What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.

Oliver Wendall Holmes

If you are not happy here and now, you never will be.

Taisen Deshimaru

If I meet a hundred year old man  and I have something to teach him, I will teach; if I meet an eight-year-old boy and he has something to teach me, I will learn.

Chao-chou

Chanting is no more holy than listening to the murmur of a stream,

counting prayer beads no more sacred than simply breathing,

religious robes no more spiritual than work clothes.

Lao-Tzu 

This life of ours would not cause you sorrow if you thought of it as like the mountain cherry blossoms which bloom and fade in a day.

Murasaki Shikibu

We accept the graceful falling of mountain cherry blossoms, but it is much harder for us to fall away from our own attachment to the world.

Rengetsu

1.Get enough to eat, and eat it.

2. Find a place to sleep where it is quiet, and sleep there.

3. Reduce intellectual and emotional noise until you arrive at the silence of yourself, and listen to it.

4.

Richard Brautigan

You can only find truth with logic if you have already found truth without it.

G. K. Chesterton

Often people attempt to live their lives backwards: they try to have more things, or more money, in order to do more of what they want so they will be happier. The way it actually works is the reverse. You must first be who you really are, then, do what you need to do, in order to have what you want.

Margeret Young

Everything is perfect, but there is a lot of room for improvement.

Shunryu Suzuki

Empty the boat of your life, O man; when empty it will swiftly sail. When empty of passions and harmful desires you are bound for the land of Nirvana.

The Dhammapada

Each day should be passed as if it were our last.

Publilius Syrus

He who knows others is wise. He who knows himself is enlightened.

Tao Te Ching

Catch the vigorous horse of your mind.

Zen Saying

He did each single thing as if he did nothing else.

Charles Dickens

Today is always here. Tomorrow, never.

Toni Morrison, Beloved (Knopf)

The Great Way is not difficult for those who have no preferences. When love and hate are both absent everything becomes clear and undisguised. Make the smallest distiction however and heaven and earth are set infinitely apart.

Seng-T'san

To be awake is to be alive. I have never yet met a man who was quite awake. How could I have looked him in the face?

Henry David Thoreau

When a fish swims, it swims on and on, and there is no end to the water. When a bird flies, it flies on and on, and there is no end to the sky. There never was a fish that swam out of water, or a bird that flew out of sky. When they need a little water or sky, they use a little; when they need a lot, they use a lot. Thus they use all of it at every moment, and in every place they have perfect freedom.

Dogen

LOVING KINDNESS MEDITATION

If anyone has hurt me or harmed me knowingly or unknowingly in thought, word, or deed, I freely forgive them. And I too ask forgiveness if I have hurt anyone or harmed anyone knowingly or unknowingly in thought, word, or deed.

Theravada Buddhism

Do not permit the events of your daily lives to bind you, but never withdraw yourselves from them. Only by acting thus can you earn the title of "A Liberated One."

Huang-Po

If a man should conquer in battle a thousand and a thousand more, and another man should conquer himself, his would be the greater victory, because the greatest victories is the victory over oneself.

The Dhammapada

Seize from every moment its unique novelty, and do not prepare your joys.

Andre' Gide

I'm astounded by people who want to "know" the univers when it's hard enough to find you way around Chinatown.

Woody Allen

Cherish what you have, so not to miss it when it's gone.

A Fortune Cookie.

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