THE STORY OF THE TAOIST FARMER

A farmer had only one horse. One day, his horse ran away.

His neighbors said, “I'm so sorry. This is such bad news. You must be so upset.”

The man just said, “We'll see.”

A few days later, his horse came back with twenty wild horses following. The man and his son corralled all 21 horses.

His neighbors said, “Congratulations! This is such good news. You must be so happy!”

The man just said, “We'll see.”

One of the wild horses kicked the man's only son, breaking both his legs.

His neighbors said, “I'm so sorry. This is such bad news. You must be so upset.”

The man just said, “We'll see.”

The country went to war, and every able-bodied young man was drafted to fight. The war was terrible and killed every young man, but the farmer's son was spared, since his broken legs prevented him from being drafted.

His neighbors said, “Congratulations! This is such good news. You must be so happy!”

The man just said, “We'll see.”

Fish don't know they're in water

Fish don't know they're in water

If you tried to explain it, they'd say, “Water? What's water?”

They're so surrounded by it, that it's impossible to see.

They can't see it until they get outside of it.

This is how I feel about culture.

We're so surrounded by people who think like us, that it's impossible to see that what we think are universal truths are just our local ‪#‎culture‬. We can't see it until we get outside of it.

"In my life I have found two things of priceless worth -- learning and loving. Nothing else -- not fame, not power, not achievement for its own sake -- can possibly have the same lasting value. For when your life is over, if you can say 'I have learned' and 'I have loved', you will also be able to say 'I have been happy'."

Arthur c.clark

“There is a wonderful mythical law of nature that the three things we crave most in life — happiness, freedom, and peace of mind — are always attained by giving them to someone else.”

Peyton Conway March

As the Japanese Zen masters say: “Don’t seek the truth; just drop your opinions.” Drop your theories; don’t seek the truth. Truth isn’t something you search for. If you stop being opinionated, you would know.

Anthony de Mello (via ashramof1)

     Reality shows are a symbol of the modern version of religion – celebrity. Celebrities are our new gods. Ordinary people crave the celebrities’ fame, their looks, their personalities, their wealth, their power, their status. They represent everything ordinary people are not and everything ordinary people want to be. If only we could become celebrities, we say, all of our problems would end. We would have all we ever desired. Our homes have become our churches where we each have our personal Ark of the Covenant – our TV set – that allows us to contact the divine. Our flat screen TVs reveal the holy paradise of celebrity to us. The judging panel of American Idol are all St Peters, holding the keys to the gates of heaven. If only we could get through those gates we would be gods. Yet these celebrities are the most selfish, greedy, undeserving, uninspiring, shallow and fake gods ever devised. They are all about “me” and nothing to do with “we”. “Because I’m worth it,” they say. A celebrity is the glorification of the individual at everyone else’s expense. A true God is on everyone’s side, not his own. How could anyone worship a god who worships himself? Yet celebrities and the super rich are now those onto whom we project our notions of divinity. The transcendent sense of the divine has all but disappeared from the modern mind. Humanity cannot progress until it has found it again.

If you resist reading what you disagree with, how will you ever acquire deeper insights into what you believe? The things most worth reading are precisely those that challenge our convictions.

All the fucntions of the human body,without exception,can be put into simple words and described in the materialistic terms.The body is nothing but a machine.If the physical limitations of the human body restrict mankind's ability to evolve,it would be as if the fall of the species called "man" had already been decided by a god that doesnt even exist. The information etched inside humans isnt only that which they themselves acquired as individuals.This species called man is connected to his predecessors and information has accumalted within him therefore if that information isnt shared,its meaningless.Mere data. Mankind can evolve.Evolve by their own power. But to do that, they must first know what they truly are

In every country the intellectual class is the most influential class. This is the class which can foresee, advise and lead. In no country does the mass of the people live the life for intelligent thought and action. It is largely imitative and follows the intellectual class. There is no exaggeration in saying that the entire destination of the country depends upon its intellectual class. If the intellectual class is honest and independent, it can be trusted to take the initiative and give a proper lead when a crisis arises. It is true that the intellect by itself is no virtue. It is only a means and the use of a means depends upon the ends which an intellectual person pursues. An intellectual man can be a good man but he may easily be a rogue. Similarly an intellectual class may be a band of high-souled persons, ready to help, ready to emancipate erring humanity or it may easily be a gang of crooks or a body of advocates of narrow clique from which it draws its support. ~ Dr.B.R Ambedkar

#Ambedkar #BabaSahebAmbedker

“We have names for everything. What if we forgot about those names? And we stopped seeing things as something? What if we just observed things, watched things, without giving them a name, without coming to a conclusion? What do you think would happen? You would transcend everything.” — Robert Adams