Nafs Quotes

“The impatient man is his own enemy; he slams the door on his own progress.”
― Idries Shah, The Commanding Self

“Great men are great until they know it. Saints are holy until they know it.”
― Idries Shah, Seeker After Truth: A Handbook

“For every Pharoah there is a Moses.”
― Idries Shah, Caravan of Dreams

“Show me a person who really knows what 'good' is, and I will show you that he almost never uses the word.”
― Idries Shah, Caravan of Dreams

“The major barrier to understanding is wishful thinking and following that which pleases one.”
― Idries Shah, The Commanding Self

“You must know everything that God has forbidden you so as to be able to avoid it, for the one who does not recognize evil falls into it.”
― Imam Abdallah ibn Alawi Al-Haddad

“To say "yes" to the Sufi way is to say "no" to imagined escapes.”
― Idries Shah, Learning How to Learn: Psychology and Spirituality in the Sufi Way

“La mayor barrera para la comprensión es el pensamiento anhelante y seguir lo que a uno le gusta.”
― Idries Shah, The Commanding Self

“Por cada Faraón hay un Moisés.”
― Idries Shah, Caravan of Dreams

“Sentirse importante es un vicio, no una virtud, no importa lo escondido que esté como participación en algo noble.”
― Idries Shah, Learning How to Learn: Psychology and Spirituality in the Sufi Way

“Si no te reprochas a ti mismo”, dice Saadi, “no aceptarás el reproche ajeno.”
― Idries Shah, The Sufis

“During the period of her adolescence, her burgeoning womanhood, high school and throughout college, her awareness of the other sex had been an involuntary thing that crept up on her unasked for and unwanted. She would come into contact with these guys, or boys really, who she really didn’t even like all that much. She could discern the weakness in their characters in a heartbeat, see into the core of their insecurities with ease. Figure out what they were hungry for in life and discern their superficialities. And yet it was these guys who would make her palms moist with sweat when they approached, whose presence sucked the air out of her chest, whose off hand comments to her made her speechless and inarticulate. Not the top-of-the-class guy with his subtle opinions and depth of character, but the attractive, muscular idiot.”
― Hannah Matus, A Second Look