Josh Robison

“Even though you try to put people under control, it is impossible. You cannot do it. The best way to control people is to encourage them to be mischievous. Then they will be in control in a wider sense. To give your sheep or cow a large spacious meadow is the way to control him. So it is with people: first let them do what they want, and watch them. This is the best policy. To ignore them is not good. That is the worst policy. The second worst is trying to control them. The best one is to watch them, just to watch them, without trying to control them.”
― Shunryu Suzuki, Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind: Informal Talks on Zen Meditation and Practice

“Life really does begin at forty. Up until then, you are just doing research.”
― Carl Jung

“I am reminded of the apocryphal conversation between Confucius and Lao Tzu when the former had been prating of universal love without the element of self: 'What stuff!' cried Lao Tzu, 'Does not universal love contradict itself? Is not your elimination of self a positive manifestation of self? Sir, if you would cause the world not to lose its source of nourishment— There is the universe: its regularity is unceasing. There are the Sun and Moon: their brightness is unceasing. There are the stars: their groupings never change. There are the birds and the beasts: they flock together without varying. There are trees and shrubs: they grow upwards without exception. Like these, accord with the Dao— with the way of all things— and be perfect. Why then these vain struggles after charity and duty to one's neighbor as though beating a drum in search of a fugitive? Alas, Sir you have brought much confusion into the mind of man.”
― Alan W. Watts, Become What You Are

“Childhood is long and narrow like a coffin, and you can’t get out of it on your own.”
― Tove Ditlevsen, Childhood