beliefs, #confidence]
"Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained." (Marie Curie)

[#values, #strength]
"The promises of this world are, for the most part, vain phantoms; and to confide in one's self, and become something of worth and value is the best and safest course." (Michelangelo)

[#spirituality, #simplicity]
"To realise the constancy and steadiness in your life is to realise the deep nature of the universe. This realisation is not dependent on any transitory internal or external condition, rather it is an expression of one’s own immutable spiritual nature. The only way to attain the Universal Way is to maintain the integral virtues of the constancy, steadiness and simplicity in one’s daily life." (Lao Tzu)

[#knowledge, #values]
"Knowledge is the highest good, truth the supreme value, all the rest is secondary and subordinate." (Aldous Huxley)

[#truth, #goals]
"Approximate truth is the only truth attainable, but at least one must strive for that, and not wade off into arbitrary falsehood." (George Eliot)

[#simplicity, #values]
"The aspects of things that are most important for us are hidden because of their simplicity and familiarity." (Ludwig Wittgenstein

[#facts, #wisdom]
"Facts are ventriloquists' dummies. Sitting on a wise man's knee they may be made to utter words of wisdom; elsewhere they say nothing or talk nonsense..." (Aldous Huxley)

[#journeys, #spirituality]
"If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things." (René Descartes)

[#journeys, #truth]
"Keep the company of those who seek the truth - run from those who have found it." (VÁCLAV HAVEL)

Week 2017-36

[#love, #life]
"If our heart were large enough to love life in all its detail, we would see that every instant is at once a giver and a plunderer.” (Gaston Bachelard)

[#success, #purpose]
"Two things are necessary for success in life; one is a sense of purpose and the other, a touch of madness." (John Harricharan)

[#life, #geometry]
"Mankind is not a circle with a single center but an ellipse with two focal points of which facts are one and ideas the other." (Victor Hugo, Les Misrables, 1862)

[#thought, #human nature]
"A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices." (William James)

[#journeys, #knowledge]
"A traveler without knowledge is like a bird without wings." (Musharif-Ud-Din)

[#happiness, #attitude]
"The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions, and not on our circumstances." (Martha Washington)

[#reason, #passion]
"Reason, ruling alone, is a force confining;
And passion, unattended, is a flame that burns its own destruction." ( Khalil Gibran )

[#errors, #self control]
"When you are offended at any man's fault, turn to yourself and study your own failings. Then you will forget your anger." (Epictetus)

[#theory, #practice]
"He who loves practice without theory is like the sailor who boards ship without a rudder and compass and never knows where he may cast." (Leonardo da Vinci)

[#oder, #theory]
“All order, I've come to understand, is theoretical, unreal - a harmless, sensible, smiling mask men slide between the two great, dark realities, the self and the world - two snake pits." (John Gardner, “Grendel”)

Week 2017-35

"Thus all our dignity lies in thought. By thought we must raise ourselves, not by space and time, which we cannot fill." (Blaise Pascal)

"When the mind loses its feeling for elegance, it grows corrupt and grovelling, and seeks in the crowd what ought to be found at home." (Walter Savage Landor)

"Much knowledge of divine things is lost to us through want of faith." (Heraclitus)

"Education is the knowledge of how to use the whole of oneself. Many men use but one or two faculties out of the score with which they are endowed. A man is educated who knows how to make a tool of every faculty how to open it, how to keep it sharp, and how to apply it to all practical purposes." (Henry Ward Beecher)

"The fountain of content must spring up in the mind; and he who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own disposition, will waste his life in fruitless efforts, and multiply the griefs which he proposes to remove." (Samuel Johnson)

"Contemplation is to knowledge, what digestion is to food the way to get life out of it." (Tryon Edwards)

"A consciousness of inward knowledge gives confidence to the outward behavior, which, of all things, is the best to grace a man in his carriage." (Owen Feltham)

