Quotes from George Leonard

The best horse, according to Suzuki, may be the worst horse. And the worst horse can be the best, for if it perseveres, it will have learned whatever it is practicing all the way to the marrow of its bones.

Perhaps the best you can hope for on the master's journey—whether your art be management or marriage, badminton or ballet—is to cultivate the mind and heart of the beginning at every stage along the way. For the master, surrender means there are no experts. There are only learners.

Perhaps the safest prediction we can make about the future is that it will surprise us.

It would be truly foolish to let the decline of communism blind us to the long-term contradictions in a free market economy unrestrained by considerations of the environment and social justice, and driven by heedless consumerism, instant gratification, and the quick fix.

More and more, the universe looks like a great thought rather than a great machine," says astronomer Sir James Jeans.

Where in our upbringing, our schooling, our career are we explicitly taught to value, to enjoy, even to love the plateau, the long stretch of diligent effort with no seeming progress?

The people we know as masters don't devote themselves to their particular skill just to get better at it. The truth is, they love to practice—and because of this they do get better.

Perhaps we'll never know how far the path can go, how much a human being can truly achieve, until we realize that the ultimate reward is not a gold medal but the path itself.

To be a learner, you've got to be willing to be a fool.

At the heart of ech of us,whatever the imperfections..exists a silent pulse of perfect rhythm....which connect us to the universe.

Intentionality fuels the master's journey. Every master is a master of vision.

For the master, surrender means there are no experts. There are only learners.

Our preoccupation with goals, results, and the quick fix has separated us from our own experiences.

Indecision leads to inaction, which leads to low energy, depression, despair.

Relaxation is essential for the full expression of power.

What we call "mastery" can be defined as that mysterious process through which what is at first difficult or even impossible becomes easy and pleasurable through diligent, patient, long-term practice.

Excessive use of external motivation can slow and even stop your journey to mastery.

It is in fact nothing short of a miracle," Albert Einstein wrote, "that the modern methods of instruction have not yet entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry. . . . It is a very grave mistake to think that the enjoyment of seeing and searching can be promoted by means of coercion and sense of duty.

The best way to describe your total creative capacity is to say that for all practical purposes it is infinite.

Who knows how many potential Olympic medalists have turned away from sports because of youth-league coaches who preach that the purpose of life lies in beating the school on the other side of town, and that it doesn't matter how you play the game, just so you win.

In the long run, the war against mastery, the path of patient, dedicated effort without attachment to immediate results, is a war that can't be won.

Of what is the body made? It is made of emptiness and rhythm. At the ultimate heart of the body, at the heart of the world, there is no solidity... there is only the dance.

Perhaps the greatest adventure of all is intimacy: the willingness to strip away one layer of reticence after another, and on certain occasions to live entirely in the moment, revealing everything and expecting nothing in return.

Ultimately, nothing in this life is "commonplace," nothing is "in between." The threads that join your every act, your every thought, are infinite. All paths of mastery eventually merge.