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> 17 quotes tagged "water"
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The supreme good is like water, Which nourishes all things without trying to.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 8
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The soft and weak overcome the hard and strong.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 43
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When water is still, it reflects everything clearly. If water derives clarity from stillness, how much more so the human mind?Chuang Tzu, Chapter 5: The Sign of Virtue Complete
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The wise adapt themselves to circumstances, as water molds itself to the pitcher.Chuang Tzu, Chapter 15: Ingrained Ideas
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The wise person looks into the water and sees their own reflection, but they also see the sky, the clouds, and all things.Chuang Tzu, Chapter 13: The Way of Heaven
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Joshu went to a hermit's cottage and asked, 'Is the master in? Is the master in?' The hermit raised his fist. Joshu said, 'The water is too shallow to anchor here,' and left. He went to another hermit and asked the same question. This hermit also raised his fist. Joshu said, 'Free to give, free to take, free to kill, free to save,' and made a deep bow.Mumonkan, Case 11
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Joshu went to a hermit and asked, 'What is it? What is it?' The hermit thrust up his fist. Joshu said, 'Ships cannot anchor where the water is too shallow,' and left. He came to another hermit and asked, 'What is it? What is it?' This hermit also thrust up his fist. Joshu said, 'Well given, well taken, well killed, well saved,' and bowed.Mumonkan, Case 31
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When Isan's teacher wanted to choose a successor, he asked who could answer correctly. He put a water vase on the ground and asked, 'Without calling it a water vase, what is it?' The head monk said, 'You cannot call it a wooden sandal.' Isan kicked the vase over and walked away. He became the teacher's successor.Mumonkan, Case 40
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A monk asked Mazu, 'What kind of person is one who does not keep company with the ten thousand things?' Mazu said, 'When you swallow all the water of the West River in one gulp, I'll tell you.'Traditional Zen
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Dongshan said, 'The teaching is like the moon in water. The moon does not get wet; the water is not broken.'Traditional Zen
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A monk asked Yaoshan, 'What is the way?' Yaoshan pointed upward and downward and said, 'Do you understand?' The monk said, 'No.' Yaoshan said, 'Clouds in the sky, water in the jug.'Traditional Zen
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Yet nothing is better than water, for overcoming the hard and rigid, because nothing can compete with it.Tao Te Ching – Chapter 78
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Nothing in the world is more yielding and softer than water; yet its greatness cannot be measured, nor its depths sounded. Water's gentle nature conceals boundless power.Huai Nan Tzu, Essay 1
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Nothing under heaven is softer or more yielding than water; But when it attacks things hard and resistant there is not one of them that can prevail. For they can find no way of altering it. That the yielding conquers the resistant and the soft conquers the hard is a fact known by all men, yet utilized by none.Tao Te Ching, Chapter 78
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To have faith is to trust yourself to the water. When you swim you don't grab hold of the water, because if you do you will sink and drown. Instead you relax, and float.Alan Watts
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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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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