The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends. One repays a teacher badly if one always remains nothing but a pupil.
Love takes off the masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within. I use the word "love" here not merely in the personal sense but as a state of being, or a state of grace — not in the infantile American sense of being made happy but in the tough and universal sense of quest and daring and growth.
3w ago
It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves. And when at last we stand upon the summit, we discover that the view we sought was not the landscape below, but the expanded vision within.
1mo ago
We do not receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves after a journey that no one can take for us or spare us.
2mo ago
We are development. We are process. We are not what we are, but what we are making of ourselves. The self is not a being but an act.
Understanding your tendencies doesn't just give you a lens to help choose the most suitable sabbatical; it also provides a mirror to help you see the life that warrants reexamination.
Somehow the despondency thus treated becomes pregnant with an access to new vitality. The organism needs to lie dormant whilst its latent energies are gathering strength for activity on a fresh plane. It is important, moreover, to observe that, so long as there is growth, the fresh plane is likewise a higher plane.
3mo ago
We are not the same persons this year as last; nor are those we love. It is a happy chance if we, changing, continue to love a changed person.
4mo ago
We do not receive wisdom, we must discover it for ourselves, after a journey through the wilderness which no one else can make for us, which no one can spare us, for our wisdom is the point of view from which we come at last to regard the world.
They are afraid of dragons because they are afraid of freedom. There is no greater freedom than the self-permission to be entirely ourselves, an entirety we must go on embracing as it goes on expanding, goes on revealing its edges and its shadows.
4mo ago
The mind, once stretched by a new experience, never returns to its original dimensions.
I decided at age 13 that I would read books to attain wisdom—and I've kept it up ever since. I got all those other benefits—job skills, entertainment, etc.—along the way. Even more interesting, I gained a powerful but intangible benefit from these tens of thousands of hours devoted to good books.
I decided at age 13 that I would read books to attain wisdom—and I've kept it up ever since. Maybe that sounds absurd when mentioned so baldly. But here's the strange thing: I got all those other benefits—job skills, entertainment, etc.—along the way.
I decided at age 13 that I would read books to attain wisdom—and I've kept it up ever since. But here's the strange thing. I got all those other benefits—job skills, entertainment, etc.—along the way.
8mo ago
Underscored — save the words that stop you in your tracks.
