The saying goes, ‘The sage rests, truly rests and is at ease.’ This manifests itself in calmness and detachment, so that worries and distress cannot affect him, nothing unpleasant can disturb him, his Virtue is complete and his spirit is not stirred up.
ZHUANGZIGood fortune is as light as a feather, but nobody knows how to pick it up. Misfortune is as heavy as earth, but nobody knows how to stay out of it’s way.
More Zhuangzi Quotes
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He who knows he is a fool is not the biggest fool; He who knows he is confused is not in the worst confusion.
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The right way to go easy is to forget the right way.
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You are still guided by your expectations.
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Only fools imagine they are already awake. How clearly they understand everything! How easily they distinguish this deception from that reality!
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I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly dreaming I am a man.
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Great knowledge is universal. Small knowledge is limited. Great words are inspiring; small words are chatter.
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For we can only know that we know nothing, and a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.
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To exercise no-thought and rest in nothing is the first step toward resting in Tao. To start from nowhere and follow no road is the first step toward attaining Tao.
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There may be difficulty at the moment, but I will not lose the Virtue that I possess. It is when the ice and snow are on them that we see the strength of the cypress and the pine. I am grateful for this trouble around me, because it gives me an opportunity to realize how fortunate I am.
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Those who follow the Tao are of clear mind. They do not load their mind with anxieties and are flexible in their adjustment to external conditions.
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But you now, you wear your soul on your sleeve, exhausting your energy, propping yourself up on a tree, mumbling, or bent over your desk, asleep. Heaven gives you a form and you wear it out by pointless argument.
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If water derives lucidity from stillness, how much more the faculties of the mind! The mind of the sage, being in repose, becomes the mirror of the universe, the speculum of all creation.
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If you have grasped the purpose of life there is no point in trying to make life into something it is not or cannot be.
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A frog in a well cannot conceive of the ocean.
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All existing things are really one. We regard those that are beautiful and rare as valuable, and those that are ugly as foul and rotten. The foul and rotten may come to be transformed into what is rare and valuable, and the rare and valuable into what is foul and rotten.
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