Week 2023-15: Anthony Robbins - Collected Quotes

"How do I define a hero? A hero is a person who courageously contributes under even the most trying circumstances; a hero is an individual who acts unselfishly and who demands more from himself or herself than others would expect; a hero is a man or woman who defies adversity by doing what he or she believes is right in spite of fear." (Anthony Robbins, "Awaken the Giant Within", 1991)

"If you don’t set a baseline standard for what you’ll accept in your life, you’ll find it’s easy to slip into behaviors and attitudes or a quality of life that’s far below what you deserve. You need to set and live by these standards no matter what happens in your life." (Anthony Robbins, "Awaken the Giant Within", 1991)

"One of the most important decisions you can make to ensure your long-term happiness is to decide to use whatever life gives you in the moment." (Anthony Robbins, "Awaken the Giant Within", 1991)

"Strive for balance rather than perfection. Most people live in a black-and-white world where they think that they’re either a volunteer with no life of their own, or just a materialistic, achievement-oriented person who doesn’t care to make a difference. Don’t fall into this trap. Life is a balance between giving and receiving, between taking care of yourself and taking care of others." (Anthony Robbins, "Awaken the Giant Within", 1991)

"Each of us is endowed with innate resources that enable us to achieve all we’ve ever dreamed of—and more. The floodgates can be opened by one decision, bringing us joy or sorrow, prosperity or poverty, companionship or solitude, long life or early death. What decisions have you made or failed to make int he past that powerfully influence your life today?" (Anthony Robbins)

"In order to succeed at anything and not be stressed, you have to be able to take a whole variety of action items and group them smartly so that they help you accomplish a common outcome. If you take a project and try to do the whole thing at once, you'll be overwhelmed; if you break something into too many small steps, it'll be equally daunting and frustrating." (Anthony Robbins)

"It is in your moments of decision that your destiny is shaped. Choose well." (Anthony Robbins)

"It's not what we do once in a while that counts, but our consistent actions. And what is the father of all action? What ultimately determines who we become and where we go in life? The answer is our decisions. It's in these moments that our destiny is shaped. More than anything else, I believe our decisions - not the conditions of our lives - determine our destiny." (Anthony Robbins)

"Make a decision today that can immediately change or improve the quality of your life. Do something you’ve been putting off, master a new set of skills, treat people with newfound respect and compassion, call someone you haven’t spoken to in years. Just know that all decisions have consequences. Even making no decision at all is a decision in its own way." (Anthony Robbins)

"Most people fail in life because they major in minor things." (Anthony Robbins)

"Most people overestimate what they can accomplish in a year - and underestimate what they can achieve in a decade!" (Anthony Robbins)

"Rewards are disproportionate when you reach an outstanding level of achievement - and outstanding is just one small notch above excellent." (Anthony Robbins)

"Small visions have no power to move us. For most people, their challenge is not that they are not motivated or that they don’t have the intelligence to figure out how to get what they want. Most people simply don’t have a large and compelling enough vision." (Anthony Robbins)

"The only impossible journey is the one you never begin." (Anthony Robbins)

"The quality of your growth is a direct reflection of how much discomfort you can comfortably live with" (Anthony Robbins)

"The way to get good at making decisions is to make more of them. Then if you make the wrong ones, you'll learn more quickly and you can use what you've learned to make better decisions in the future." (Anthony Robbins)

"There are no failures in life, only results." (Anthony Robbins)

"There is always room in your life for thinking bigger, pushing limits, imagining the unimaginable." (Anthony Robbins)

"We are not creatures of circumstance; we are creators of circumstance." (Anthony Robbins)

"What we can or cannot do, what we consider possible or impossible, is rarely a function of our true capability." (Anthony Robbins)

Week 2023-14: Bhagavad Gita - Collected Quotes

"A gift is pure when it is given from the heart to the right person at the right time and at the right place, and when we expect nothing in return." (Bhagavad Gita)

"All this visible universe comes from my invisible being. All beings have their rest in me, but I have not my rest in them." (Bhagavad Gita)

"Anyone who is steady in his determination for the advanced stage of spiritual realization and can equally tolerate the onslaughts of distress and happiness is certainly a person eligible for liberation." (Bhagavad Gita)

"As a strong wind sweeps away a boat on the water, so the mind dwelling on even one of the senses carries away the intelligence." (Bhagavad Gita)

"But they that spread a feast all for themselves eat sin and drink of sin." (Bhagavad Gita)

"Curving back within myself I create again and again." (Bhagavad Gita)

"For him who has no concentration, there is no tranquility." (Bhagavad Gita)

"For the uncontrolled there is no wisdom, nor for the uncontrolled is there the power of concentration; and for him without concentration there is no peace. And for the unpeaceful, how can there be happiness?" (Bhagavad Gita)

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

"Looking to thine own duty thou shouldst not tremble; for there is nothing more welcome to a Kshattriya (Warrior) than righteous war offered unsought as an open door to heaven." (Bhagavad Gita)

"The happiness which comes from long practice, which leads to the end of suffering, which at first is like poison, but at last like nectar - this kind of happiness arises from the serenity of one's own mind." (Bhagavad Gita)

"The peace of God is with them whose mind and soul are in harmony, who are free from desire and wrath, who know their own soul." (Bhagavad Gita)

"The self is the friend of a man who masters himself through the self, but for a man without self-mastery, the self is like an enemy at war." (Bhagavad Gita)

"The soul that moves in the world of senses and yet keeps the senses in harmony ... finds rest in quietness." (Bhagavad Gita)

"There's no wisdom from a man without harmony, and without harmony there is no contemplation. Without contemplation there cannot be peace, and without peace there can be no joy..." (Bhagavad Gita)

"Without self-mastery he has no understanding of inner power; without inner power, he has no peace; and without peace, where is joy?" (Bhagavad Gita)

Week 2023-13: Pema Chödrön - Collected Quotes

"By not knowing, not hoping to know, and not acting like we know what’s happening, we begin to access our inner strength." (Pema Chödrön)

"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 Chödrön)

"If it weren’t for my mind, my meditation would be excellent." (Pema Chödrön)

"In Buddhism, we call the notion of a fixed identity 'ego clinging'. It's how we try to put solid ground under our feet in an ever shifting world. Meditation practice starts to erode that fixed identity." Pema Chödrön

"It's helpful to remind yourself that meditation is about opening and relaxing with whatever arises, without picking and choosing." (Pema Chödrön)

"Life is glorious, but life is also wretched. Knowing pain is a very important ingredient of being there for another person. Gloriousness and wretchedness need each other. One inspires us, the other softens us. They go together." (Pema Chödrön)

"Meditation is not a matter of trying to achieve ecstasy, spiritual bliss, or tranquillity, nor is it attempting to become a better person. It is simply the creation of a space in which we are able to expose and undo our neurotic games, our self-deceptions, our hidden fears and hopes." (Pema Chödrön & Chogyam Trungpa)