"If you look at the world through rose-coloured spectacles, you cannot tell which parts of it really are rosy and which parts just look rosy." (Oliver Penrose, “An Asymmetric World”)

Week 2017-34

[#understanding, #perception]
"When we want to understand something we cannot just stand outside and observe it. We have to enter deeply into it and be one with it in order to really understand." (Thich Nhat Hanh)

[#education, #growth]
"You have to start where people are, because their growth is going to be from there, not from some abstraction or where you are or someone else is." (Myles Horton)

[#flow, #choice]
"Stop choosing between chaos and order and live at the boundary between them where rest and action move together." (Rainer Maria Rilke)

[#understanding, #pain]
"[...] if we understood ourselves better, we would damage ourselves less." (James Baldwin)

[#detachment, #awareness]
"This is what Zen means by being detached - not being without emotion or feeling, but being one in whom feeling is not sticky or blocked, and through whom the experiences of the world pass like the reflections of birds flying over water." (Alan Watts)

[#mind, #meditation]
"The mind has power over the body and speech, and therefore any training of body and speech must begin with the mind." (Dalai Lama, “Stages Of Meditation”)

[#change, #patience]
"To master change, nothing is more important than to know the time; to know the time, nothing is more important than to understand inner design; to understand inner design, nothing is more important than open calm." (Li Daoqun, “The Book of Balance and Harmony”)

[#patience, #acceptance]
"Patience is the calm acceptance that things can happen in a different order than the one you have in mind." (David G. Allen)

[#action, #impossible]
"Only those who attempt the absurd will achieve the impossible." (M. C. Escher)

[#self, #love]
"There is in fact no self which needs to be negated. We merely manifest self in terms of our affection and love for people and our willingness to work. When we manifest this way, the self that needs to be negated is already negated." (Kyozan Joshu Sasaki)

[#truth, #human nature]
"If the individual, or heretic, gets hold of some essential truth, or sees some error in the system being practised, he commits so many marginal errors himself that he is worn out before he can establish his point." (Ezra Pound)

Week 2017-33

"The more a man can forget, the greater the number of metamorphoses which his life can undergo, the more he can remember the more divine his life becomes." (Soren Kierkegaard)

"Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic." (Frank Herbert)

"Peaceful is the one who's not concerned with having more or less." (Rumi)

"Balance is the all-important factor in a fighter’s attitude or stance. Without balance at all times, he can never be effective." (Bruce Lee, “Tao of Jeet Kune Do”)

"Never fear the shadows. They simply mean that there's a light somewhere nearby." (Ruth E Renkel)

"All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware." (Martin Buber)

"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." (Shams Tabrizi)

"Non-action is the real action. One hundred acts are not as good as one moment of silence. One hundred exercises are not as good as one moment of standing still." (Wang Xiang Zhai)

"A problem is a question you haven't yet answered to a level that has fulfilled you." (Tony Robbins)

"The most important function of education at any level is to develop the personality of the individual and the significance of his life to himself and to others. This is the basic architecture of a life; the rest is ornamentation and decoration of the structure." (Grayson L. Kirk)

Week 2017-32

"A man must have a certain amount of intelligent ignorance to get anywhere." (Charles F. Kettering)

"There is no happiness except in the realization that we have accomplished something." (Henry Ford)

"The universe is a fractal. Whatever energy signature we carry will be repeated infinitely, again and again...until we change that vibration." (Paige Bartholomew)

"Unanticipated side effects arise because we too often act as if cause and effect were always closely linked in time and space." (John Sterman)

"Side effects are not a feature of reality but a sign that our understanding of the system is narrow and flawed." (John Sterman)

"Know the rules well, so you can break them effectively." (Dalai Lama)

"Renunciation is not giving up the things of this world, but accepting that they go away." (Shunryu Suzuki-roshi)

"In the age of constant movement, nothing is so urgent as sitting still." (Pico Iyer)

