Quotes from Idries Shah

Exaggeration is a standard peculiarity of man. To deprecate is often a form of exaggeration which people do not notice, because it appears to be its opposite.

Premature independence is the daughter of conceit.

The mine is always bigger than the gem.

Saying of the Prophet Accusations Anyone reviling a brother for a sin will not himself die before committing it.

When you realise the difference between the container and the content, you will have knowledge

The function of a nutrient is to become transmuted, not to leave unaltered traces.

The secret of Sufism is that it has no secret at all'.

Mediation - Before you learn how to meditate, you must unlearn what you think meditation might be.

Service I will not serve God like a labourer, in expectation of my wages. Rabia el-Adawia.

Trying to force something is the best way to stop it happening.

But the minimum human duty is to serve others: it is no great attainment.

Neither imagine that you are false, nor lash yourself, for both may be forms of self-indulgence.

The more wakeful a man is to the things which surround him, the more asleep is he, and his waking is worse than his sleep.

Virtually all organisations known to you work largely by means of your greed. They attract you because... they appeal to your greed.

He who knows himself, knows his Lord' means, among other things, that self-deception prevents knowledge.

There is a saying that, according to what a person's mentality is, even an angel may seem to him to have a devil's face.

The automatism of man is overcome, in the words of Dhun'Nun, by aiming for 'being as you were, where you were, before you were'.

Saying of the Prophet Humility Humility and courtesy are themselves a part of piety.

You are still adrift while you still think that a means is an end.

What you are seeking in your retreat, I see clearly in every road and alleyway.

Inheritance and culture obscure people's higher capacities.

The skilled artisan uses the same iron to make a horseshoe As he does for a polished mirror for the King.

You can learn more in half an hour's direct contact with a source of knowledge (no matter the apparent reason for the contact or the subject of the transaction) than you can in years of formal effort.

Things which are seemingly opposed may in fact be working together