"Meditation takes us just as we are, with our confusion and our sanity. This complete acceptance of ourselves as we are is a simple, direct relationship with our being. We call this maitri, loving-kindness toward ourselves and others." (Pema Chödrön)

"Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know." (Pema Chödrön)

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

"The teacher serves as a mirror but also encourages your ability to trust in yourself. You begin to trust in your basic goodness instead of identifying with your neurosis. There’s a shift of allegiance. Then the obstacles begin to seem temporary, and what’s permanent is the wisdom. To the degree that you become intimate with your neurosis - not acting-out and not repressing - to that degree you discover your wisdom." (Pema Chödron)

"There is nobody on the planet, neither those whom we see as the oppressed nor those whom we see as the oppressor, who doesn’t have what it takes to wake up. We all need support and encouragement to be aware of what we think, what we say, and what we do. Notice your opinions. If you find yourself becoming aggressive about your opinions, notice that. If you find yourself being nonaggressive, notice that. Cultivating a mind that does not grasp at right and wrong, you will find a fresh state of being. The ultimate cessation of suffering comes from that. Finally, never give up on yourself. Then you will never give up on others. Wholeheartedly do what it takes to awaken your clear-seeing intelligence, but one day at a time, one moment at a time. If we live that way, we will benefit this earth." (Pema Chödrön)

"When you open yourself to the continually changing, impermanent, dynamic nature of your own being. [...] You’re able to keep your eyes open, your heart open, and your mind open. [...] you begin to think of your life as offering endless opportunities to start to do things differently." (Pema Chödrön)

"While we are sitting in meditation, we are simply exploring humanity and all of creation in the form of ourselves. We can become the world’s greatest experts on anger, jealousy, and self-deprecation, as well as on joyfulness, clarity, and insight. Everything that human beings feel, we feel. We can become extremely wise and sensitive to all of humanity and the whole universe simply by knowing ourselves, just as we are." (Pema Chödrön)

"Without anger there is no enemy… When hatred consumes us we perceive enemies everywhere." (Pema Chödrön)

Week 2023-12: Baltasar Gracian - Collected Quotes

 "A prudent man will think more important what fate has conceded to him, than what it has denied." (Baltasar Gracian)

"Advice is sometimes transmitted more successfully through a joke than grave teaching." (Baltasar Gracian)

"Attempt easy tasks as if they were difficult, and difficult as if they were easy; in the one case that confidence may not fall asleep, in the other that it may not be dismayed." (Baltasar Gracian)

"Do not be held a cheat, even though it is impossible to live today without being one. Let your greatest cunning lie in covering up what looks like cunning." (Baltasar Gracian)

"Friends are a second existence." (Baltasar Gracian)

"Friendship multiplies the good of life and divides the evil. 'Tis the sole remedy against misfortune, the very ventilation of the soul." (Baltasar Gracian)

"He who finds Fortune on his side should go briskly ahead, for she is wont to favor the bold." (Baltasar Gracian)

"If you are wise, live as you can; if you cannot, live as you would." (Baltasar Gracian)

"It is a great piece of skill to know how to guide your luck, even while waiting for it." (Baltasar Gracian)

"Knowledge without courage is sterile." (Baltasar Gracian)

"Nothing arouses ambition so much as the trumpet clang of another's fame." (Baltasar Gracian)

"One must pass through the circumference of time before arriving at the center of opportunity."(Baltasar Gracian)

"One who was adored by all in prosperity is abhorred by all in adversity." (Baltasar Gracian)

"Some are satisfied to stand politely before the portals of Fortune and to await her bidding; better those who push forward, who employ their enterprise, who on the wings of their worth and valor seek to embrace luck, and to effectively gain her favor." (Baltasar Gracian)

"Sometimes it proves the highest understanding not to understand." (Baltasar Gracian)

"Surfeits of happiness are fatal." (Baltasar Gracian)

"The greatest wisdom often consists in ignorance." (Baltasar Gracian)

"The heaven of the envied is hell for the envious." (Baltasar Gracian)

"The wise man does at once what the fool does finally." (Baltasar Gracian)

"There is no wilderness like a life without friends; friendship multiplies blessings and minimizes misfortunes; it is a unique remedy against adversity, and it soothes the soul." (Baltasar Gracian)

Week 2023-11: Francóis de La Róchefoucald - Collected Quotes

"A man who finds no satisfaction in himself, seeks for it in vain elsewhere." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"A man's happiness or unhappiness depends as much on his temperament as on his destiny." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"A true friend is the greatest of all blessings, and that which we take the least care of all to acquire." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Before we set our hearts too much upon anything, let us examine how happy they are who already possess it." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Boredom ... causes us to neglect more duties than does interest." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Friendship is only a reciprocal conciliation of interests." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Great men’s success should always be measured against the means they used to reach it." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Happiness is in the taste, and not in the things themselves; we are happy from possessing what we like, not from possessing what others like." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Hope is the last thing that dies in man." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"I always say to myself, what is the most important thing we can think about at this extraordinary moment." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"If we have not peace within ourselves, it is in vain to seek it from outward sources." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"If we resist our passions, it is more from their weakness than from our strength." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"In great affairs we ought to apply ourselves less to creating chances than to profiting from those that are offered." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"In jealousy there is more of self-love than love." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Interest speaks all sorts of tongues, and plays all sorts of parts, even that of disinterestedness." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"It is as proper to have pride in oneself as it is ridiculous to show it to others." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"It is more shameful to distrust our friends than to be deceived by them." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Love’s greatest miracle is the curing of coquetry." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Nothing is so infectious as example." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"One forgives to the degree that one loves." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"One is never fortunate or as unfortunate as one imagines." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Perfect courage means doing unwitnessed what we would be capable of with the world looking on." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"The confidence which we have in ourselves gives birth to much of that which we have in others." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"The intellect is always fooled by the heart." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"The passions are the only orators which always persuade." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"The prospect of being pleased tomorrow will never console me for the boredom of today." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"The virtues and the vices are all put in motion by interest."  (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"There are more defects in temperament than in the mind." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"There are no accidents so unlucky from which clever people are not able to reap some advantage, and none so lucky that the foolish are not able to turn them to their own disadvantage." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Though men pride themselves on their great actions, often they are not the result of any great design, but of chance." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"To establish oneself in the world, one has to do all one can to appear established." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"True eloquence consists of saying all that should be said, and that only." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"We are never so happy or so unhappy as we think." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"We do not wish ardently for what we desire only through reason." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"We often forgive those who bore us, but can't forgive those whom we bore." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"We promise according to our hopes, and perform according to our fears." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"We should not judge a man’s merits by his qualities, but by the use he makes of them."  (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"We should scarcely desire things ardently if we were perfectly acquainted with what we desire." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"Weakness of character is the only defect which cannot be amended." Francóis de La Róchefoucald

"What causes us to like new acquaintances is not so much weariness of our old ones, or the pleasure of change, as disgust at not being sufficiently admired by those who know us too well, and the hope of being admired more by those who do not know so much about us." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

