Traditional Quotes

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The True Path is the path on which
there is no coming and no going.
- Traditional Zen Koan

A son is a son till he takes him a wife,
a daughter is a daughter all of her life.
- Irish Traditional

I give you this one thought to keep -
I am with you still - I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond glints on snow,
I am the sunlight on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning's hush,
I am the sweet uplifting rush,
of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft starts that shine at night.
Do not think of me as gone -
I am with you still in each new dawn.
- Traditional Native American Prayer

Overflowing Cup of Tea:
The Zen Master poured his visitor's teacup full, and then kept pouring.
The visitor watched until he could no longer restrain himself.
"It is overfull. No more will go in!"
"Like this cup," the Zen Master said,
"you are full of your own opinions and assumptions.
How can you learn truth until you first empty your cup?"
- Traditional Zen Koan

The Moon Cannot Be Stolen:
A thief entered the little hut of a Zen Master,
but discovered there was nothing to steal.
The Zen Master discovered the thief.
"You have come a long way to visit me," he told the prowler,
"and you should not return empty-handed.
Please take my clothes as a gift."
The thief was bewildered,
but he took the clothes and slunk away.
The Zen Master sat naked, watching the moon.
"Poor fellow," he mused,
"I wish I could have given him this beautiful moon."
- Traditional Zen Koan

Time to Die:
A Zen teacher had a rare and priceless teacup.
One day, his precocious student accidentally broke the cup.
Hearing the footsteps of his teacher,
the student held the pieces of the cup behind his back.
When the master appeared, he asked: "Why do people have to die?"
"This is natural," explained the teacher.
"Everything has to die and has just so long to live."
The student showed the shattered cup, saying,
"It was time for your cup to die."
- Traditional Zen Koan

We return thanks to our mother,
the earth, which sustains us.
We return thanks to the rivers and streams
which supply us with water.
We return thanks to all herbs, which furnish medicines
for the cure of our diseases.
We return thanks to the corn, and to her sisters,
the beans and squashes, which give us life.
We return thanks to the bushes and trees,
which provide us with fruit.
We return thanks to the wind,
which, moving the air, has banished diseases.
We return thanks to the moon and the stars,
which have given us their light when the sun was gone.
We return thanks to our grandfather He-no,
that he has protected his grandchildren from witches and reptiles,
and has given us his rain.
We return thanks to the sun,
that he has looked upon the earth with a beneficent eye.
Lastly, we return thanks to the Great Spirit,
in whom is embodied all goodness,
and who directs all things for the good of his children.
- Iroquois traditional

Nothing is ever absolutely "wrong."
"Wrong" is in the cultural tradition of the beholder.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

When men are easy in their circumstances,
they are naturally enemies to innovations.
- Joseph Addison

The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie,
deliberate, contrived and dishonest,
but the myth, persistent, persuasive and unrealistic.
- John F. Kennedy

Nothing in all the world is more dangerous
than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

What old people say you cannot do,
you try and find that you can.
Old deeds for old people, and new deeds for new.
- Henry David Thoreau

Re-examine all that you have been told...
dismiss that which insults your soul.
- Walt Whitman

Most people don't CHOOSE their value system -
they simply inherit the beliefs of their parents and community.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Open your arms to change, but don't let go of your values.
- Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

The most dangerous phrase in the language is,
"We've always done it this way."
- Grace Hopper

Who has fully realized that history
is not contained in thick books
but lives in our very blood?
- Carl Jung

Every generation laughs at the old fashions,
but follows religiously the new.
- Henry David Thoreau

Let reason trump tradition and the opinions of others,
but let your own sense of what is Right trump even reason.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Hardly a man in the world has an opinion
upon morals, political, or religion
which he got otherwise than
through his associations and sympathies.
- Mark Twain

The inherent nature of God
is not changed by our individual beliefs,
our religious institutions,
or our communal traditions.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

No written law has ever been more binding
than unwritten custom supported by popular opinion.
- Carrie Chapman Catt

Nothing is more dangerous to tradition
than the creative imagination of youth.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

You can't move so fast that you try to change
the mores faster than people can accept it.
That doesn't mean you do nothing,
but it means that you do the things that
need to be done according to priority.
- Eleanor Roosevelt

The most erroneous stories are those
we think we know best -
and therefore never scrutinize or question.
- Stephen Jay Gould

Decide questions without regard for tradition -
one way or the other.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

We shape our dwellings, and afterwards
our dwellings shape us.
- Winston Churchill

Are creeds such simple things like the clothes
which a man can change at will - and put on at will?
Creeds are such for which people live for ages and ages.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