"Words are not truth. Truth is like the moon, and words are like my finger. I can point to the moon with my finger, but my finger is not the moon." (Hui Neng)

"The way to love anything is to realize that it may be lost." (G. K. Chesterton)

Week 2017-31

"As soon as you concern yourself with the 'good' and 'bad' of your fellows, you create an opening in your heart for maliciousness to enter. Testing, competing with, and criticizing others weakens and defeats you." (Morihei Ueshiba, "The Art of Peace", 1991)

"The greatest meditation is a mind that lets go.
The greatest wisdom is seeing through appearances." (Atisha)

"The root of compassion is compassion for oneself." (Pema Chodron)

"Happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness." (Chuang Tzu)

"Maybe you are searching among the branches, for what only appears in the roots." (Rumi)

"With love you don’t bargain. There, the choice is not yours. Love is a mirror, it reflects only your essence, if you have the courage to look in its face." (Rumi)

"Your knowledge should improve your heart and purge your ego." (Imam Al-Ghazali)

"When the heart is at peace for and against are forgotten." (Chuang Tzu)

"Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It’s a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity." (Pema Chodron)

"[...] you cannot go on ‘explaining away’ forever: you will find that you have explained explanation itself away. You cannot go on ‘seeing through’ things forever. The whole point of seeing through something is to see something through it. It is good that the window should be transparent, because the street or garden beyond it is opaque. How if you saw through the garden too? It is no use trying to ‘see through’ first principles. If you see through everything then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To ‘see through’ all things is the same as not to see." (Clive S Lewis, "The Abolition of Man", 1943)

Week 2017-30

"Those who don't believe in magic will never find it." (Roald Dahl)

"There is nothing in this world which does not speak. Every thing and every being is continually calling out its nature, its character, its secret; the more the inner sense is open, the more capable it becomes of hearing the voice of all things." (Inayat Khan)

"Seek the wisdom that will untie your knot.
Seek the path that demands your whole being." (Rumi)

"When mind is still, then truth gets her chance to be heard in the purity of the silence." (Sri Aurobindo)

"Bringing joy to one heart with love is better than one thousand repetitive prayer recitings." (Sufi saying)

"In order to understand the world, one has to turn away from it on occasion." (Albert Camus)

"Let your mind wander in the pure and simple.
Be one with the infinite.
Let all things take their course." (Zhuangzi)

"Things are not difficult to make; what is difficult is putting ourselves in the state of mind to make them." (Constantin Brâncuși)

"To be trusted is a greater compliment than being loved." (George MacDonald)

"And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom." (Anaïs Nin)

Week 2017-29

"If you are looking for a friend who is faultless, you will be friendless." (Rumi)

"This is the first, wildest, and wisest thing I know, that the soul exists and that it is built entirely out of attentiveness." (Mary Oliver)

"A snowflake never falls in the wrong place." (Zen saying)

"It is useless to fight against people’s rigid ways, or to argue against their irrational concepts. You will only waste time and make yourself rigid in the process. The best strategy is to simply accept rigidity in others, outwardly displaying deference to their need for order. On your own, however, you must work to maintain your open spirit, letting go of bad habits and deliberately cultivating new ideas." (Robert Greene)

"In this world which is getting more and more closely interconnected, we have to learn to tolerate each other, we have to learn to put up with the fact that some people say things that we don’t like. We can only live together in that way — and if we are to live together and not die together, we must learn a kind of charity and a kind of tolerance, which is absolutely vital to the continuation of human life on this planet." (Bertrand Russell)

"Nothing we see or hear is perfect. But right there - in the imperfection is perfect reality." (Shunryū Suzuki)

"We rarely hear the inward music, but we're all dancing to it nevertheless." (Rumi)

"Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars." (Khalil Gibran)

"The practice of forgiveness is our most important contribution to the healing of the world." (Marianne Williamson)

"We must learn to live with contradictions, because they lead to deeper and more effective understanding." (Edward Teller)

