Emptiness Quotes - Page 13

• I remember having a discussion with [Kaz] about his translation of the word shunyata as "boundlessness," instead of the more traditional "emptiness." I said: "Kaz, everyone is used to the word emptiness for shunyata. This might not sit well with people. He said: "Translator's prerogative!" Then he added, "One cannot assume we know what they meant...." I agreed.

  Joan Halifax

  People, Might, Assuming

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• My Father... He was there when I didn't understand, he was there when I was wrong, he was there when I cried, he was there when I lied. For some reason my dad was always there, when I needed him the most. His love was never ending. And now that he's gone there is an emptiness in my world, but not in my heart.

  Michael Jordan

  Dad, Father, Heart

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• We live in an era when established values are no longer valid, when prodigious discoveries are being made every year, when catastrophes of unbelievable proportions occur weekly. In ancient Greek the word “chaos” means “gaping void” or “yawning emptiness.” The most effective response to the chaos in our lives is the creation of new forms of literature, music, poetry, art and cinema.

  Werner Herzog

  Art, Mean, Yawning

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• I can begin to give God attributes. He's a counselor. He's a healer. He's a friend that sits closer than a brother. To me, he just - I sum it up that he's my anchor, my rock, my foundation in life, that my life was - had an emptiness - a deep, dark void with something - it had a lot of fulfillment externally, but something inside said there's more.

  Paula White

  Brother, Dark, Anchors

  Source: culteducation.com

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• The here-and-now mountain
  is a tiny piece of a piece of straw
  blown off into emptiness.

  Rumi

  Mountain, Pieces, Tiny

  Rumi (2014). “'Another city'. a selectionf of poems from the Persian”, p.44, Lulu.com

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• I think probably one of the important things that happened to me was growing up in Idaho in the mountains, in the woods, and having a very strong presence of the wilderness around me. That never felt like emptiness. It always felt like presence.

  Marilynne Robinson

  Strong, Growing Up, Thinking

  "Marilynne Robinson Extended Interview". Interview with Bob Abernethy, www.pbs.org. September 18, 2009.

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• When I was a very young student I loved and admired the work of Sam Beckett, who is famously pessimistic, and whose writing is an extraordinary examination of emptiness. I wanted to be like Beckett. I don't have the same attitude toward the world, I'm naturally optimistic, and so of course I could never be like Beckett. You can't force yourself to become like someone you admire.

  Michael Craig-Martin

  Attitude, Optimistic, Writing

  Source: www.artzip.org

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• Get yourself empty in the Eastern sense. Not in the Western sense. In the Western sense when we feel empty we feel lonely, miserable, but in the Eastern sense - "I'm so empty, because I'm filled with everything, and I'm connected to everything." It's very energizing. You want that kind of emptiness, whatever you have to do to get yourself quiet.

  Sandra Cisneros

  Lonely, Want, Kind

  "Talking in Our Pajamas: A Conversation with Sandra Cisneros on Finding Your Voice, Fear of Highways, Tacos, Travel, and the Need for Peace in the World". Interview with Ruth Behar, quod.lib.umich.edu. 2008.

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• The greatest crisis of our lives is neither economic, intellectual, nor even what we usually call religious. It is a crisis of imagination. We get stuck on our paths because we are unable to reimagine our lives differently from what they are right now. We hold on desperately to the status quo, afraid that if we let go, we will be swept away by the torrential undercurrents of our emptiness.

  Marc Gafni

  Letting Go, Religious, Imagination

  FaceBook post by Marc Gafni from Aug 26, 2015

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• I've found that contemporary psychology enrages me with its simplistic ideas of human life, and also its emptiness.

  James Hillman

  Ideas, Psychology, Found

  Source: scottlondon.com

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• No words, phrases, or sentences are capable of describing or naming the Way, because once it is named, it is a false name and has to be eliminated. Once it is eliminated, only emptiness is left. When the false is abandoned, the true emerges.

  Henry Chang

  Wisdom, Names, Attachment

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• I cried, for happiness, for sadness, but most of all, for emptiness.

  Daul Kim

  Sadness, Cried

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• How impossible it is for strong healthy people to understand the way in which bodily malaise and suffering eats at the root of one's life! The philosophy that is true - the religion that is strength to the healthy - is constantly emptiness to one when the head is distracted and every sensation is oppressive.

  George Eliot

  Strong, Philosophy, Roots

  George Eliot (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of George Eliot (Illustrated)”, p.6781, Delphi Classics

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• Like all children I had taken my father for granted. Now that I had lost him, I felt an emptiness that could never be filled. But I did not let myself cry, believing as a Muslim that tears pull a spirit earthward and won't let it be free.

  Benazir Bhutto

  Children, Father, Grief

  Benazir Bhutto (1989). “Daughter of Destiny: An Autobiography”, Simon & Schuster

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• I wanted to turn everything off, too. Just press a button - click - and shut myself down. Turn off my heart, turn off my mind, turn off my body - just lie there, senseless, like a dormant tree in winter, waiting for the spring to return.

  Kevin Brooks

  Spring, Lying, Heart

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• Of what is the body made? It is made of emptiness and rhythm. At the ultimate heart of the body, at the heart of the world, there is no solidity. Once again, there is only the dance.

  George Leonard

  Philosophy, Heart, Medicine

  George Leonard (2009). “The Silent Pulse”, p.40, Gibbs Smith

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• Emptiness is that which frees us from religiosity and leads us to true spirituality.

  Brother Lawrence

  Teacher, Spirituality

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• There's a brief moment when you first wake up, where you have no memories. A blissful blank slate, a happy emptiness.

  Candace Bushnell

  Happy, Memories, Firsts

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• when a gourd is hollowed out it becomes empty and is of great use to the world because of its emptiness.

  Dorothy Gilman

  Gourds, Use, World

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• Gangs exist when there are lots of empties in a person, in family, in community. It points out how we need to do more to bring real art, passions, teachings, caring, and resources into the emptiness of young peoples' lives.

  Luis J. Rodriguez

  Art, Real, Teaching

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• There is no emptiness of soul ever for those whose life is devoted to God.

  William Lawson

  God, Soul, Life Is

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• Emotionally, grief is a mixture of raw feelings such as sorrow, anguish, anger, regret, longing, fear, and deprivation. Grief may be experienced physically as exhaustion, emptiness, tension, sleeplessness, or loss of appetite.

  Judy Tatelbaum

  Regret, Grief, Loss

  Judy Tatelbaum (2009). “The Courage to Grieve: The Classic Guide to Creative Living, Recovery, and Growth Through Grief”, p.7, Harper Collins

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• To be still means to empty yourself from the incessant flow of thoughts and create a state of consciousness that is open and receptive.

  John Daido Loori

  Mean, Flow, Consciousness

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• The attempt to satisfy greed is like drinking salty water when thirsty.
  When lost in greed we look outward rather than inward for satisfaction, yet we never find enough to fill the emptiness we wish to escape.
  The real hunger we feel is for knowledge of our true nature.

  Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche

  Nature, Real, Drinking

  Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche, Mark Dahlby (2004). “The Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep”, p.38, Motilal Banarsidass Publ.

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• Oh, the cares of men! how much emptiness there is in human concerns!

  Aulus Persius Flaccus

  Men, Vanity, Care

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