kay > kay's Quotes

“At birth he enters the realm of dreams only to awaken to reality at death.”
― Okakura Kakuzo, The Book of Tea

“Death is a stripping away of all that is not you. The secret of life is to 'die before you die'—and find that there is no death.”
― Eckhart Tolle

“Lust and learning,” Katherine once said. “That’s really all there is, isn’t it?”
― John Williams, Stoner

“Perfection is everywhere if we only choose to recognise it. Rikiu loved to quote an old poem which says: ‘To those who long only for flowers, fain would I show the full-blown spring which abides in the toiling buds of snow-covered hills.”
― Okakura Kakuzo, El libro del té

“This tumultuous sea of foolish troubles which we call life are constantly in a state of misery while vainly trying to appear happy and contented. We stagger in the attempt to keep our moral equilibrium, and see forerunners of the tempest in every cloud that floats on the horizon. Yet there is joy and beauty in the roll of the billows as they sweep outward toward eternity. Why not enter into their spirit, or, like Liehtse, ride upon the hurricane itself?”
― Okakura Kakuzo, El libro del té

“But, after all, we see only our own image in the universe-- our particular idiosyncrasies dictate the mode of our perceptions.”
― Okakura Kakuzo, The Book of Tea

“When you become comfortable with uncertainty, infinite possibilities open up in your life.”
― Eckhart Tolle

“Peace is every step.”
― Thích Nhất Hạnh, Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life

“The best books... are those that tell you what you know already.”
― George Orwell, 1984

“There is also the memory of the hut in the mind of the traveler-- and in the mind of the reader reading this description. Wabi-sabi, in its purest, most idealised form, is precisely about these delicate traces, this faint evidence, at the border of nothingness.”
― Leonard Koren, Wabi-Sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers

“Yesterday a dream; tomorrow dust. Nothing, just before, just after, smoke.”
― Francisco de Quevedo y Villegas

“The art of today is that which really belongs to us: it is our own reflection. In condemning it we but condemn ourselves.”
― Okakura Kakuzo, The Book of Tea

“We live as we dream--alone....”
― Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

“You seem to be under the impression that there is a special breed of bad humans. There is no such thing as a stereotype bad man in this world. Under normal conditions, everybody is more or less good, or, at least, ordinary. But tempt them, and they may suddenly change. That is what is so frightening about men.”
― Natsume Soseki, Kokoro

“In this core reality all things are indeed Empty, and the mind is like a mirror which reflects a world but attaches nowhere and grasps at nothing. This is the pure formless mind; a direct and immediate pointing to true reality which admits of no secondary pointing via names, descriptions, views, doctrines, symbols, images, icons, and the like.
Curiously, yet significantly, this Emptiness can be characterized as a kind of fullness. Emptiness in and of itself is truly Empty, but as lived out or activated in the world of living human existence it is truly non-empty and enlightens or illuminates all things. That is to say, the formless or awakened mind becomes a new or transformed basis for functioning in the world of forms, not a retreat center for withdrawal from that world. It functions in the world of form, but, by being no longer based in subject/ object consciousness, it is no longer "stained" by it. The pure mirror reflects directly, immediately, and without subjectivity that which it meets, and it meets the world of form as it is. This is what is meant by the Buddhist statement, "true Emptiness, wondrous being.”
― Richard B. Pilgrim

“You see, loneliness is the price we have to pay for being born in this modern age, so full of freedom, independence, and our own egoistical selves.”
― Natsume Soseki, Kokoro

“Tell me, gentle flowers, teardrops of the stars, standing in the garden, nodding your heads to the bees as they sing of the dews and the sunbeams, are you aware of the fearful doom that awaits you? Dream on, sway and frolic while you may in the gentle breezes of summer. To-morrow a ruthless hand will close around your throats. You will be wrenched, torn asunder limb by limb, and borne away from your quiet homes. The wretch, she may be passing fair. She may say how lovely you are while her fingers are still moist with your blood. Tell me, will this be kindness?”
― Okakura Kakuzo, El libro del té

“I'm quite illiterate, but I read a lot. ”
― J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye

“And her joy was nearly like sorrow.”
― John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath

“For a few moments in the evening, then, they talked quietly and casually, as if they were old friends or exhausted enemies.”
― John Williams, Stoner

“When he had thought of death before, he had thought of it either as a literary event or as the slow, quiet attrition of time against imperfect flesh.”
― John Williams, Stoner

“He really had been through death, but he had returned because he could not bear the solitude.”
― Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

“...time was not passing...it was turning in a circle...”
― Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

“Lost in the solitude of his immense power, he began to lose direction.”
― Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

“Death really did not matter to him but life did, and therefore the sensation he felt when they gave their decision was not a feeling of fear but of nostalgia.”
― Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

“It is the stupid and the ugly who have the best of it in this world”
― Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

“The closer things get to nonexistence, the more exquisite and evocative they become. Consequently to experience wabi-wabi means you have to slow way down, be patient, and look very closely.”
― Leonard Koren, Wabi-Sabi: for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers

“Greatness depends on where you are coming from.”
― Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Half of a Yellow Sun

“if something is there, you can only see it with your eyes open, but if it isn't there, you can see it just as well with your eyes closed. That's why imaginary things are often easier to see than real ones.”
― Norton Juster, The Phantom Tollbooth

“Art is never finished, only abandoned.”
― Leonardo da Vinci