Lao Tzu Quotes
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What's the difference between beautiful and ugly?
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Be empty. Be still. Just watch everything come and go. This is the way of Nature.
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The Way is ever without action, yet nothing is left undone.
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Supreme good is like water. Water greatly benefits all things, without conflict. It flows through places that people loathe. Thereby it is close to the Way.
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. . . the mind is desperate to fix the river {of events} in place: Possessed by ideas of the past, preoccupied with images of the future, it overlooks the plain truth of the moment.
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There is no need to run outside for better seeing... Rather abide at the center of your being; For the more you leave it the less you learn. Search your heart and see... The way to do is to be.
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To know and not to do is not yet to know.
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The cords of passion and desire weave a binding net around you. Worldly confrontation makes you stiff and inflexible. The trap of duality is tenacious. Bound, rigid, and trapped, you cannot experience liberation.
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Those who stay where they are will endure.
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There are many paths to enlightenment. Be sure to take the one with a heart.
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The Tao is infinite, eternal. Why is it eternal? It was never born; thus it can never die. Why is it infinite? It has no desires for itself; thus it is present for all beings. The Master stays behind; that is why she is ahead. She is detached from all things; that is why she is one with them. Because she has let go of herself, she is perfectly fulfilled.
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He who knows he has enough is rich.
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Good leaders reach solutions, and then stop. They do not dare to rely on force.
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What makes a kingdom great is its being like a down-flowing river,--the central point towards which all the smaller streams under Heaven converge; or like the female throughout the world, who by quiescence always overcomes the male. And quiescence is a form of humility.
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The most difficult in the world must be easy in its beginning.
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Those who understand others are clever, those who understand themselves are wise.
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Gentleness brings victory to him who attacks, and safety to him who defends. Those whom Heaven would save, it fences round with gentleness.
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By following this simple path, you become extraordinary, unfathomable, a being of profound cosmic subtlety. You outlive time and space by realizing the subtle truth of the universe.
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All things such as grass and trees are soft and supple in life. At their death they are withered and dry.
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When there is no desire, all things are at peace.
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My words are very easy to understand and very easy to practice; but there is no one in the world who is able to understand and practice them.
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Without desire there is stillness, and the world settles by itself.
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Be gentle and you can be bold; be frugal and you can be liberal; avoid putting yourself before others and you can become a leader among men.
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Marriage is three parts love and seven parts forgiveness of sins.