"When we are unable to find tranquility within ourselves, it is useless to seek it elsewhere." (Francóis de La Róchefoucald)

Week 2023-10: Upanishads

"Equipped with qualities, a doer of works and creator of their consequences, he reaps the result of his actions; he is the ruler of the life and he moves in his journey according to his own acts: he has idea and ego and is to be known by the qualities of his intelligence and his quality of self. Smaller than the hundredth part of the tip of a hair, the soul of the living being is capable of infinity. Male is he not nor female nor neuter, but is joined to whatever body he takes as his own." (Swetaswatara Upanishad)

"From the non-being to true being, from the darkness to the Light, from death to Immortality." (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad)

"He becomes the Eternal and departs into the Eternal." (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad)

"He fashions one form of things in many ways." (Katha Upanishad)

"He passes in his departure from this world to the physical Self; he passes to the Self of life; he passes to the Self of mind; he passes to the Self of knowledge; he passes to the Self of bliss; he moves through these worlds at will." (Taittiriya Upanishad)

"He strives by these means and has the knowledge: in him this spirit enters into its supreme status. Satisfied in knowledge, having built up their spiritual being, the Wise, in union with the spiritual self, reach the Omnipresent everywhere and enter into the All." (Mundaka Upanishad)

"It is not large, and not minute; not short, not long; without blood, without fat; without shadow, without darkness; without wind, without ether; not adhesive, not tangible; without smell, without taste; without eyes, ears, voice, or mind; without heat, breath, or mouth; without personal or family name; unaging, undying, without fear, immortal, dustless, not un¬ covered or covered; with nothing before, nothing behind, nothing within. It consumes no one, and is consumed by no one. It is the imseen seer, the un¬ heard hearer, the unthought thinker, the unknown knower." (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad)

"Long and narrow is the ancient Path, - I have touched it, I have found it, the Path by which the wise, blowers of the Eternal, attaining to salvation, depart hence to the high world of Paradise." (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad)

"Made certain of the meaning of the highest spiritual knowledge, purified in their being." (Mundrake Upanishad)

"Seven are these worlds in which move the life-forces that are hidden within the secret heart as their dwelling-place seven by seven." (Mundaka Upanishad)

"The Infinite indeed is below, above, behind, before, right and left—it is indeed all this. Now follows the explanation of the Infinite as the I; I am below, I am above, I am behind, before, right and left - I am all this. Next follows the explanation of the Infinite as the Self: Self is below, above, behind, before, right and left - Self is all this. He who sees, perceives, and understands this, loves the Self, delights in the Self, revels in the Self, rejoices in the Self -  he becomes a Svaraj, [an autocrat or self-ruler]; he is lord and master in all the worlds." (Upanishads)

"The one Godhead secret in all beings, all-pervading, the inner Self of all, presiding over all action, witness, conscious knower and absolute... the One in control over the many who are passive to Nature, fashions one seed in many ways." (Svetosvatara Upanishad)

"The Swan that settles in the purity... born of the Truth, - itself the Truth, the Vast." (Katha Upanishad)

"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)

"There is a birth and growth of the self. According to his action', the embodied being assumes forms successively in many places; many forms gross and subtle he assumes by force of his own qualities of nature..." (Swetaswatara Upanishad)

"There is a light that shines beyond all things on earth, beyond the highest, the very highest heavens. This is the light that shines in your heart." (Chandogya Upanishad)

"They say indeed that the conscious being is made of desire. But of whatsoever desire he comes to be, he comes to be of that will, and of whatever will he comes to be, he does that action, and whatever his action, to (the result of) that he reaches... Adhered to by his Karma he goes in his subtle body to wherever his mind cleaves, then, coming to the end of his Kama, even of whatsoever action he does here, he returns from that world to this world for Karma." (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad)

"This bodiless and immortal Life and Light is the Brahman." (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad)

"This is the eternal Tree with its root above and its branches downward; this is Brahman, the is the Immortal; in it are lodged all the worlds and none goes beyond it. This and That are one." (Katha Upanishad)

"This Self is to be won by the Truth and by an integral knowledge." (Mundaka Upanishad)

"This whole world is filled with beings who are His members." (Swetaswatara Upanishad)

"Thou art man and woman, boy and girl; old and worn thou walkest bent over a staff; thou art the blue bird and the green and the scarleteyed..." (Swetaswatara Upanishad)

"When a blade of grass is cut, the whole universe quivers." (Upanishads)

"When all the desires that cling to the heart Me loosed away from it, then the mortal becomes immortal, even here he possesses the Eternal." (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad)

Week 2023-09: Euripides - Collected Quotes

"A bad beginning makes a bad ending." (Euripides)

"A coward turns away, but a brave man's choice is danger." (Euripides)

"All is change; all yields its place and goes." (Euripides)

"Along with success comes a reputation for wisdom." (Euripides)

"Among mortals second thoughts are wisest." (Euripides)

"Enjoy yourself, drink, call the life you live today your own - but only that; the rest belongs to chance." (Euripides)

"Every man is like the company he is wont to keep." (Euripides)

"Fortune always will confer an aura
Of worth, unworthily; and in this world
The lucky person passes for a genius."" Euripedes

"Happiness, greatness, pride - nothing is secure, nothing keeps." (Euripides)

"How base a thing it is when a man will struggle with necessity! We have to die." (Euripides)

"Human misery must somewhere have a stop; there is no wind that always blows a storm." (Euripides)

"I loathe a friend ... who takes his friend's prosperity but will not voyage with him in his grief." (Euripides)

"I would prefer as a friend a good man who is ignorant than one more clever who is evil, too." (Euripides)

"It is a good thing to be rich, it is a good thing to be strong, but it is a better thing to be beloved of many friends." (Euripides)

"It was my tongue that swore; my heart is unsworn." (Euripides)

"Let a man accept his destiny. No pity and no tears." (Euripides)

"Love is all we have, the only way that each can help the other." (Euripides)

"No one can confidently say that he will still be living tomorrow." (Euripides)

"No one is happy all his life long." (Euripides)

"One loyal friend is worth ten thousand relatives." (Euripides)

"One man; two loves. No good ever comes of that." (Euripides)

"Pray the gods do not envy your happiness!" (Euripides)

"Real friendship is shown in times of trouble; prosperity is full of friends." (Euripides)

"Since luck's a nine days' wonder, wait their end." (Euripides)

"Slight not what is near though aiming at what is far." (Euripides)

"Sufficiency's enough for men of sense." (Euripides)

"Talk sense to a fool and he calls you foolish." (Euripides)

"Ten thousand men possess ten thousand hopes." (Euripides)

"That man is happiest who lives from day to day and asks no more, garnering the simple goodness of a life." (Euripides)

"The good and the wise lead quiet lives." (Euripides)

"The man who glories in his luck may be overthrown by destiny." (Euripides)

