Emptiness Quotes - Page 9

• Most time is wasted, not in hours, but in minutes. A bucket with a small hole in the bottom gets just as empty as a bucket that is deliberately kicked over.

  Paul J. Meyer

  Education, Time, Buckets

  10 Copy quote

• All sentient beings - all holons in fact - contain Buddha-nature - contain depth, consciousness, intrinsic value, Spirit - and thus we are all members of the council of all beings... And the ultimate objective truth is that all beings are perfect manifestations of Spirit or Emptiness

  Ken Wilber

  Perfect, Facts, Depth

  Ken Wilber (1998). “The Essential Ken Wilber”, p.101, Shambhala Publications

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Each time he took a walk, he felt as though he were leaving himself behind, and by giving himself up to the movement of the streets, by reducing himself to a seeing eye, he was able to escape the obligation to think, and this, more than anything else, brought him a measure of peace, a salutary emptiness within...By wandering aimlessly, all places became equal and it no longer mattered where he was. On his best walks he was able to feel that he was nowhere. And this, finally was all he ever asked of things: to be nowhere.

  Paul Auster

  Eye, Thinking, Wandering Aimlessly

  5 Copy quote

• She’s never where she is,' I said. 'She’s only inside her head.

  Janet Fitch

  Numbness, Detachment, Said

  Janet Fitch (2013). “White Oleander”, p.145, Hachette UK

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• Just as eagles soar through the vast expanse of the sky without meeting any obstructions, needing only minimal effort to maintain their flight, so advanced meditators concentrating on emptiness can meditate on emptiness for a long time with little effort. Their minds soar through space-like emptiness, undistracted by any other phenomenon. When we meditate on emptiness we should try to emulate these meditators.

  Geshe Kelsang Gyatso

  Eagles, Sky, Space

  Geshe Kelsang Gyatso (2011). “Modern Buddhism: The Path of Compassion and Wisdom - Volume 1 Sutra”, p.98, Tharpa Publications US

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• We do not admire, we hardly excuse, the fanatic who wrecks this world for love of the other. But what are we to say of the fanatic who wrecks this world out of hatred of the other? He sacrifices the very existence of humanity to the non-existence of God. He offers his victims not to the altar, but merely to assert the idleness of the altar and the emptiness of the throne. He is ready to ruin even that primary ethic by which all things live, for his strange and eternal vengeance upon some one who never lived at all.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Sacrifice, Hatred, Humanity

  "Orthodoxy". Book by Gilbert K. Chesterton, Chapter VIII. "The Romances of Orthodoxy", 1908.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• The whole house seemed to exhale a melancholy breath of emptiness

  Michael Chabon

  House, Melancholy, Whole

  4 Copy quote

• Loneliness is emptiness, but happiness is you.

  Johnny Cash

  Inspirational, Loneliness

  Song: Happiness is you, Album: Happiness Is You, 1966

  31 Copy quote

  Show source

• I believe that suffering is part of the narrative, and that nothing really good gets built when everything's easy. I believe that loss and emptiness and confusion often give way to new fullness and wisdom.

  Shauna Niequist

  Believe, Loss, Giving

  Shauna Niequist (2010). “Bittersweet: Thoughts on Change, Grace, and Learning the Hard Way”, p.8, Zondervan

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• I get lost, sometimes. Days pass and this emptiness fills my heart.

  Peter Gabriel

  Heart, Sadness, Sometimes

  Song: In Your Eyes

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• Tao is the source of both fullness and emptiness. But it is itself neither fullness nor emptiness.

  Zhuangzi

  Tao, Source, Fullness

  9 Copy quote

• Clay is used to make vases, but it is the emptiness they contain that makes them useful.

  Laozi

  Clay, Vases, Used

  36 Copy quote

• By perfecting the practices of zazen and mindfulness, by learning patience and love and by realizing the essential emptiness of all phenomena, you will discover nirvana.

  Frederick Lenz

  Compassion, Practice, And Love

  4 Copy quote

• The empty, the one, the unmoved, the full, satiation, wanting nothing--that would be my evil: in short, dreamless sleep.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Sleep, Evil, Unity

  7 Copy quote

• Our enemy is not lack of preparation; it’s not the difficulty of the project or the state of the marketplace or the emptiness of our bank account. The enemy is our chattering brain, which, if we give it so much as a nanosecond, will start producing excuses, alibis, transparent self-justifications and a million reasons why we can’t/shouldn’t/won’t do what we know we need to do.

  Steven Pressfield

  Self, Giving, Preparation

  "Do the Work: Overcome Resistance and Get Out of Your Own Way". Book by Steven Pressfield, 2011.

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• Be happy. If you're successful but unhappy, that's emptiness.

  John McEnroe

  Happiness, Successful, Unhappy

  7 Copy quote

• Dolby stereo increases the possibility of emptiness in film sound at the same time that it enlarges the space that can be filled. It's this capacity for emptiness and not just fullness that offers possibilities yet to be explored. Kurosawa has magnificently exploited this dimension in Dreams: sometimes the sonic universe is reduced to a single point-the sound of the rain, an echo that disappears, a simple voice.

  Michel Chion

  Dream, Rain, Simple

  12 Copy quote

• My main goal is to stay alive. To keep fooling myself into hanging around. To keep getting up every day. Right now I live without inspiration. I go day to day and do the work because it's all I know. I know that if I keep moving I stand a chance. I must keep myself going until I find a reason to live. I need one so bad. On the other hand maybe I don't. Maybe it's all bullshit. Nothing I knew from my old life can help me here. Most of the things that I believed turned out to be useless. Appendages from someone else's life.

  Henry Rollins

  Moving, Inspiration, Hands

  Henry Rollins (2005). “Roomanitarian”, 2.13.61

  64 Copy quote

  Show source

• I stare at the pile of discarded remnants and think of my mother. Did she touch that pillar there? Does her scent still linger in a fragment of glass or a splinter of wood? A terrible emptiness settles into my chest. No matter how much I go about living, there are always small reminders that make the loss fresh again.

  Libba Bray

  Mother, Loss, Thinking

  Libba Bray (2010). “The Sweet Far Thing”, p.23, Simon and Schuster

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• Oh, sometimes I think it is of no use to make friends. They only go out of your life after awhile and leave a hurt that is worse than the emptiness before they came.

  Lucy Maud Montgomery

  Friendship, Fake People, Hurt

  Lucy Maud Montgomery (2015). “Anne of Green Gables Collection: Anne of Green Gables, Anne of the Island, and More Anne Shirley Books”, p.439, Xist Publishing

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• No person, possession, profession, or position ever fills the cup of a wounded, empty heart. It's an emptiness only God can fill.

  Lysa TerKeurst

  God, Heart, Cups

  FaceBook post by Lysa TerKeurst from Aug 15, 2014

  32 Copy quote

  Show source

• Work is only justified by leisure time. To admit the emptiness of leisure time is to admit the impossibility of life.

  Guy Debord

  Leisure, Justified, Impossibility

  11 Copy quote

• Am I willing to give up what I have in order to be what I am not yet? Am I willing to let my ideas of myself, of man be changed? Am I able to follow the spirit of love into the desert? To empty myself even of my concept of emptiness?

  Mary Caroline Richards

  Giving Up, Hero, Men

  Mary Caroline Richards (2011). “Centering in Pottery, Poetry, and the Person”, p.141, Wesleyan University Press

  13 Copy quote

  Show source