This overcoming of all the usual barriers
between the individual and the Absolute
is the great mystic achievement.
In mystic states we both become one with the Absolute
and we become aware of our oneness.
This is the everlasting and triumphant mystical tradition,
hardly altered by differences of clime or creed.
- William James

Tradition is the illusion of permanence.
- the Woody Allen movie Deconstructing Harry

Trumpet in a herd of elephants;
crow in the company of cocks;
bleat in a flock of goats.
- Malayan Proverb

Customs do not concern themselves
with right or wrong or reason.
But they have to be obeyed;
one reasons all around them until he is tired,
but he must not transgress them, it is sternly forbidden.
- Mark Twain

Mankind are more disposed to suffer,
while evils are sufferable,
than to right themselves by abolishing
the forms to which they are accustomed.
- Thomas Jefferson

Do not let spacious plans for a new world
divert your energies from saving
what is left of the old.
- Winston Churchill

Tradition is like a second-hand store.
It is best to sort carefully
between the treasures and the trash.
See everything with new eyes.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Without tradition, art is a
flock of sheep without a shepherd.
Without innovation, it is a corpse.
- Winston Churchill

In this outward and physical ceremony,
we attest once again to the inner
and spiritual strength of our Nation.
As my high school teacher, Miss Julia Coleman, used to say:
"We must adjust to changing times,
and still hold to unchanging principles."
- Jimmy Carter

Laws are sand, customs are rock.
Laws can be evaded and punishment escaped,
but an openly transgressed custom brings sure punishment.
The penalty may be unfair, unrighteous, illogical, and a cruelty;
no matter, it will be inflicted, just the same.
Certainly, then, there can be but one wise thing
for a visiting stranger to do -
find out what the country's customs are,
and refrain from offending against them.
- Mark Twain

You hold onto religion, you know,
rules, regulations, traditions.
I think what God is interested in
is people's hearts, and that's hard enough.
- Bono

All major religious traditions
carry basically the same message,
that is love, compassion and forgiveness.
The important thing is they should
be part of our daily lives.
- Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

I choose to adapt to the circumstances in which I find myself.
I choose to be flexible in my dealings with those around me.
I understand that my way is not the only way -
that inner peace comes from respecting the ways of others,
and that, if I am open, I may gain great insights and happiness
from the ideas and traditions of others.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

In many ways, it is easier to be a good giver than a good receiver.
The giver chooses the gift and the timing.
More important, societal and religious traditions
tend to elevate the status of giver and lower the status of receiver.
When the Bible (Acts 20:32-35) speaks of it being
more blessed to give than to receive,
I believe that a better translation might be
"take" rather than "receive," as the context
of that passage is "coveting."
Certainly there is nothing blessed about coveting,
stealing, begging, or demanding,
however the skill of graciously receiving a freely offered gift
is another matter entirely.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

If you aren't in the moment,
you are either looking forward to uncertainty,
or back to pain and regret.
- Jim Carrey

If you don't know where you're going,
any road will take you there.
- Lewis Carroll
(Alice in Wonderland)

You are never too old to set another goal
or to dream a new dream.
- C. S. Lewis

Don't Take Anything Personally.
Nothing others do is because of you.
- Miguel Angel Ruiz (don Miguel Ruiz)

You will not be punished for your anger,
you will be punished by your anger.
- The Buddha

The true meaning of life is to plant trees,
under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
- Nelson Henderson

Life is without meaning.
You bring the meaning to it.
The meaning of life is
whatever you ascribe it to be.
Being alive is the meaning.
- Joseph Campbell

The greatest mistake you can make in life
is to be continually fearing you will make one.
- Elbert Hubbard

A well-developed sense of humor
is the pole that adds balance to your steps,
as you walk the tightrope of life.
- William Arthur Ward

The way I see it, if you want the rainbow,
you gotta put up with the rain.
- Dolly Parton

Faith is taking the first step,
even when you don't see the whole staircase.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

To go against the dominant thinking of your friends,
of most of the people you see every day,
is perhaps the most difficult act of heroism you can perform.
- Theodore H. White

Whatever you do, do with kindness.
Whatever you say, say with kindness.
Wherever you go, radiate kindness.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Simply do your best, and you will avoid
self-judgment, self-abuse and regret.
- don Miguel Ruiz

How do you want to be remembered?
Live life full out - Begin today.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Laugh when you can,
apologize when you should,
and let go of what you can't change.
Life's too short to be anything... but happy.
- Anonymous

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May the world be kind to you,
and may your own thoughts be gentle upon yourself.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

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