#nature

We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.

Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.

The earth has music for those who listen.

Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is.

Things not in our control are body, property, reputation, command, and, in one word, whatever are not our own actions.

He has suppressed all desire in himself, and transferred his aversion only to the things contrary to nature which are within his own power.

Watch the turmoil of beings, but contemplate their return.

When there is no peace in the family, filial piety begins. When the country falls into chaos, patriotism appears.

I am different from other people: I drink from the Great Mother's breast.

Do you want to improve the world? I don't think it can be done. The world is sacred. It can't be improved.

If you tamper with it, you will ruin it. If you treat it like an object, you will lose it.

If you want to shrink something, you must first allow it to expand. If you want to get rid of something, you must first allow it to flourish.

The Tao never acts, yet nothing is left undone.

All truly great thoughts are conceived while walking.

You didn't come into this world. You came out of it, like a wave from the ocean. You are not a stranger here.

We do not 'come into' this world; we come out of it, as leaves from a tree.

As the ocean 'waves', the universe 'peoples'. Every individual is an expression of the whole realm of nature.

You are not something that is a visitor on the earth and doesn't belong here. You are the earth.

Real wealth consists in having clean water, fresh air, healthy food, and good friends with whom to share them.

The snow goose need not bathe to make itself white. Neither need you do anything but be yourself.

Wild geese do not intend to cast their reflection; the water has no mind to receive their image.

The world is not a collection of objects, but a communion of subjects.

We do not need to invent meaning; we are meaning. Every leaf, every bug, every cloud is an answer to a question no one needed to ask.

If you see yourself in the correct way, you are all as much extraordinary phenomenon of nature as trees, clouds, the patterns in running water.

There are no mistakes in nature. There are only events.

The purpose of the eye is to see; the purpose of the flower is to bloom; the purpose of your life is simply to be.

Things are as they are. Looking out into the universe at night, we make no comparisons between right and wrong stars, nor between well and badly arranged constellations.

As a plant produces its flower, so the psyche creates its symbols. Every dream is evidence of this process.

He who knows what is right will do what is right, for no one voluntarily chooses that which he knows will harm his own nature.

Contentment is natural wealth; luxury is artificial poverty.