Week 2017-28

"Realizing that our inability to control life is not the same as having no way to navigate it, leads to freedom and liberation. Just because I can't control the sea doesn't mean I can't learn how to swim in it." (Rami Shapiro)

"With life as short as a half-taken breath, don’t plant anything but love." (Rumi)

"What worries you, masters you." (John Locke)

"Happiness is a butterfly which, when pursued, is always just beyond your grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you." ( Nathaniel Hawthorne )

"A man who fears suffering is already suffering from what he fears." (Michel de Montaigne)

"We can be absolutely certain only about things we do not understand." (Eric Hoffer)
  
"Love and art do not embrace what is beautiful but what is made beautiful by this embrace." ( Karl Kraus)

"If you don't like something, change it.
If you can't change it, change the way you think about it." (Mary Engelbreit)

"Let go of certainty. The opposite isn’t uncertainty. It’s openness, curiosity and a willingness to embrace paradox, rather than choose up sides. The ultimate challenge is to accept ourselves exactly as we are, but never stop trying to learn and grow." (Tony Schwartz)

"To be truly happy and contented, you must let go of the idea of what it means to be truly happy or content." (Confucius)

Week 2017-27

"Treat every moment as your last. It is not preparation for something else." (Shunryū Suzuki)

"Think simple as my old master used to say - meaning reduce the whole of its parts into the simplest terms, getting back to first principles." (Frank L. Wright)

"Sometimes it's necessary to go a long distance out of the way in order to come back a short distance correctly." (Edward Albee)

"Fear is a distraction from ‘what is', from the present actual moment, preventing us from existing, from being what we are." (Vanda Scaravelli)

"Learning is the only thing the mind never exhausts, never fears, and never regrets." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"The power of imagination makes us infinite." (John Muir)

"Happy is he who gets to know the reasons for things." (Virgil)

"Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage." (Lao Tzu)

"The more risks you allow children to take, the better they learn to take care of themselves" (Roald Dahl)

"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." (Shams Tabrizi)

Week 2017-26

"People who inspire others are those who see invisible bridges at the end of dead-end streets" (Charles Swindoll)

"As long as you seek for something, you will get the shadow of reality and not reality itself." (Shunryu Suzuki-roshi)

"The limits of my language means the limits of my world." (Ludwig Wittgenstein)

"We can control our lives by controlling our perceptions." (Bruce H. Lipton)

"Wisdom tells me I am nothing. Love tells me I am everything. And between the two my life flows." (Nisargadatta Maharaj)

"Only great minds are capable of estimating the magnitude of little things." (Rayon)

"The wit we long for spoils the wit we have." (Jean-Baptiste-Louis Gresset)

"A miracle does not happen in contradiction to nature, but in contradiction to that which is known to us of nature." (St Augustine)

"To be empty means to be empty of ego, not in the sense that one functions as a vegetable or a wild animal, but in the sense that one ceases to gauge the events, the persons and the things of one's environment in terms of 'I' or 'me' or 'mine'". (Hsu Yun)

"We will discover the nature of our particular genius when we stop trying to conform to our own or to other people's models, learn to be ourselves, and allow our natural channel to open." (Shakti Gawain)

Week 2017-25

[#discovery, #models]
"We will discover the nature of our particular genius when we stop trying to conform to our own or to other people's models, learn to be ourselves, and allow our natural channel to open." (Shakti Gawain)

[#complexity, #simplicity]
"Reduce the complexity of life by eliminating the needless wants of life, and the labors of life reduce themselves." (Edwin Way Teale)

[#learning, #perfection]
"Perfecting oneself is as much unlearning as it is learning." (Edsger W. Dijkstra)

[#complexity, #simplicity]  
"Great truths are simple because they are of universal application. Truth itself is always simple. Complexity is due to man's ignorance." (Swami Vivekananda)