"The same man cannot be skilled in everything; each has his special excellence." (Euripides)

"There is as much confusion in the world of the gods as in ours." (Euripides)

"There is in the worst of fortune the best of chances for a happy change." (Euripides)

"There is just one life for each of us: our own." (Euripides)

"This is courage in a man: to bear unflinchingly what heaven sends." (Euripides)

"To persevere, trusting in what hopes he has, is courage in a man. The coward despairs." (Euripides)

"Try first thyself, and after call in God,/ For to the worker God himself lends aid." (Euripides)

"We pay a high price for being intelligent. Wisdom hurts." (Euripides)

Week 2023-08: Jean de La Bruyère - Collected Quotes

"A vain man finds it wise to speak good or ill of himself; a modest man does not talk of himself." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"Children have neither a past nor a future. Thus they enjoy the present, which seldom happens to us." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"Everything has been said, and we are more than seven thousand years of human thought too late." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"He who has lived a day has lived an age." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"Love and friendship exclude each other." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"Making a book is a craft, like making a clock; it needs more than native wit to be an author." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"Man has but three events in his life: to be born, to live, and to die. He is not conscious of his birth, he suffers at his death and he forgets to live." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"Out of difficulties grow miracles." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"Profound ignorance makes a man dogmatic. The man who knows nothing thinks he is teaching others what he has just learned himself; the man who knows a great deal can't imagine that what he is saying is not common knowledge, and speaks indifferently." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"The best way to get on in the world is to make people believe it’s to their advantage to help you." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"The exact contrary of what is generally believed is often the truth." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"The most exquisite pleasure is giving pleasure to others." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"The people have little intelligence." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"The regeneration of society is the regeneration of society by individual education." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"The shortest and best way to make your fortune is to let people see that it is in their interests to promote yours." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"The wise person often shuns society for fear of being bored." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"There are certain people who so ardently and passionately desire a thing, that from dread of losing it they leave nothing undone to make them lose it." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"There is no business in the world so troublesome as the pursuit of fame: life is over before you have hardly begun your work." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"Those who make the worst use of their time most complain of its brevity." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"Two persons cannot long be friends if they cannot forgive each other's little failings." (Jean de La Bruyère)

"We must laugh before we are happy, for fear of dying without having laughed at all." (Jean de La Bruyère)

Week 2023-07: Chang Tsai - Collected Quotes

"All rotating things have a spontaneous force and thus their motion is not imposed on them from outside." (Chang Tsai)

"By enlarging one's mind, one can enter into all the things in the world [to examine and understand their principle]. As long as anything is not yet entered into, there is still something outside the mind. The mind of ordinary people is limited to the narrowness of what is seen and what is heard. The sage, however, fully develops his nature and does not allow what is seen or heard to fetter his mind. He regards everything in the world to be his own self. This is why Mencius said that if one exerts his mind to the utmost, he can know nature and Heaven. (1) Heaven is so vast that there is nothing outside of it. Therefore the mind that leaves something outside is not capable of uniting itself with the mind of Heaven. Knowledge coming from seeing and hearing is knowledge obtained through contact with things. It is not knowledge obtained through one's moral nature. Knowledge obtained through one's moral nature does not originate from seeing or hearing." (Chang Tsai)

"Every birth is a condensation (of Qi). Every death is a dispersal (of Qi). Birth is not a gain; Death is not a loss. When condensed, Qi becomes a living thing, when dispersed, it is the substrata of mutation." (Chang Tsai)

"Everything is destiny. A man should accept obediently what is correct [in his destiny]." If one obeys the principles of his nature and destiny, he will obtain what is correct in them. If one destroys principle and indulges in desires to the limit, he will be inviting evil fortune." (Chang Tsai)

"From the Great Vacuity, there is Heaven. From the transformation of material force, there is the Way. In the unity of the Great Vacuity and material force, there is the nature (of man and things). And in the unity of the nature and consciousness, there is the mind." (Chang Tsai)

"He who understands virtue will have a sufficient amount, that is all. He will not allow sensual desires to be a burden to his mind, the small to injure the great, or the secondary to destroy the fundamental." (Chang Tsai)

"Human nature at its source is absolutely tranquil and unaffected by externality. When it is affected by contact with the external world, consciousness and knowledge emerge. Only those who fully develop their nature can unify the state of formlessness and unaffectedness, and the state of objectification and affectedness." (Chang Tsai)

"In one's words there should be something to teach others. In one's activities there should be something to serve as model for others. In the morning something should be done. In the evening something should be realized. At every moment something should be nourished. And in every instant something should be preserved." (Chang Tsai)

"Material force moves and flows in all directions and in all manners. Its two elements unite and give rise to the concrete. Thus the multiplicity of things and human beings is produced. In their ceaseless successions the two elements of yin and yang constitute the great principles of the universe." (Chang Tsai)

"The Great Void cannot but consist of ch’i; this ch’i cannot but condense to form all things; and these things cannot but become dispersed so as to form (once more) the Great Void." (Chang Tsai)

"The great benefit of learning is to enable one to transform his physical nature himself. Otherwise he will have the defect of studying in order to impress others, in the end will attain no enlightenment, and cannot see the all-embracing depth of the sage." (Chang Tsai)

"The Great Harmony is called the Way (Tao, Moral Law). It embraces the nature which underlies all counter processes of floating and sinking, rising and falling, and motion and rest. It is the origin of the process of fusion and intermingling, of overcoming and being overcome, and of expansion and contraction. At the commencement, these processes are incipient, subtle, obscure, easy, and simple, but at the end they are extensive, great, strong, and firm. It is ch'ien (Heaven) that begins with the knowledge of Change, and k'un (Earth) that models after simplicity. That which is dispersed, differentiated, and capable of assuming form becomes material force (ch'i), and that which is pure, penetrating, and capable of assuming form becomes spirit. Unless the whole universe is in the process of fusion and intermingling like fleeting forces moving in all directions, it may not be called Great Harmony." (Chang Tsai)

"The Great Vacuity is clear. Being clear, it cannot be obstructed. Not being obstructed, it is therefore spirit. The opposite of clearness is turbidity. Turbidity leads to obstruction. And obstruction leads to physical form. When material force is clear, it penetrates; and when it is turbid, it obstructs. When clearness reaches its limit, there is spirit. When spirit concentrates, it penetrates like the breeze going through the holes (of musical instruments), producing tones and carrying them to great distances. This is the evidence of clearness. As if arriving at the destination without the necessity of going there, penetration reaches the highest degree." (Chang Tsai)

"The integration and disintegration of material force is to the Great Vacuity as the freezing and melting of ice is to water. If we realize that the Great Vacuity is identical with material force, we know that there is no such thing as non-being." (Chang Tsai)

"When a thing first comes into existence, material force comes gradually into it to enrich its vitality. As it reaches its maturity, material force gradually reverts to where it came from, wanders off and disperses. Its coming means positive spiritual force (shen), because it is expanding (shen). Its reversion means negative spiritual force (kuei), because it is returning (kuei)." (Chang Tsai)

