The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.

Recommended reading: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change.

Maturity begins with the capacity to sense and, in good time and without defensiveness, admit to our own craziness. If we are not regularly deeply embarrassed by who we are, the journey to self-knowledge hasn’t begun.

Recommended reading: The Course of Love.

 

Don’t let the force of an impression when it first hit you knock you off your feet; just say to it: Hold on a moment; let me see who you are and what you represent. Let me put you to the test.

Recommended reading: Art of Living: The Classical Manual on Virtue, Happiness, and Effectiveness.

In the strictest sense, we cannot actually think about life and reality at all, because this would have to include thinking about thinking, thinking about thinking about thinking, and so ad infinitum. One can only attempt a rational, descriptive philosophy of the universe on the assumption that one is totally separate from it. But if you and your thoughts are part of this universe, you cannot stand outside them to describe them. This is why all philosophical and theological systems must ultimately fall apart. To “know” reality you cannot stand outside it and define it; you must enter into it, be it, and feel it.

Recommended reading: The Wisdom of Insecurity.

Let there be spaces in your togetherness, And let the winds of the heavens dance between you. Love one another but make not a bond of love: Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls. Fill each other’s cup but drink not from one cup. Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf. Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone, Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music. Give your hearts, but not into each other’s keeping. For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts. And stand together, yet not too near together: For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.

Recommended reading: The Prophet.

The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places.

Recommended reading: For Whom the Bell Tolls.

I feel what you feel but you name it fear; I name it a call to action.

Recommended reading: The Art of Peace: Teachings of the Founder of Aikido.

People wish to be settled; only as far as they are unsettled is there any hope for them.

Recommended reading: Nature.

The great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.

Recommended reading: The Essential Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Solitude does not necessarily mean living apart from others; rather, it means never living apart from one’s self. It is not about the absence of other people – it is about being fully present to ourselves, whether or not we are with others. Community does not necessarily mean living face-to-face with others; rather, it means never losing the awareness that we are connected to each other. It is not about the presence of other people – it is about being fully open to the reality of relationship, whether or not we are alone.

Recommended reading: A Hidden Wholeness: The Journey Toward an Undivided Life.