[#gaia]
"Constantly regard the universe as a single living being, having one substance and one soul; observe how all creation relates to the cosmic consciousness of this one living being. Observe too how everything moves with its impulse, working together to create all events, continuously spinning its delicate thread in the amazing complexity of its web." (Marcus Aurelius)

[#peacefulness, #change]
"Peace of mind comes from not wanting to change others, but by simply accepting them as they are. True acceptance is always without demands and expectations." (Dr. Gerald Jampolsky, "Love Is Letting Go of Fear", 1979)

[#illness, #human nature]
"Illnesses do not come upon us out of the blue. They are developed from small daily sins against Nature. When enough sins have accumulated, illnesses will suddenly appear." (Hippocrates)

[#self control, #strength]
"You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength." (Marcus Aurelius)

[#acceptance]
"When faced with any difficulty of life, resolve it by following these four steps: face it, accept it, deal with it and let it go." (Sheng Yen)

[#learning #acceptance]
"Reading doesn’t mean accepting everything you read, it means reasoning everything you read." (Amit Kalantri)

Week 2017-24

"Man has such a predilection for systems and abstract deductions that he is ready to distort the truth intentionally, he is ready to deny the evidence of his senses only to justify his logic." (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)

"Only in the eyes of love you can find infinity." (Sorin Cerin, “Wisdom Collection: The Book of Wisdom”)

"If there is anything more dangerous to the life of the mind than having no independent commitment to ideas, it is having an excess of commitment to some special and constricting idea." (Richard Hofstadter)

"The problem with introspection is that it has no end." (Philip K. Dick)

"Keep me away from the wisdom which does not cry, the philosophy which does not laugh and the greatness which does not bow before children" (Khalil Gibran)

"If you live the sacred and despise the ordinary, you are still bobbing in the ocean of delusion." (Lin-chi)

"You can only apprehend the Infinite by a faculty superior to reason, by entering into a state in which you are your finite self no longer." (Plotinus, "Enneads")

"The essence of all things is one and the same, perfectly calm and tranquil, and shows no sign of 'becoming'; ignorance, however, is in its blindness and delusion oblivious of Enlightenment, and, on that account, cannot recognize truthfully all those conditions, differences, and activities which characterize the phenomena of the Universe." (Ashvaghosha, "The Awakening of Faith", cca. 2nd century)

"All action results from thought, so it is thoughts that matter." (Sai Baba)

"Civilization begins with order, grows with liberty and dies with chaos." (Will Durant)

Week 2017-23

[#reality, #illusion]
"The unreal is more powerful than the real, because nothing is as perfect as you can imagine it." (Chuck Palahniuk)

[#meaning]
"Challenging the meaning of life is the truest expression of the state of being human." (Viktor E. Frankl)

[#wisdom, #doubt]
"The beginning of wisdom is found in doubting; by doubting we come to the question, and by seeking we may come upon the truth." (Pierre Abélard)

[#knowledge, #wisdom]
"Don't be conceited about your own knowledge. Take advice from the ignorant as well as the wise, since there is no single person who embodies perfection nor any craftsman who has reached the limits of excellence. The perfect word is as rare as an emerald, yet it may be found among the maidservants working at the millstone." (Ptah-hotep)

[#limits, #belief]
"When a man is denied the right to live the life he believes in, he has no choice but to become an outlaw." (Nelson Mandela)

[#knowledge, #mystery]
"Perplexity is the beginning of knowledge." (Kahlil Gibran)

[#love, #identity]
"The things that we love tell us what we are." (Thomas Aquinas)

[#quest, #learning]
"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)

[#beauty, #fragility]
"The best people possess a feeling for beauty, the courage to take risks, the discipline to tell the truth, the capacity for sacrifice. Ironically, their virtues make them vulnerable; they are often wounded, sometimes destroyed." (Ernest Hemingway)

[#patience, #trust]
"Patience does not mean to passively endure. It means to be farsighted enough to trust the end result of a process. It means to look at the thorn and see the rose, to look at the night and see the dawn." (Rumi)