"When one knows that the Great Void is full of ch’i, one realizes that there is no such thing as nothingness." (Chang Tsai)

"When the ch’i condenses, its visibility becomes apparent so that there are then the shapes (of individual things). When it disperses, its visibility is no longer apparent and there are no shapes. At the time of its condensation, can one say otherwise than that this is but temporary? But at the time of its dispersing, can one hastily say that it is then non-existent?'" (Chang Tsai)

"When it is understood that the Vacuity, the Void, is nothing but material force, then existence and nonexistence, the hidden and the manifested, spirit and eternal transformation, and human nature and destiny are all one and not a duality. He who apprehends integration and disintegration, appearance and disappearance, form and absence of form, and trace them to their source, penetrates the secret of Change." (Chang Tsai)

"When the Way of Heaven [or principle] and the nature of man [or desires] function separately, there cannot be sincerity. When there is a difference between the knowledge obtained by following (the Way of) Heaven and that obtained by following (the nature of) man, there cannot be perfect enlightenment. What is meant by enlightenment resulting from sincerity is that in which there is no distinction between the Way of Heaven as being great and the nature of man as being small." (Chang Tsai)

Week 2023-06: Hakuin Ekaku - Collected Quotes

"All beings are by nature are Buddhas, as ice by nature is water. Apart from water there is no ice; apart from beings, no Buddhas. How sad that people ignore the near and search the truth afar: like someone in the midst of watercrying out in thirst: like a child of a wealthy home wandering among the poor." (Hakuin Ekaku)

"At the bottom of great doubt lies great awakening. If you doubt fully, you will awaken fully." (Hakuin Ekaku)

"From the sea of effortlessness, let your great uncaused compassion shine forth." (Hakuin Ekaku)

"If you forget yourself, you become the universe." (Hakuin Ekaku)

"Meditation in action is endlessly more important than meditation in stillness." (Hakuin Ekaku)

"Should you desire the great tranquility prepare to sweat white beads." (Hakuin Ekaku)

"The spirit of meditation is the combating of self-willed thinking - it is a combat against the weight of one's feelings."

"Those who practice only in silence/tranquility, cannot establish their [internal] freedom when entering into activity. When they engage into worldy activities, their usual satori (enlightment) will eventually disappear without any trace." (Hakuin Ekaku)

"Those who testify to the truth of the nature of the Self, Have found it by reflecting within themselves." (Hakuin Ekaku)

"Zen practice in the midst of activity is a million times superior to that pursued within tranquility." (Hakuin Ekaku)

"What is this true meditation? It is to make everything: coughing, swallowing, waving the arms, motion, stillness, words, action, the evil and the good, prosperity and shame, gain and loss, right and wrong, into one single koan." (Hakuin Ekaku)

"You know the sound of two hands clapping; tell me, what is the sound of one hand?" (Hakuin Ekaku)

Week 2023-5: Anaxagoras of Clazomenae - Collected Quotes

"All things were together, infinite both in number and in smallness; for the small too was infinite." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC) 

"And since the portions of the great and the small are equal in number, so too all things would be in everything. Nor is it possible that they should exist apart, but all things have a portion of everything." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC)

"Appearances are a glimpse of the unseen." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC)

"Everything has a natural explanation. The moon is not a god, but a great rock, and the sun a hot rock.

The seed of everything is in everything else." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC)

"Men would live exceedingly quiet if these two words, mine and thine, were taken away." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC)

"Mind is infinite and self-ruled, and is mixed with nothing, but is alone itself by itself." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC)

"The contents of the cosmos are not separated from each other or cut of by an axe not the hot from the cold nor the cold from the hot." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC)

"The descent to Hades is the same from every place." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC)

"Th ere is no smallest among the small and no largest among the large; but always something still smaller and something still larger." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC)

"There is no smallest among the small and no largest among the large, But always something still smaller and something still larger." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC)

"Thought is something limitless and independent, and has been mixed with no thing but is alone by itself. […] What was mingled with it would have prevented it from having power over anything in the way in which it does. […] For it is the finest of all things and the purest." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC)

"Wise men argue causes; fools decide them." (Anaxagoras, cca. 5th century BC)

Week 2023-4: Thales of Miletus - Collected Quotes

"A multitude of words is no proof of a prudent mind." (Thales of Miletus)

"All things are from water and all things are resolved into water." (Thales of Miletus)

"Avoid doing what you would blame others for doing." (Thales of Miletus)

"Hope is the only good that is common to all men; those who have nothing else possess hope still." (Thales of Miletus)

"Nothing is more active than thought, for it travels over the universe, and nothing is stronger than necessity for all must submit to it." (Thales of Miletus)

"Place is the greatest thing, as it contains all things." (Thales of Miletus)

"The most difficult thing in life is to know yourself." (Thales of Miletus)

"There are three attributes for which I am grateful to Fortune: that I was born, first, human and not animal; second, man and not woman; and third, Greek and not barbarian." (Thales of Miletus)

"What is the sagest of all? It is a time, because it opens all." (Thales of Miletus)

Week 2023-3: Pythagoras of Samos - Collected Quotes

"All was numbers." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"Animals share with us the privilege of having a soul." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"Be silent or let thy words be worth more than silence." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"Choose always the way that seems the best, however rough it may be; custom will soon render it easy and agreeable." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"Do not say a little in many words but a great deal in a few." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"everything changes, nothing is lost" (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"Geometry is knowledge of the eternally existent."  (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"Hearing and keeping silence, you become a wise man. The beginning of wisdom is silence." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"Number is the ruler of forms and ideas, and the cause of gods and demons." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"Number rules the universe." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"Number was the substance of all things." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"The first elements of wisdom: you should study to reflect and to lose your ability to chat." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"The learning of many things does not teach intelligence […]." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

"There is geometry in the humming of the strings; there is music in the spacing of the spheres." (Pythagoras of Samos, cca. 6th century BC)

Week 2023-2: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe - Collected Quotes

"One does not get to know that one exists until one rediscovers oneself in others." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1775)

"The imagination lurks as the most powerful foe. It has an irresistible affinity for the absurd. Even cultured individuals are subject to this impulse to a high degree. It  is hostile to all civilized life and it confronts our decorous society with a reversion to the innate rudeness of the savage and his love of grimaces." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Annals", 1805)

"Genuine works of art carry their own aesthetic theory implicit within them and suggest the standards according to which they are to be judged." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1808)

"The highest gift we have received from God and nature is life, the rotating movement of the monad about itself, knowing neither pause nor rest. The impulse to nurture this life is ineradicably implanted in each individual, although its specific nature remains a mystery to ourselves and to Others." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "On Theory of Color", 1810)

"The modern age has a false sense of superiority because of the great mass of data at its disposal. But the valid criterion of distinction is rather the extent to which man knows how to form and master the material at his command." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "On Theory of Color", 1810)

