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> 21 quotes tagged "non-action"
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Not to value and employ men of superior ability causes disorder; Not to prize goods that are hard to come by causes theft.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 3
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The highest type of ruler is one of whose existence the people are barely aware.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 17
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A good traveler has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 27
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Those who would take over the world and shape it to their will never succeed.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 29
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Whoever relies on the Tao in governing men does not try to force issues or defeat enemies.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 30
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The Tao never does anything, yet through it all things are done.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 37
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Rulers who govern by laws and punishments are like the rafts and boats of a river: they prevent accidents, but they do not make people virtuous.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 60
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The ten directions converging, each learning to do nothing.Zen Poem – P'ang Yün (740-808 CE)
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Therefore the Sage rules by emptying their hearts and filling their bellies, weakening their intelligence and toughening their sinews, ever striving to make the people knowledgeless and desireless. Indeed he sees to it that if there be any who have knowledge, they dare not interfere. Yet through his actionless activity all things are duly regulated.Tao Te Ching, Chapter 3
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Tao never does; Yet through it all things are done. If the barons and kings would but possess themselves of it, the ten thousand creatures would at once be transformed. The blankness of the Unnamed brings dispassion; To be dispassionate is to be still. And so, of itself, the whole empire will be at rest.Tao Te Ching, Chapter 37
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Great perfection seems incomplete; yet its use is not impaired. Great fullness seems empty; yet its use is inexhaustible. Great straightness seems crooked. Great skill seems clumsy. Great eloquence seems silent.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 45
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The space between heaven and earth is like a bellows — empty yet inexhaustibly generative. The more it moves, the more comes out. Better to hold to the centre than to talk too much and too often lose the thread.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 5
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Everyone knows the usefulness of what is useful, but no one knows the usefulness of what is useless.Chuang Tzu, Chapter 4 – The Human World
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The flower of Noh is found not in what is shown but in what is withheld. The actor who reveals everything leaves nothing for the audience to complete. The art lives in the space between performance and imagination.Zeami Motokiyo – Fushikaden (The Transmission of the Flower), c. 1400
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Nothing in the world is as soft and yielding as water. Yet for dissolving the hard and inflexible, nothing can surpass it. The soft overcomes the hard; the gentle overcomes the rigid. Everyone knows this is true, but few can put it into practice.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 78
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The softest thing in the universe overcomes the hardest. That which has no substance enters where there is no space. Through this I know the value of non-action. Teaching without words, working without effort — few in the world can grasp this.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 43
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Prince Hui's cook was cutting up an ox. Every touch of his hand, every heave of his shoulder, every move of his feet was in perfect rhythm — like the dance of the Mulberry Grove. 'I work with my mind and not with my eye,' he said. 'My mind works along without the control of the senses. Falling back upon eternal principles, I glide through the great joints as they are. A good cook changes his chopper once a year — because he cuts. An ordinary cook, once a month — because he hacks. I have used this chopper for nineteen years, yet its edge is still as keen as if fresh from the grindstone. Because I always work in accordance with the natural constitution of the animal.'Chuang Tzu, Chapter 3 – The Secret of Caring for Life
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Confucius saw an old man swimming at the Lüliang waterfall — the current violent enough to drown fish and turtles. He sent a disciple to help. But the man came out singing. 'How do you do it?' Confucius asked. 'I go under with the whirls and come up with the eddies,' said the man. 'I follow along with the way of the water and do not impose my own selfish wishes upon it. This is how I stay afloat.'Chuang Tzu, Chapter 19 – Mastering Life
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Yield and overcome. Bend and be straight. Empty and be full. Wear out and be new. Have little and gain. Have much and be confused. Therefore the sage embraces the One and becomes a model for the world. He does not put himself on display, and therefore shines. He does not justify himself, and therefore is distinguished. He does not boast, and therefore has merit. He does not contend, and therefore no one can contend with him.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 22
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The best rulers: the people barely know they exist. Next best: they love and praise them. Next: they fear them. Worst: they despise them. When the best leader's work is done, the people say: 'We did it ourselves.'Tao Te Ching – Chapter 17
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Beginning students of the Way often hear it said that there is fundamentally nothing to be attained. But hearing this, they jump to the conclusion that it means complete inactivity — that sitting blankly will do.Huang Po, The Zen Teaching of Huang Po, tr. John Blofeld