Tag Archives: quote

The Zen ‘everyday mind’

The Zen ‘everyday mind’ described as ‘sleeping when tired, eating when hungry’, or, in other words, knowing what one’s real needs are. Like a bamboo leaf, it bends lower and lower under the weight of the snow. Suddenly the snow slips to the ground without the leaf having stirred. The distinction between action and result disappears. The hands and feet are the brushes and the whole universe is the canvas on which the Zen mind depicts his life. The constant present moment.

(Extrapolated and rearranged from the works of Eugen Herrigel, Michael J. Gelb and Ryōkan Taigu.)

Purchase the book Zen in the Art of Archery by clicking here.

Purchase the book Body Learning by clicking here.

What I Believe in by E. M. Forster

I believe in aristocracy, though — if that is the right word, and if a democrat may use it. Not an aristocracy of power, based upon rank and influence, but an aristocracy of the sensitive, the considerate and the plucky. Its members are to be found in all nations and classes, and all through the ages, and there is a secret understanding between them when they meet. They represent the true human tradition, the one permanent victory of our queer race over cruelty and chaos. Thousands of them perish in obscurity, a few are great names. They are sensitive for others as well as themselves, they are considerate without being fussy, their pluck is not swankiness but power to endure, and they can take a joke.

by E. M. Forster

I often read this quote to friends. Somehow it captures an important quality in all people of goodwill. It seemed only appropriate I would share it right here.

Freedom From The Known Quotes

I read this book for the first time as I was traveling through Mexico and it made a lot of sense. I was at a strange place in my life reexamining  faith and superstition and reading Jiddu Krishnamurti’s book Freedom From The Known was liberating. A lot of these excerpts still ring true.

What follows is a collection of Jiddu Krishnamurti quotes taken from the book Freedom From The Known (you can purchase it by clicking here).

Faith invariably breeds violence. (p.9)

The primary cause of disorder is the seeking of reality promised by another. (p.11)

Immaturity lies only in total ignorance of self. (p.12)

The whole history of man is written in ourselves. (p.13)

We are each one of us responsible for every war because of the aggressiveness of our own lives. (p.14)

Truth has no path, and that is the beauty of truth, it is living. (p.15)

It seems to me that all ideologies are utterly idiotic. (p.16)

If I were foolish enough to give you a system and if you were foolish enough to follow it, you would merely be copying, imitating, conforming, accepting, and when you do that you have set up in yourself the authority of another and hence the conflict between you and that authority. (p.17)

If you try to study yourself according to another you will always be a secondhand human being. (p.17)

Order imposed from without must always breed disorder. (p.17)

If you reject all authority it means you are no longer afraid. (p.18)

When you reject something false which you have been carrying about with you for generations, …you have more energy, you have more capacity, you have more drive. …if you do not feel this, then you have not thrown off the burden, you have not discarded the dead weight of authority. But when you have thrown it off you have ….no fear of making a mistake, no fear of doing right or wrong. (p.18)

We need tremendous amount of energy and we dissipate it through fear but when there is this energy which comes from throwing off every form of fear, that energy itself produces the radical inward revolution. You don’t have to do a thing about it. (p.18)

Freedom is entirely different from revolt. (p.19)

All authority of any kind, especially in the field of thought and understanding, is the most destructive, evil thing. Leaders destroy the followers and followers destroy the leaders. (p.21)

If you do not follow somebody you feel very lonely. Be lonely then. Why are you frightened of being alone? Because you are faced with yourself as you are. (p.21)

I have to study myself in actuality – as I am, not as I wish to be. (p.22)

Learning is a constant movement without the past. (p.23)

We may be sensitive about certain things that touch us personally but to be completely sensitive to all the implications of life demands that there be no separation between the organism and the psyche. It is a total movement. (p.23)

Continue reading Freedom From The Known Quotes

Orson Welles Quotes Collection

I may not agree with everything Orson Welles had to say but I’ve always found his views on the art of cinema to be akin to mine.

This is a collection of quotations I selected while reading the book This is Orson Welles” with Peter Bogdonovich & Orson Welles“.

I recommend it to anyone interested in his life and work. You may purchase it by clicking here.

“The only thing that keeps people alive in their old age is power.” (p. xvi)

“It is only in your twenties and in your seventies and eighties that you do the greatest work.” (p. xvi)

“Gentlemen went into art for its own sake not for money.” (p. xviii)

“I’m more like Celine – writing away at books no one ever reads.” (p. xxix)

Continue reading Orson Welles Quotes Collection