"As soon as we proceed from the principle that knowledge and faith are not designed to cancel each other out but rather to supplement each other, we are on the right path pointing to just solutions." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1813)

"Faith is a sacred vessel in which each individual is prepared to sacrifice his feeling, his reason, his imagination, to the best of his ability. In the case of knowledge exactly the opposite holds true, I said. Not that one knows but what one knows, how well and how much one knows, is what counts. That is why knowledge is a subject for argument, inasmuch as it may be corrected, expanded, and concealed. Knowledge begins with isolated facts; it is endless and formless, and we can at most dream of grasping it as a totality. Hence it is diametrically opposed to faith." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "The Autobiography", 1814)

"Idea and experience will never coincide in the center. Only art and action can effect a synthesis." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1816) 

"When all is said and done, nothing suits the theater except what also makes a symbolic appeal to the eyes a significant action suggesting an even more significant one." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Shakespeare and No End", 1816)

"That which is formed is straightway transformed again, and if we would to some degree arrive at a living intuition of Nature, we must on our part remain forever mobile and plastic, according to her own example." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Morphology", 1817)

"As we contemplate the edifice of the universe, in its vastest extension, in its minutest divisibility, we cannot resist the notion that an idea underlies the whole, according to which God and Nature creatively interact forever and ever. Intuition, contemplation, reflection give us an approach to these mysteries, We are emboldened to venture upon ideas; in a more modest mood we fashion concepts that might bear some analogy to those primal beginnings." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Doubts and Resignation", 1820)

"Even in the sciences, mere knowing is of no avail. It is always a matter of doing." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections", 1822)

"General concepts and great conceit are always poised to make a terrible mess of things." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections", 1822)

"The most foolish of all errors is for young people to believe that they lose their originality by accepting the truths which have already been accepted by their predecessors." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections", 1822)

"When Nature begins to reveal her manifest mystery to a man, he feels an irresistible longing for her worthiest interpreter art." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections", 1823)

"Truth is like a torch, but of gigantic proportions. It is all we can do to grope our way with dazzled eyes, in fear even of getting scorched." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections", 1824)

"Man was not born to solve the problems of the universe, but rather to seek to lay bare the heart of the problem and then confine himself within the limits of what is amenable to understanding." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1825)

"The true, which is identical with the divine, transcends our grasp as such. We perceive it only as reflection, parable, symbol, in specific and related manifestations.  We become aware of it as life that defies comprehension, and for all that we cannot renounce the wish to comprehend. " (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Essay on Meteorology", 1825)

"Error finds ceaseless repetition in deed, for which reason one must never tire of repeating the truth in words." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections", 1826)

"Knowing is possible only when one knows little. As one comes to experience more, one gets gradually assailed by doubts. [...] No phenomenon can be explained, taken merely by itself. Only many, surveyed in their connection, and methodically arranged, finally yield something that can pass for theory." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1828)

"The greatest art, both in teaching and in life itself, consists in transforming the problem into a postulate." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1928)

"For truth is simple and without fuss, whereas error affords opportunity for dissipating time and energy." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1829)

"Man must cling to the belief that the incomprehensible is comprehensible. Else he would give up investigating. " (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections", 1829)  

"To concentrate on a craft is the best procedure. For the person of inferior gifts it will always remain a craft. The more gifted person  will raise it to an art. And as for the man of highest endowment, in doing one thing he does all things; or, to put it less paradoxically, in the one thing that he does properly, he sees a symbol of all things that are done right. " (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1829)

"'Nature does nothing for nothing' is an old Philistine saying. She is eternally alive, prodigal and extravagant in her workings, to keep the infinite ever present, because nothing can endure without change." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1831)

"The desire to explain what is simple by what is complex, what is easy by what is difficult, is a calamity affecting the whole body of science, known, it is true, to men of insight, but not generally admitted." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections", 1833)

"With the growth of knowledge our ideas must from time to time be organized afresh. The change takes place usually in accordance with new maxims as they arise, but it always remains provisional. (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections", 1833)

"Nothing hurts a new truth more than an old error." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Sprüche in Prosa", 1840)

"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) 

"Everything is simpler than one can imagine, at the same time more involved than can be comprehended." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)

"In nature we never see anything isolated, but everything in connection with something else which is before it, beside it, under it and over it." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)

"In tearing down a position, all false arguments carry weight; not so in building up. Only the truth is constructive." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections" [posthumous])

"It requires a much higher organ to seize upon truth than it does to defend error." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections" [posthumous])

"Nature, despite her seeming diversity, is always a unity, a whole; and thus, when she manifests herself in any part of that whole, the rest must serve as a basis for that particular manifestation, and the latter must have a relationship to the rest of the system." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)

"No phenomenon can be explained in and of itself; only many comprehended together, methodically arranged, in the end yield something that could be regarded as theory." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)

"That is the way of youth and life generally, that we usually come to understand the strategy only after the campaign is over. " (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "The Autobiography",  [posthumous])

"The highest happiness of man as a thinking being is to have probed what is knowable and quietly to revere what is unknowable." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections" [posthumous])

"The orbits of certainties touch one another; but in the interstices there is room enough for error to go forth and prevail." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)

"The tissue of the world is built from necessities and randomness; the intellect of men places itself between both and can control them; it considers the necessity and the reason of its existence; it knows how randomness can be managed, controlled, and used." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)

"Thinking by analogy is not to be despised. Analogy has this merit, that it does not settle things - does not pretend to be conclusive. On the other hand, that induction is pernicious which, with a preconceived end in view, and working right forward for only that, drags in its train a number of unshifted observations, both false and true." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)

"Thinking is more interesting than knowing, but not more so than beholding." (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Maxims and Reflections", [posthumous])

Week 2023-01: Leonardo da Vinci - Collected Quotes

"All our knowledge has its origins in our perceptions." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"Although nature commences with reason and ends in experience it is necessary for us to do the opposite, that is to commence with experience and from this to proceed to investigate the reason." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"Experience does not feed investigators on dreams, but always proceeds from accurately determined first principles, step by step in true sequence to the end." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"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)

"Inequality is the cause of all local movements." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"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)

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

"Mechanics is the paradise of mathematical science, because by means of it one comes to the fruits of mathematics." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"Nature is economical and her economy is quantitative." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"[…] no human inquiry can be called science unless it pursues its path through mathematical exposition and demonstration." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"Science is the observation of things possible." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"The grandest pleasure is the joy of understanding." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"There is no certainty where one can neither apply any of the mathematical sciences nor any of those which are connected with the mathematical sciences." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"There is no higher or lower knowledge, but one only, flowing out of experimentation." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"Those who condemn the supreme certainty of mathematics feed on confusion, and can never silence the contradictions of the sophistical sciences which lead to eternal quackery." (Leonardo da Vinci)

"To me it seems that all sciences are vain and full of errors that are not born of Experience, mother of all certainty […] that is to say, that do not at their origin, middle or end, pass through any of the five senses." (Leonardo da Vinci)

