Wisdom,
Polarity & Paradox

 

CONTENTS

WISDOM, POLARITY & BALANCE

" The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool."
(As You Like It) Shakespeare

Genius is the ability to reduce the complicated to the simple - C.W. Ceran

No man is free who cannot command himself - Pythagoras

"Wisdom is the power to play with opposites" Robert Assagioli

The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time,
and still retain the ability to function.
-- F. Scott Fitzgerald

"true strength is delicate' Loise Nevelson

Thus, those who say they would have right without its correlate, wrong; or good government without its correlate, misrule, do not apprehend the great principles of the universe, nor the nature of all creation. - Chuang Tzu

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COMMUNICATION

Vision is the art of seeing the invisible. Jonathan Swift

The most important thing in communication is to hear what isn't being said."
-- Peter F. Drucker.

"To serve is to rule"

The name that can be named is not the real name - Lao Tzu

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HELPING OTHERS

You can only make others better by being good yourself. Hugh R. Hanels

"One of the many paradoxes about soul-making is that its reward is the most valuable and unique a person could have, and yet its raw material is often the most despised and common" Thomas Moore

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SUFFERING

"We are healed of suffering only by experiencing it to the full" Marcel Proust

"one must have chaos in one to give birth to a dancing star" Fredrich Nietzche

For fast acting relief try slowing down. Lily Tomlin

"the uncertainty about what I and the patient are there for, is what we are there for" James Hillman

"We are afraid of things that cannot harm us, and we know it. And we long for things which cannot help us and we know it. But actually it is something within us that we are afraid of, and it is something within ourselves we long for"

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LOVE

You want to be loved because you do not love; but the moment you love, it is finished, you are no longer inquiring whether or not somebody loves you. - J. Krishnamurti

"They do not love that do not show their love. " ~ William Shakespeare
(The Two Gentlemen from Verona)

'Hatred is self-suicide and love is self-sacrifice.' Yogi Bhajan

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CHANGE

Change is the only Constant! - I Ching

'Not having flexibility to change is a tragedy in itself,
and having too much flexibility not to stand for anything is a tragedy in itself.' Yogi Bhajan

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HAPPINESS

'A graceful person is one who remains graceful even through all ungraceful times.
A happy person is one who remains happy through all unhappy times.' Yogi Bhajan

Perfect happiness is the absence of striving for happiness. Chuang Tzu

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CHANCE & LUCK

The harder you work the luckier you get. Gary Player - Golfer

"Chance favors the prepared mind" -
Louis Pasteur

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CHINESE WISDOM - TAOISM

Change is the only Constant! - I Ching

To embrace all is to be selfless - Lao Tzu

"Be really whole and all things will come to you" Lao-Tzu

Perfect happiness is the absence of striving for happiness. Chuang Tzu

Flexibility Masters Hardness - Taoism

Thus, those who say they would have right without its correlate, wrong; or good government without its correlate, misrule, do not apprehend the great principles of the universe, nor the nature of all creation. - Chuang Tzu

When the Great Tao is lost, we have "goodness" and "righteousness." When wisdom" and "sagacity" arise we have great hypocrites - Lao Tzu

When everyone knows beauty as beautiful, there is already ugliness;
When everyone knows goodness as goodness, there is already evil.
"To be" and "not to be" arise mutually - Lao Tzu

Tao Te Ching

Look at it you can not see it!
It's Name is Formless!
Listen to it you can not hear it!
It's name is soundless.
Grasp it but you cannot get it!
It's name is Incorporeal.

These three attributes are unfathomable,
Therefore they fuse into one.

It's upperside is not bright:
It's underside not dim.
Continually the unnameable moves on,
Until it returns beyond the realm of things.

We call it the formless Form, the imageless Image.
We call it the indefinable and unimaginable.

Confront it and you do not see it's face!
Follow it and you do not see it's back!
Yet equipped with this timeless Tao,
You can harness present realities.

To know the origins is initiation into the Tao.

- by Lao Tzu

 

Chapter 8 - Tao Te Ching

The Highest form of goodness is like water
Water knows how to benefit all things without striving with them.
It stays in places loathed by all men
Therefore it comes near the Tao.

More from the Dao De Jing:

Unborn

Heaven and Earth last forever.
Why do heaven and Earth last forever?
They are unborn, So ever living.
The sage stays behind, thus he is ahead.
He is detached, thus at one with all.
Through selfless action, he attains fulfillment.

Dao De Jing - Chapter 7

Strength, Ignorance & Health

"true strength is delicate" Louise Nevelson

Knowing ignorance is strength.
Ignoring knowledge is sickness.
If one is sick of sickness, then one is not sick.
The sage is not sick because he is sick of sickness.
Therefore he is not sick.

Dao De Jing - Chapter 71

The softest thing in the universe
Overcomes the hardest thing in the universe
That without substance can enter where there is no room
Hence I know the value of non-action
Teaching without words and work without doing
Are understood by very few.

from Tao of Power (Dao De Jing)

Wisdom of the Sages

Passage 81:
Sages do not accumulate.
The more they do for others, the more they gain.
The more they give to others, the more they possess.

Passage 77:
Sages act without expectation,
succeed without taking credit,
and have no desire to display their excellence.

Passage2:
Sages hold their position without effort,
practice their philosophy without words,
are a part of all things and overlook nothing.
They produce but do not possess,
act without expectation,
succeed without taking credit.

Passage 7:
Sages put themselves last, and yet they are first.
Put themselves outside, and yet they remain.
Is it not because they are without self-interest that their interests succeed?

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POLARITY - quotes by Yogi Bhajan

'Faith means one-pointedness of mind towarads infinity. Duality means one-pointedness of mind toward two existences, Infinite and finite.'

'In all darkness, there is a light and in all light there is a darkness.'

'Giving does not mean cleverness. Giving is not giving when you feel you are losing something. Giving in reality is creating an effective vacuum, sucking the flow from the great infinite Consciousness. That is giving.'

'The highest man is he who can uninvolve in every involvement.'

'A graceful person is one who remains graceful even through all ungraceful times.
A happy person is one who remains happy through all unhappy times.'

'Hatred is self-suicide and love is self-sacrifice.'

'What is God union? It is the same union that we find in our polarity. In that ecstasy, in that enjoyment where there is a complete merger of two polarities, when the female offers herself and the male accepts, both unite in that ecstasy of infinity. In such a union soul is born out of the soul of a woman, which changes the face of the earth.'

'It is not only the child that is born which is creativity, it is the merger of the two polarities that is highly important.'

'Of God you are the polarity. God is infinite and you are finite.'

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