Quotes About Wisdom

My philosophy is to live below your means.

It's so much more interesting having life under your belt.

Intelligence is the door to freedom and alert attention is the mother of intelligence. NISARGADATTA MAHARAJ, I Am That

attention and the awareness that arises from it are the doorway to true education and learning — life-long gifts that keep deepening with use.

By grounding yourself in mindfulness early in the morning, you are reminding yourself that things are always changing, that good and bad things come and go, and that it is possible to embody a perspective of constancy, wisdom, and inner peace as you face any conditions that present themselves.

Imagine forty-five years of profound teaching distilled into one sentence: "Nothing is to be clung to as 'I,' 'me,' or 'mine.

Oh, I've had my moments, and if I had to do it over again, I'd have more of them. In fact, I'd try to have nothing else. Just moments, one after another, instead of living so many years ahead of each day. —NADINE STAIR, EIGHTY-FIVE YEARS OLD, LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY

There are an infinite number of ways in which people suffer. Therefore, there must be an infinite number of ways in which the Dharma is made available to people." What he meant by Dharma was the universal teachings of the Buddha on suffering and the possibility of liberation from suffering.

Common sense is no match for the voice of God.

Pat was a serious listener. He was one of the first people who really challenged my ideas: 'Do you really believe that? Why? Don't accept everything you read. You should question it all, take what makes sense, and throw away the rest.' He was constantly asking, 'Did you ever consider this? What about that?' He changed the way I thought. (quoting Russell Baer, Army Ranger.)

Crusty old alpinists who've survived a lifetime of close scrapes like to counsel young protégés that staying alive hinges on listening carefully to one's "inner voice.

Climb if you will, but remember that courage and strength are nought without prudence, and that a momentary negligence may destroy the happiness of a lifetime. Do nothing in haste; look well to each step; and from the beginning think what may be the end.

escala si quieres, pero recuerda que el coraje y la fuerza no son nada sin la prudencia, y que un descuido momentáneo puede destruir la felicidad de toda una vida. No hagas nada con precipitación; vigila cada paso que des, y, desde el principio, piensa en cuál puede ser el final.

There was a hint in it of laughter, but of a laughter more terrible than any sadness—a laughter that was mirthless as the smile of the Sphinx, a laughter cold as the frost and partaking of the grimness of infallibility. It was the masterful and incommunicable wisdom of eternity laughing at the futility of life and the effort of life. It was the Wild, the savage, frozen-hearted Northland Wild.

Jackson lead as he lived, sometimes with his heart, sometimes with his mind, sometimes with both.

Immaturity is the inability to use one's understanding without guidance from another.

So what can we, in our time, learn from the past, even while we're getting knocked in the head? That the perfect should not be the enemy of the good. That compromise is the oxygen of democracy. And that we learn the most from those who came before not by gazing up at them uncritically or down on them condescendingly but by looking them in the eye and taking their true measure as human beings, not as gods.

Once, when a Republican congressman from Massachusetts accused Lincoln of having changed his mind, Lincoln replied, "Yes, I have; and I don't think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.

One wishes for a better outcome, for wiser heads, for a more compassionate public. Yet one wishes in vain. The only comfort, if we can call it that, is that a knowledge of our past failings may equip us to confront evil without delay when evil comes again. For it will.

I THINK IT IS MONTAIGNE who has said that ignorance is the softest pillow on which a man can rest his head

The people have often made mistakes, but given time and the facts, they will make the corrections. —HARRY S. TRUMAN

To Lincoln, God whispered His will through conscience, calling humankind to live in accord with the laws of love.

Lincoln replied, "Yes, I have; and I don't think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday.

Reason's last step is the recognition that there are an infinite number of things which are beyond it," the