" To avoid being disappointed, minimize expectations."

"Nobody likes to write, but everyone loves to have written…"

"Perfectionism leads to paralysis, which leads to procrastination."

"It is easier to write than not to write…"

"It is not what you are that holds you back, but what you think you are not…"

"The most important thing is this: To sacrifice what you are for what you become…"

"Today is the first day of the rest of your life… and it could be the last day…"

"Right now a moment of time is passing by… We must become that moment."

Paul Cezanne

"Every concept grasped by the mind becomes an obstacle in the quest to those who search…" Gregory of Nyssa

"Searching for the truth through words and speech is like sticking your head in a bowl of glue." Yuan Wu

"The prayer of the monk is not perfect until he no longer recognizes himself or the fact that he is praying." St. Anthony

"The eye with which I see God is the same eye with which God sees me."

Meister Eckhart

"The only Zen you find on the tops of mountains is the Zen you bring up there."

Robert M. Pirsig

"The purpose of a fish trap is to catch fish, and when the fish are caught, the trap is forgotten."

" The purpose of a rabbit snare is to catch rabbits. When the rabbits are caught, the snare is forgotten."

" The purpose of words is to convey ideas. When the ideas are grasped, the words are forgotten."

"Where can I find a man who has forgotten words? He is the one I would like to talk to." Chuang-tzu

"It is good to have an end to journey toward, but it is the journey that matters in the end."

Ursula K. Le Guin

"The map is not the territory."

Alfred Korzbyski

"In walking, just walk. In sitting, just sit. Above all, don’t wobble."

Yun-men

"The only joy in the world is to begin."

Cesare Pavese

Another time I saw a child coming toward me holding a lighted torch in his hand. "Where have you brought the light from?" I asked him. He immediately blew it out and said to me, "O Hasan, tell me whence I fetched it."

Hasan Basri

"To set up what you like against what you dislike- this is the disease of the mind."

Seg-t’san

"When the student is ready, the master appears."

Buddhist proverb

"Teachers open the door, but you must enter by yourself."

Chinese proverb

"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the old; seek what they sought."

Basho

"Somebody showed it to me and I found it by myself."

Lew Welch

"I threw my cup away when I saw a child drinking from his hands at the trough."

Diogenes

TODAY.

John Ruskin’s desk

"Thinking is more interesting than knowing but less interesting than looking."

Goethe

"We are more curious about the meaning of dreams than about things we see when awake."

Diogenes

The "silly question" is the first intimation of some totally new development.

Alfred North Whitehead

Great Faith.

Great Doubt.

Great Effort.

Three qualities necessary for training.

"Whoever knows himself knows God."

Muhammad

"Life is what happens to you while your busy making other plans."

John Lennon

"When making your choice in life, do not neglect to live."

Samuel Johnson

1. Out of clutter, find simplicity.
2. From discord, find harmony.
3. In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.

Albert Einstein

"Zen is not some kind of excitement, but concentration on our usual everyday routine."

Shunryu Suzuki

"Talking about Zen all the time is like looking for fish tracks in a dry riverbed."

Wu-tzu

"It is not how many hours you practice, but what you put into the hours."

"The best revenge is success."

"You can’t talk yourself out of a problem you behaved yourself into."

Stephen R. Covey

"Practice does not make perfect.

Perfect practice does not make perfect.

Practice makes improvements and improvements lead towards excellence."

"Pain is mandatory. Suffering is optional."

AA

"Lost time is never found again."

"What is the goal? To be, not to do."

Triumph is just "umph" added to try.

"The greatest right in the world is the right to be wrong."

"You are what you think about."

The best vitamin for making friends: "B-1"

"He who throws mud loses ground."

"The only difference between a warrior and an ordinary man is that a warrior takes everything as a challenge, while an ordinary man takes everything -- a curse or blessing."

"Mind’s mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions."

"A hard thing about business is minding your own."

"Teachers open doors, you enter by yourself."

"It is a funny thing about life: If you refuse to accept anything but the best, you very often get it."

"Some folks won’t look up until they are flat on their back."

"A good example is the best sermon."

"Live as you wish your kids would."

"Feed your faith and doubt will starve itself."

"Well done is better than well said."

"One thing you can’t recycle is wasted time."

"Lost time is never found again."

"A quitter never wins; a winner never quits."

"Knowledge is not power, it is potential power. It is what you do with knowledge that is power."

"One who lacks courage to start has already finished."

"The Ten Commandments are not multiple choices."

"All know the way; a few walk it."

"The only good luck many great men had was being born with the ability and determination to overcome bad luck."

Luck stands for Labor Under Correct Knowledge.

Fear stands for False Evidence Appearing Real.

"Two thirds of promotion is motion."

"People forget how fast you did your job – but they remember how well you did it."

"We seldom think of what we have and often of what we lack."

"The secret of happiness is not in the doing what one likes but in liking what one does."

"If you don’t care where you are going, any road will get you there."

"The difference between ordinary and extraordinary…. is the little extra."

"Some people dream of worthy accomplishments while others stay awake and do them."

"Not all famous martial artists are winners and only a few winners will ever become famous."

"Success and failure are matters on interpretation."

"Rule #1: Don’t sweat the small stuff.

Rule #2: It’s all small stuff…"

"You can’t buy it,

You can’t rent it,

You can’t lease it,

You can’t borrow it,

You can’t steal it,

You can’t fake it,

You just do it………………………. Excellence."

"What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters

compared to what lies within us."

Oliver Wendell Holmes

"Service is the rent we pay for the privilege of living on this earth."

N. Eldon Tanner

"Sometimes when I consider what tremendous

consequences come from little things…

I am tempted to think…

There are no little things."