Week 2022-52: Gichin Funakoshi - Collected Quotes

"In training, do not expect good results in a short time. [...] train systematically, without becoming impatient or overexerting yourself, and develop gradually, advancing steadily, one stop at a time, with increased application of force and numbers of exercises practiced." (Gichin Funakoshi, "Karate-do Kyohan: The Master Text", 1935)

"The objective of martial arts has always been to defend oneself and not to attack others [...]" (Gichin Funakoshi, "Karate-do Kyohan: The Master Text", 1935)

"The secret principle of martial arts is not vanquishing the attacker but resolving to avoid an encounter before its occurrence. To become the object of an attack is an indication that there was an opening in one's guard, and the important thing is to be on guard at all times." (Gichin Funakoshi, "Karate-do Kyohan: The Master Text", 1935)

"To stand still is to regress; those who think that they have learned everything and become conceited braggarts proclaiming their own merits after learning the movements of some kata and acquiring dexterity in their physical movements are not fit to be considered as serious trainees in the martial arts." (Gichin Funakoshi, "Karate-do Kyohan: The Master Text", 1935)

"Karate is a defensive art from beginning to end" (Gichin Funakoshi)

"Since karate is a martial art, you must practice with the utmost seriousness from the very beginning." (Gichin Funakoshi, Karate-dō Nyūmon: The Master Introductory Text")

"The ultimate aim of the art of Karate lies not in victory or defeat, but in the perfection of the character of it's participants." (Gichin Funakoshi)

"There is no first strike in Karate." (Gichin Funakoshi)

"You may train for a long time, but if you merely move your hands and feet and jump up and down like a puppet, learning karate is not very different from learning a dance. You will never have reached the heart of the matter; you will have failed to grasp the quintessence of karate-do." (Gichin Funakoshi)

"When two tigers fight, one is certain to be maimed, and one to die." (Gichin Funakoshi)

Week 2022-51: Jim Lau - Collected Quotes

"A good player recognizes these moves for what they are: a process of sounding out and experimentation. The good player is patient. He is observant, controlling his patience, and organizing his composure. When he sees an opportunity he explodes." (Jim Lau)

"I can defeat you physically with or without a reason. But I can only defeat your mind with a reason. (Jim Lau)

"It's not bad to have aggressive or hostile thoughts and feelings towards others. When you acknowledge these feelings you no longer have to pretend to be that which you are not. You can learn to accept these moods. What is bad, however, is letting them dictate your nature. When you unleash your aggression or hostility on another person, it inspires aggression and hostility in return. The result then is conflict, which all true martial artists try to avoid. Anger doesn't demand action. When you act in anger, you lose self-control." (Jim Lau)

"Stop straining. The less effort, the faster and more powerful you will be." (Jim Lau)

"There are times when you should fight, and there are times when you should split." (Jim Lau)

"When a problem arises, don't fight with it or try to deny it. Accept and acknowledge it. Be patient in seeking a solution or opening, and then fully commit yourself to the resolution you think advisable." (Jim Lau)

"You must learn to allow patience and stillness to take over from anxiety and frantic activity for the sake of doing something, Between martial artists of the first rank, there is room for only one mistake. Before an exchange of blows, several minutes may be spent in controlled patience and planning while each man respectfully observes his opponent, studying his position or stance, watching, getting ideas, and charging his energy. When one man thinks he is going to attack, his opponent may quickly change his stance. If he has overreacted, his opponent makes a note of it. This is a weakness which he will later attempt to use to his advantage." (Jim Lau)

Week 2022-50: Wayne Dyer - Collected Quotes

"Acceptance means no complaining, and happiness means no complaining about the things over which you can do nothing." (Wayne Dyer, "Your Erroneous Zones", 1976)

"Behavior is a much better barometer of what you are than words." (Wayne Dyer, "Your Erroneous Zones", 1976)

"Be a student. Stay open and willing to learn from everyone and anyone. Being a student means you have room for new input. When you are green you grow, when you are ripe you rot. By staying green you will avoid the curse of being an expert. When you know in your heart that every single person you encounter in your lifetime has something to teach you, you are able to utilize their offerings in a profound way." (Wayne Dyer, "Real Magic: Creating Miracles in Everyday Life", 1992)

"Everything in the universe has a purpose. Indeed, the invisible intelligence that flows through everything in a purposeful fashion is also flowing through you." (Wayne Dyer, "Real Magic: Creating Miracles in Everyday Life", 1992)

"Act as if what you intend to manifest in life is already a reality. Eliminate thoughts of conditions, limitations, or the possibility of it not manifesting. If left undisturbed in your mind and in the mind of intention simultaneously, it will germinate in the physical world." (Wayne Dyer, "Everyday Wisdom for Success", 1993)

"The only boundaries we have are in form. There are no obstacles in thought." (Wayne Dyer, "Everyday Wisdom", 1993)

"You create your thoughts, your thoughts create your intentions, and your intentions create your reality." (Wayne Dyer, "Everyday Wisdom for Success", 1993)

"Gratitude is a sacred space where you allow and know that a force greater than your ego is always at work and always available." (Wayne Dyer, "The Power of Intention", 2004)

"Intention is not something you do, but rather a force that exists in the universe as an invisible field of energy, a power that can carry us. (Wayne Dyer, "The Power of Intention", 2004)

"Your imagination creates the inner picture that allows you to participate in the act of creation." (Wayne Dyer, "The Power of Intention", 2004)

"Thoughts are mental energy; they're the currency that you have to attract what you desire. You must learn to stop spending that currency on thoughts you don't want." (Wayne Dyer, "Being in Balance: 9 Principles for Creating Habits to Match Your Desires", 2006)

"While the world of reality has its limits, the world of your imagination is without boundaries." (Wayne Dyer, "Being in Balance: 9 Principles for Creating Habits to Match Your Desires", 2006)

"Most people are searching for happiness. They're looking for it. They're trying to find it in someone or something outside of themselves. That's a fundamental mistake. Happiness is something that you are, and it comes from the way you think." (Wayne Dyer, "Staying on the Path: Easyread Super Large 24pt Edition", 2009)

"Our most important problems cannot be solved; they must be outgrown." (Wayne Dyer, "Excuses Begone!: How to Change Lifelong, Self-Defeating Thinking Habits", 2009)

"The use of mental imagery is one of the strongest and most effective strategies for making something happen for you." (Wayne Dyer, "Staying on the Path: Easyread Super Large 18pt Edition", 2009)

"With everything that has happened to you, you can either feel sorry for yourself or treat what has happened as a gift. Everything is either an opportunity to grow or an obstacle to keep you from growing. You get to choose." (Wayne Dyer, "Staying on the Path: Easyread Super Large 18pt Edition", 2009)

"This is called synchronicity - a state in which you almost feel as if you are in a collaborative arrangement with fate." (Wayne Dyer, "I Can See Clearly Now", 2014)

