Quotes from Idries Shah

He who sleeps on the Road will lose either his hat or his head.

A stolen kiss is not easily returned.

Definitions from Mulla Do-Piaza Drugs: Source of the mystical experience of the ignorant.

All forms are limited. Some of the limitations are time, place, culture, language.

Rust through washing never became white.

Disappointment cannot exist without expectation. "The expected apricot is never as sweet when it reaches the mouth.

Saying of the Prophet Women Women are the twin-halves of men.

People who cannot trust are themselves not trustworthy, and therefore cannot be entrusted with important things.

One of the basic Sufi needs is to enable people to see themselves as they really are.

Words, they say, are the food of minds. But, like other foods, they can do little by themselves.

Sufi service has to be the right kind of service; neither servitude nor hypocrisy.

If you have no troubles – buy a goat.

It will pass, whatever it is.

Saying of the Prophet Sleep Sleep is the brother of death.

Why did I do such-and-such a thing?' is all very well. But what about 'How otherwise could I have done it?'.

People talk about 'service, effort, love, knowledge'. But with knowledge you know what love is, and what it is not.

Saying of the Prophet Privacy Whoever invades people´s privacy corrupts them.

When prayer, rituals and ascetic life are just a means of self-indulgence, they are harmful rather than beneficial.

Sufism is experience, and hence not to be defined – imprisoned – in perennial, static categories.

Teaching One hour's teaching is better than a whole night of prayer.

Patience is the food of understanding.

Learn how much knowledge is needed before we can see how ignorant we are.

Los ángeles son los poderes ocultos en las facultades y órganos del hombre

An old fool is worse than a young one: For the young may always grow wise. (Zohair)