Bruce Barton

"The greatest battles of life are fought out daily in the silent chambers of the soul."

David O. McKay

"If you win the battles there, if you settle the issues that inwardly conflict, you feel a sense of peace, a sense of knowing what you’re about. And you’ll find that he public victories-where you tend to think cooperatively, to promote the welfare and good of other people, and to be genuinely happy for the other people’s successes-will follow naturally."

Stephen R. Covey

"The Lord works from the inside out.

The world works from the outside in.

The world would take people out of the slums.

Christ takes the slums out of people, and then they take themselves out of the slums.

The world would mold men by changing theirs environment.

Christ changes men, who then change their environment. The world would shape human behavior, but Christ can change human nature."

Ezra Taft Benson

"We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience."

Teilhard de Chardin

"The royal road to success would have more travelers if so many weren’t lost attempting to find short cuts."

To see a World in a Grain of Sand

And a Heaven in a Wildflower

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand

In the Orient, there is a story of a samurai who is being chased by a bear. He literally runs off a cliff. As he’s falling, he grabs a branch.

He looks up and sees the bear leaning over the cliff, clawing at his head, missing only by inches. As he looks down to the ground below, only about fifteen feet, he sees a lion leaping up, missing his feet only by inches. As he looks at the branch he is clutching, he sees two groundhogs gnawing away at it. He watches as his lifeline disappears, bite by bite.

As he takes a deep, long breath, he notices, next to his branch, a clump of wild strawberries. In the midst of the clump is a great, red, juicy strawberry. With his one free hand, he reaches over, picks the strawberry, puts it in his mouth, chews it slowly and says, "Ah—delicious."

It is said that what the caterpillar calls the end of the world the master calls the butterfly. There is a Zen story about a peasant farmer who owned a beautiful horse desired by others. One day it disappeared. When all the villagers remarked on his bad luck, he calmly replied, "Maybe so, maybe not." A few days later the horse returned, leading a heard of fine wild horses. A week later, his only son was thrown and crippled while training the horses. When the villagers again remarked on his bad luck, he calmly replied, "Maybe so, maybe not." Within a week, a frivolous war was declared by the emperor and all young men, save the farmer’s son, were forced into battle and none returned.

We sit around in a ring and suppose

There was a man hanging from a cliff two thousand feet above the valley floor. The terrified man looked to the top of the cliff and screamed, "Is there anyone up there who can help me?"

A deep, booming reply came from above, "Yes, I’ll help you. I’m the Lord. Just relax and let go."

A long pause.

"Is there anyone else up there who can help me?"

Why not go out on a limb? That’s where the fruit is.

The little I know, I owe to my ignorance.

Sacha Guitry

Toutes Reflexions Faites

Nothing is more dangerous than an idea when it is the only one you have.—Emile Chartier

Normally, we do not so much look at things as overlook them.—Alan Watts

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.—Helen Keller

The only person who likes change is a wet baby.—Roy Z-M Blitzer

What a strange machine man is! You fill him with bread, wine, fish and radishes, and out of him come sighs, laughter and dreams.—Nikos Kazantzakis

Zorba the Greek

My name used to be Me. But now it’s You.—Theophane the Monk

In Aikido, there are no enemies. The mistake is to begin to think that budo (the way of the warrior) means to have an opponent or enemy; somebody you want to be stronger than, someone you want to throw down. In true budo there is no enemy or opponent. True budo is to become one with the universe.—Morihei Ueshiba

Anyone can count the seeds in an apple.

No one can count the apples in a seed.—Anonymous

Ryoken, a Zen master, lived the simplest kind of life in a little hut at the foot of a mountain. One evening a thief visited the hut, only to discover there was nothing in it to steal.

Ryoken returned and caught him. "You may have come a long way to visit me," he told the prowler, "and you should not return empty handed. Please take my clothes as a gift."

The thief was bewildered. He took the clothes and slunk away.

Ryoken sat naked, watching the moon. "Poor fellow," he mused. "I wish I could give him this beautiful moon."

…everytime you think you are not happy, say "I am happy." Say it strongly to yourself, even if your feelings are contradictory. Remember, it is your self-image and not you. Just as fast as a fish can move in water, you can instantly change to a happy balanced attitude.—Tarthang Tulku Rinpoche

"The Self-Image"

Years ago there was a Christian monastery in Egypt. It was very poor materially. The only precious possessions were the Scriptures, written on three beautiful scrolls, that were always left open on a table in a small study near the chapel.

One day a monk came out of the study, screaming, "Father! Father! Someone is stealing the scrolls!"

The abbot of the monastery came running to the study and saw that two scrolls were indeed missing. But on the windowsill was the third scroll. It had been dropped by the thief.

The abbot grabbed the third scroll and dashed off in the direction of the fleeing thief. After a long chase, the abbot finally caught him.

The exhausted thief collapsed on the ground and surrendered himself to his captor and awaited the subsequent severe punishment rendered to thieves in those days.

Instead, the abbot stood in front of the man and handed him the third scroll, exclaiming, "I have been chasing you for quite awhile. I wanted to give you this third scroll. You forgot to take it and it is the most important one. The teachings would be incomplete without it."

With this, the abbot bowed and walked back to the monastery.

Shortly thereafter, the thief returned to the monastery with the scrolls, totally committed to becoming one of its monks.

What we see, and like to see, is cure and change. But what we do see and do not want to see is care, the participation I the pain, solidarity in suffering, the sharing in the experience of brokenness. And still, cure without care is as dehumanizing as a gift given with a cold heart.—Henri Nouwen

Man is most nearly himself when he achieves the seriousness of a child at play.—Heraclitus