Week 2022-49: Sri Aurobindo - Collected Quotes

"Our actual enemy is not any force exterior to ourselves, but our own crying weaknesses, our cowardice, our selfishness, our hypocrisy, our purblind sentimentalism." (Sri Aurobindo, "New Lamps for Old", 1893)

"The deeper we look, the more we shall be convinced that the one thing wanting, which we must strive to acquire before all others, is strength — strength physical, strength mental, strength moral, but above all strength spiritual which is the one inexhaustible and imperishable source of all the others. If we have strength everything else will be added to us easily and naturally." (Sri Aurobindo, "India's Rebirth", 1905)

"A thought is an arrow shot at the truth; it can hit a point, but not cover the whole target. But the archer is too well satisfied with his success to ask anything farther."  (Sri Aurobindo, "Thoughts and Aphorisms", 1913)

"Inspiration is a slender river of brightness leaping from a vast and eternal knowledge, it exceeds reason more perfectly than reason exceeds the knowledge of the senses." (Sri Aurobindo, "Thoughts and Aphorisms", 1913)

"Mankind has used two powerful weapons to destroy its own powers and enjoyment, wrong indulgence and wrong abstinence." (Sri Aurobindo, "Thoughts and Aphorisms", 1913)

"Be conscious first of thyself within, then think and act. All living thought is a world in preparation; all real act is a thought manifested. The material world exists because an Idea began to play in divine self-consciousness." (Sri Aurobindo, "Thoughts and Glimpses", 1916-17)

"Nothing in the many processes of Nature, whether she deals with men or with things, comes by chance or accident or is really at the mercy of external causes."  (Sri Aurobindo, "The Renaissance in India", 1918)

"Suffering makes us capable of the full force of the Master of Delight; it makes us capable also to bear the utter play of the Master of Power. Pain is the key that opens the gates of strength; it is the high-road that leads to the city of beatitude." (Sri Aurobindo, "Thoughts and Aphorisms", 1913)

"The strangest of the soul's experiences is this, that it finds, when it ceases to care for the image and threat of troubles, then the troubles themselves are nowhere to be found in one's neighbourhood. It is then that we hear from behind those unreal clouds God laughing at us." (Sri Aurobindo, "Thoughts and Aphorisms", 1913)

"Transform effort into an easy and sovereign overflowing of the soul-strength; let all thyself be conscious force. This is thy goal." (Sri Aurobindo, "Thoughts and Glimpses", 1916-17)

"Spirituality is not necessarily exclusive; it can be and in its fullness must be all-inclusive." (Sri Aurobindo, "The Renaissance in India", 1918)

"The supreme truths are neither the rigid conclusions of logical reasoning nor the affirmations of credal statement, but fruits of the soul's inner experience." (Sri Aurobindo, "Indian Spirituality and Life", 1919)

"All religions have some truth in them, but none has the whole truth; all are created in time and finally decline and perish."  (Sri Aurobindo, [letter] 1929)

"The way of yoga followed here has a different purpose from others, - for its aim is not only to rise out of the ordinary ignorant world-consciousness into the divine consciousness, but to bring the supramental power of that divine consciousness down into the ignorance of mind, life and body, to transform them, to manifest the Divine here and create a divine life in Matter." (Sri Aurobindo, "Lights on Yoga", 1935)

"Nothing to the supramental sense is really finite; it is founded on a feeling of all in each and of each in all." (Sri Aurobindo, "The Synthesis of Yoga", 1948)

"The material object becomes [...] something different from what we now see, not a separate object on the background or in the environment of the rest of nature but an indivisible part and even in a subtle way an expression of the unity of all that we see." (Sri Aurobindo, "The Synthesis of Yoga", 1948)

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

Week 2022-48: Carlos Castañeda - Collected Quotes

"A man goes to knowledge as he goes to war: wide-awake, with fear, with respect, and with absolute assurance. Going to knowledge or going to war in any other manner is a mistake, and whoever makes it might never live to regret it." (Carlos Castaneda, "The Teachings of Don Juan", 1968)

"Look at every path closely and deliberately. Try it as many times as you think necessary. Then ask yourself, and yourself alone, one question... Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn't, it is of no use." (Carlos Castaneda, "The Teachings of Don Juan", 1968)

"Only as a warrior can one withstand the path of knowledge. A warrior cannot complain or regret anything. His life is an endless challenge, and challenges cannot possibly be good or bad. Challenges are simply challenges." (Carlos Castaneda, "The Teachings of Don Juan", 1968)

"The most effective way to live is as a warrior. A warrior may worry and think before making any decision, but once he makes it, he goes his way, free from worries or thoughts; there will be a million other decisions still awaiting him. That's the warrior's way." (Carlos Castañeda, "A Separate Reality: Further Conversations with Don Juan", 1971)

"Things don't change. You change your way of looking, that's all." (Carlos Castañeda, "A Separate Reality: Further Conversations with Don Juan", 1971)

"It doesn't matter what one reveals or what one keeps to oneself. Everything we do, everything we are, rests on our personal power. If we don't have enough personal power the most magnificent piece of wisdom can be revealed to us and it won't make a damn bit of difference." (Carlos Castaneda, "Tales of Power", 1974)

"The basic difference between an ordinary man and a warrior is that a warrior takes everything as a challenge while an ordinary man takes everything as a blessing or a curse." (Carlos Castaneda, "Tales of Power", 1974)

"The world doesn't yield to us directly, the description of the world stands in between. So, properly speaking, we are always one step removed and our experiences of the world is always a recollection of the experience. We are perennially recollecting the instant that has just happened, just passed. Re recollect, recollect, recollect." (Carlos Castaneda, "Tales of Power", 1974)

"The daily world exists because we know how to hold its images; consequently, if one drops the attention needed to maintain those images, the world collapses." (Carlos Castaneda, "Second Ring of Power", 1977)

"To tune the spirit when someone is trampling on you is called control." (Carlos Castaneda, "The Fire from Within", 1984)

"The third point of reference is freedom of perception; it is intent; it is spirit; the somersault of thought into the miraculous; the act of reaching beyond our boundaries and touching the inconceivable." (Carlos Castaneda, "Power of Silence", 1987) 

"Anything is one of a million paths. Therefore, a warrior must always keep in mind that a path is only a path; if he feels that he should not follow it, he must not stay with it under any conditions. His decision to keep on that path or to leave it must be free of fear or ambition. He must look at every path closely and deliberately. There is a question that a warrior has to ask, mandatorily: 'Does this path have a heart?'" (Carlos Castaneda, "The Wheel of Time: The Shamans of Mexico Their Thoughts About Life", 1998)

"The internal dialogue is what grounds people in the daily world. The world is such and such or so and so, only because we talk to ourselves about its being such and such and so and so. The passageway into the world of shamans opens up after the warrior has learned to shut off his internal dialogue." (Carlos Castaneda, "The Wheel of Time: The Shamans of Mexico Their Thoughts About Life", 1998)