words of wisdom

Be as the still mountain,
Move like the great river.

~Chang Tzu ~

A thousand mile journey
begins with one step.

~Lao Tzu~

Do not go where the path may lead;
go, instead where there is no path
and leave a trail.

~Ralph Waldo Emerson~

Two roads diverge in a wood,
and I – I took the one less traveled by,
and that has made all the difference.

~Robert Frost~

The wild geese do not intend
to cast their reflection,
The water has no mind
to receive their image.

~a Zen saying~

What the caterpillar calls
the end of the world,
the master calls a butterfly.

~Richard Bach~

What is now proved was
once only imagined.

~William Blake~

When you come to the edge of
all the light you know,
and are about to step off
into the darkness of the unknown,
faith is knowing one of two things will happen:
there will be something solid to stand on,
or you will be taught how to fly.

~Unknown~

When one door closes another opens.
But we often look so long
and so regretfully upon
the closed door that
we fail to see the one
that has opened for us.

~Alexander Graham Bell~

You cannot kill time
without injuring eternity.

~Henry David Thoreau~

What does not change
is the will to change.

~Charles Olson~

Sometimes your joy
is the source of your smile,
but sometimes your smile
can be the source of your joy.

~Thich Nhat Hanh~

We can easily forgive a child
who is afraid of the dark;
the real tragedy of life is
when men are afraid of the light.

~Plato~

Who says the eternal being does not exist?
Who says the sun has gone out?
Someone who climbs up on the roof
and closes his eyes tight and says,
I don’t see anything.

~Rumi~

We make a living by what we get.
We make a life by what we give.

~Winston Churchill~

You see things and say ‘Why?
But I dream things that never were
and say ‘Why Not?’.

~George Bernard Shaw~

An optimist is a person
who sees a green light everywhere,
while a pessimist sees
only the red stoplight…
The truly wise person is color-blind.

~Albert Schweitzer~

Twenty years from now you will be more
disappointed by the things you didn’t do
than by the ones you did do.

So throw off the bowlines.
Sail away from the safe harbour.
Catch the trade winds in your sails.
Explore. Dream. Discover.

~Mark Twain~

If we will be quiet and ready enough,
we shall find compensation in every
disappointment.

~Henry David Thoreau~

You must live in the present,
launch yourself on every wave,
find your eternity in each moment.

~Henry David Thoreau~

The only wealth is life.

~Henry David Thoreau~

To know that we know what we know,
and that we do not know what we
do not know, that is true knowledge.

~Henry David Thoreau~

Distrust any enterprise
that requires new clothes.

~Henry David Thoreau~

If you have built castles in the air,
your work need not be lost;
that is where they should be.
Now put the foundations under them.

~Henry David Thoreau~

We must walk consciously
only part way toward our goal,
and then leap in the darkness
to our success.

~Henry David Thoreau~

Experience is in the fingers and head.
The heart is forever inexperienced.

~Henry David Thoreau~

Autobiography in Five Chapters

1) I walk down the street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk
I fall in.
I am lost… I am hopeless.
It isn’t my fault.
It takes forever to find a way out.

2) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I pretend I don’t see it.
I fall in again.
I can’t believe I’m in the same place.
But it isn’t my fault.
It still takes a long time to get out.

3) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I see it is there.
I still fall in… it’s a habit
My eyes are open
I know where I am
It is my fault.
I get out immediately.

4) I walk down the same street.
There is a deep hole in the sidewalk.
I walk around it.

5) I walk down another street.

~The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying~