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Explore all of the quotations in our Living Book…
In antiquity those that excelled in warfare first made themselves unconquerable in order to await (the moment when) the enemy could be conquered. Being unconquerable lies with yourself. Being conquerable lies with the enemy.
This fault in us I find,
The error of our eye directs our mind:
What error leads must err; O, then conclude
Minds sway’d by eyes are full of turpitude.
“Don’t look for God,” the Master said. “Just look, and all will be revealed.”
“But how is one to look?”
“Each time you look at anything, see only what is there and nothing else.”
The disciples were bewildered, so the Master made it simpler: “For instance: when you look at the moon, see the moon and nothing else.”
“What else could one see except the moon when one looks at the moon?”
“A hungry person could see a ball of cheese. A lover, the face of his beloved.”
The hour is not past. Why will you put off your resolution? Arise, begin this very moment, and say, “Now is the time to do. Now is the time to fight. Now is the proper time for amendment.”
We must eradicate from the soul
all fear and terror of what
comes towards man
out of the future.
We must acquire serenity
in all feelings and sensations
about the future.
We must look forward
with absolute equanimity
to everything that may come.
And we must think only that
whatever comes is given to us
by a world-directive
full of wisdom.
It is part of what we
must learn in this age,
namely, to live out of pure
trust, without any security
in existence.
Trust in the ever present
help of the spiritual world.
Truly, nothing else will do
if our courage is not to fail us.
And let us seek the awakening
from within ourselves,
every morning
and every evening.
If you are surprised at the number of our maladies, count our cooks.
In order to become mature, in short, we must not only reject the authority of our parents — but at the same time, in order to replace them, we must kill off our fantasy selves. Only by killing this fantasy self can a man become fully mature. Unless he does so, he is still in a state of rebellion, a perpetual state of immaturity…
Ultimately, to overcome our fantasy self is the supreme contribution that a man can make to mankind. All the fantasies that are around us, that infect the collective human organism, are in the end just one fantasy, made up of all the separate unresolved images and acts of self assertion that are fed into it from each individual fantasy-self of all the thousands of millions of human beings on earth…
Every man who asserts his ego against the general framework in any way, however small, or adds to the sum of unresolved imagery, however idly, is playing his tiny part in increasing the sum of the world’s discords and miseries…
However much one wishes to change the outside world, the only thing one can change or have any control over is ultimately oneself. Which is why the greatest good any man can do to change the world is the least dramatic act of all — to withdraw his own contribution from the general sum of evil.
As long as man stands in his own way, everything seems to be in his way, governments, society, and even the sun and moon and stars.
The true value of a human being can be found in the degree to which he has attained liberation from the self.
Every one of us, whatever our speculative opinions, knows better than he practices, and recognizes a better law than he obeys.
When we are doing nothing in particular, it is then we are living through all our being… Will is suspended, but nature and time are always active, and if our life is no longer our work, the work goes on nonetheless. With us, without us, or in spite of us, our existence travels through its appointed phases.
Many think that dying to themselves is what causes them so much pain. But it is actually the part of them that still lives that causes the problem. Death is only painful to you when you resist it. Your imagination exaggerates how bad death will be. Self-love fights with all of its strength to live. Die inwardly as well as outwardly. Let all that is not born of God within you die.
We are no longer happy so soon as we wish to be happier.
Why do you take by force what you could obtain by love?
It is useless quibbling over a mere word, even if that word is God. To accept or reject it, when we have no knowledge of what it may represent, is equally inappropriate. God is a mystery, and the mystery remains, whatever name we give to it.
Hakim Sanai (circa 1080 – 1141), from The Walled Garden of Truth
Out beyond ideas of wrong-doing and right-doing there is a field. I’ll meet you there.
Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.
What you are looking for is what is looking.
Not satisfied with the needs of nature, he demands the unnecessary.
We don’t have to quarrel about a word because “God” is only a word, a concept. One never quarrels about reality. We only quarrel about opinions, about concepts, about judgments. Drop your concepts, drop your opinions, drop your prejudices, drop your judgments, and you will see that.