[#understanding, #discrimination]
"Those who judge will never understand, and those who understand will never judge." (Wilson Kanadi)

Week 2017-22

"Cleansing the mind does not require water. Practicing generosity does not require wealth." (Sam van Schaik, “Tibetan Zen”)

"The only way to survive eternity is to be able to appreciate each moment." (Lauren Kate Fallen)

"When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy." (Rumi)

"The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience." (Eleanor Roosevelt)

"Do not confine your children to your own learning, for they were born in another time." (Hebrew proverb)

"Silence is not an absence of sound but rather a shifting of attention toward sounds that speak to the soul." (Thomas Moore)

"People generally see what they look for, and hear what they listen for." (Harper Lee, "To Kill a Mockingbird")

"A person who becomes fatigued when unhappy is useless. Meeting with people should be a matter of quickly grasping their temperament and reacting appropriately […] This is a function of both the heart and words." (Miyamoto Musashi & Yamamoto Tsunetomo, "The Samurai Series: The Book of Five Rings, Bushido & Hagakure")

"The book to read is not the one that thinks for you but the one which makes you think." (Harper Lee)

"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." (Shams Tabrizi)

Week 2017-21

"We can ignore reality, but we cannot ignore the consequences of ignoring reality." (Ayn Rand)

"You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view... Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it." (Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird)

"When you step beyond your own gate, you face a million enemies." (Gichin Funakoshi)

"When you resist the flow of life, what you are actually resisting is your own inner nature, for everything that happens to us is a reflection of who we are. This isn’t a mystical statement; it is part of the apparatus of perception. To perceive is to grasp the meaning of something." (Deepak Chopra)

"Do not follow the ideas of others, but learn to listen to the voice within yourself. Your body and mind will become clear and you will realize the unity of all things." (Dōgen)

"What we perceive and what we understand depends upon what we are." (Aldous Huxley)

"The only fence against the world is a thorough knowledge of it." (John Locke)

"In the life cycle of every conflict, there is a point when it’s large enough to be recognized, but small enough to be resolved." (Daniel Dana)

"Love is a natural kind of meditation. And meditation is a supernatural kind of love." (Osho)

"When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about." (Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore)

Week 2017-20

[#budo, #perception]
"The true value of Budo is to train the mind to see clearly and maintain spiritual strength." (Toshitsugu Takamatsu)

[#practice, #method]
"Be soft in your practice. Think of the method as a fine silvery stream, not a raging waterfall. Follow the stream in its course. It will go its own way, meandering here, trickling there. It will find the grooves, the cracks, the crevices. Just follow it. Never let it out of your sight. It will take you." (Master Sheng Yen)

[#happiness]
"Happiness is your nature. It is not wrong to desire it. What is wrong is seeking it outside when it is inside." (Ramana Maharshi)

[#force, #fight]
"Who overcomes by force, hath overcome but half his foe." (John Milton)

[#patience, #expectations]
"The two hardest tests on the spiritual road are the patience to wait for the right moment and the courage not to be disappointed with what we encounter." (Paulo Coelho)

[#illusion, #wisdom]
"Losing an illusion makes you wiser than finding a truth." (Ludwig Börne)

[#knowledge]
"All our knowledge is ourselves, to know." (Alexander Pope)

[#knowledge, #learning]
"Each excellent thing, once learned, serves for a measure of all other knowledge." (Philip Sidney)

[#certainty, #knowledge]
"Living is a form of not being sure, not knowing what next or how. The moment you know how, you begin to die a little." (Agnes de Mille)

[#mind, #attachment]
"What do you hang on the walls of your mind?" (Eve Arnold)

Week 2017-19

"Truth is not to be found outside. No teacher, no scripture can give it to you. It is inside you and if you wish to attain it, seek your own company. Be with yourself." (Osho)

"When the search for truth is confused with political advocacy, the pursuit of knowledge is reduced to the quest for power." (Alston Chase)

"It is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else's life with perfection." (Bhagavad Gita)

"Sadness gives depth. Happiness gives height. Sadness gives roots. Happiness gives branches. Happiness is like a tree going into the sky, and sadness is like the roots going down into the womb of the earth. Both are needed, and the higher a tree goes, the deeper it goes, simultaneously. The bigger the tree, the bigger will be its roots. In fact, it is always in proportion. That's its balance." (Osho)

"If you wish to be a warrior prepare to get broken, if you wish to be an explorer prepare to get lost, and if you wish to be a lover prepare to be both." (Anon)

"Wisdom is perishable. Unlike information or knowledge, it cannot be stored in a computer or recorded in a book. It expires with each passing generation." (Sid Taylor)

"Men are wise in proportion, not to their experience, but to their capacity for experience." (James Boswell)

"There are gaps between the fingers; there are gaps between the senses. In these gaps is the darkness which hides the connection between things." (Idris Parry)

"Of all the paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt." (John Muir)

"Seeking means to have a goal; but finding means to be free, to be receptive, to have no goal. You, O worthy one, are perhaps indeed a seeker, for in striving towards your goal, you do not see many things that are under your nose." (Hermann Hesse)

Week 2017-18

"To be satisfied with a little, is the greatest wisdom; and he that increaseth his riches, increaseth his cares; but a contented mind is a hidden treasure, and trouble findeth it not." (Akhenaton)

"The truth which makes men free is for the most part the truth which men prefer not to hear." (Herbert Agar)

"An act of imagination is an act of self-acceptance." (Richard Hugo, "Triggering Town")

"We are on a journey to keep an appointment with whatever we are." (Gene Roddenberry)

"Belief can convert the mundane into the miraculous." (Charles F Glassman)

"Every man is the sum total of his reactions to experience. As your experiences differ and multiply, you become a different man, and hence your perspective changes. This goes on and on. Every reaction is a learning process; every significant experience alters your perspective." ( Hunter S. Thompson )

"Staring at the light of another blinds the view of our own." (Charles F Glassman)

"Man is not what he thinks he is, he is what he hides." (André Malraux)

"I do not fix problems. I fix my thinking. Then problems fix themselves." (Louise L. Hay)

Week 2017-17

"Using someone else’s ruler to measure your self-worth will always leave you short." (Charles F Glassman)

"Flow with whatever is happening and let your mind be free.   
Stay centered by accepting whatever you are doing.  
This is the ultimate." (Chuang Tzu)

"When meditation is mastered,  
the mind is unwavering,  
like the flame of a lamp in a windless place." (Bhagavad Gita)

"What cannot be known is more revealing than what can." (John D. Barrow, "Impossibility", 1998)

"Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darkness of other people." (Carl Jung)

"All great things have their origin in that which is small." (Lao Tzu)

"I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by conscious endeavor. (Henry David Thoreau)

"Exploring your imagination is the first step to understanding your heart." (Anon)

"Every man is guilty of all the good he didn't do." (Voltaire)

"It seldom happens that a man changes his life through his habitual reasoning. No matter how fully he may sense the new plans and aims revealed to him by reason, he continues to plod along in old paths until his life becomes frustrating and unbearable—he finally makes the change only when his usual life can no longer be tolerated." (Leo Tolstoy)

Week 2017-16

"Love is not always fireworks and magic. Often we’ll experience it in the form of patience, acceptance, loyalty, and mutual respect." (Charles F Glassman)

"To make a great dream come true, the first requirement is a great capacity to dream; the second is persistence." (Cesar Chavez)

"Too many people are thinking of security instead of opportunity. They seem more afraid of life than death." (James F. Byrnes)

"The true measure of a man is not his intelligence or how high he rises in this freak establishment. No, the true measure of a man is this: how quickly can he respond to the needs of others and how much of himself he can give." (Philip K. Dick)

"Men are not moved by things, but the views they take of them." (Epitectus)

"To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly." (Henri Bergson)

"Keep constantly in mind in how many things you yourself have witnessed changes already. The universe is change, life is understanding." (Marcus Aurelius)

"Knowledge without action is insanity and action without knowledge is vanity." (Imam al-Ghazali)

"Thinking will not overcome fear but action will." (W. Clement Stone)

"Nothing hurts a good soul and a kind heart more than to live amongst people who cannot understand it." (Hazrat Ali ibn Abi Talib)

Week 2017-15

"If we do not believe within ourselves this deeply rooted feeling that there is something higher than ourselves, we shall never find the strength to evolve into something higher." (Rudolf Steiner)

"We come to love not by finding the perfect person but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly." (Sam Keen)
  
"A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within." (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

"In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don't." (Blaise Pascal)

"Student: Master tell me, is death the end or is it the beginning?
Master: Tell me, is the water in the river which flows, new or old?" (Zen story)

"True spirituality is to be aware that if we are interdependent with everything and everyone else, even the smallest, least significant thought, word and action has real consequences throughout the universe." (Sogyal Rinpoche)

"He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how." (Friedrich Nietzsche)

"Dare to reach out your hand into the darkness, to pull another hand into the light." (Norman B. Rice)

"Man is not the creature of circumstances. Circumstances are the creatures of men." (Benjamin Disraeli)

"I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth." (Umberto Eco)

Week 2017-14

[#duality, #light]
"There are two kinds of light - the glow that illumines, and the glare that obscures." (James Thurber)

[#wisdom, #thought]
"Thinking and doing, doing and thinking, these are the sum of all wisdom. Both must move ever onward in life, to and fro, like breathing in and breathing out. Whoever makes it a rule to test action by thought, thought by action, cannot falter, and if he does, will soon find his way back to the right road." (Goethe)

[#mastery, #strength]
"The only means of strengthening one's intellect is to make up one's mind about nothing - to let the mind be a thoroughfare for all thoughts." (John Keats)

[#character, #mastery]
"You cannot dream yourself into a character; you must hammer and forge yourself one." (Henry David Thoreau)

[#belief]
"An idealist believes the short run doesn't count. A cynic believes the long run doesn't matter. A realist believes that what is done or left undone in the short run determines the long run." (Sydney J. Harris)

[#feelings, #thought]
"Life is a tragedy for those who feel, and a comedy for those who think." (Jean de La Bruyère)

[#patience]
"To endure the unendurable is true endurance." (Japanese saying)

[#simplicity]
"If people never did silly things, nothing intelligent would ever get done." (Ludwig Wittgenstein)

[#action, #love]
"The grand essentials of life are something to do, something to love, something to hope for." (Thomas Chalmers)

[#knowledge]
"Nothing is enough for the man to whom enough is too little." (Epicurus)

Week 2017-13

[#success, #learning]
"The whole secret of life is to be interested in one thing profoundly and in a thousand things well." (Horace Walpole)

[#action, #chance]
"Don't wait for extraordinary opportunities. Seize common occasions and make them great." (Orison Swett Marden)

[#strength, #will]
"Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will." (Gandhi)

[#errors]
"Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one’s mistakes." (Oscar Wilde, "The Picture of Dorian Gray")

[#limits, #chance]
"It is by fighting the limitations, temptations, and failures of the world that we reach our highest possibilities." (Helen Keller)

[#truth, #quest]
"Don’t keep searching for truth. Just let go of your opinions." (Seng Ts'an)

[#acceptance]
"We often refuse to accept an idea merely because the tone of voice in which it has been expressed is unsympathetic to us." (Friedrich Nietzsche)

[#altruism, #meaning]
"Life has meaning only if one barters it day by day for something other than itself." (Antoine de Saint-Exupéry)

[#limits, #human nature]
"The greatest enemy of the individual is the individual himself." (Saul Alinsky)