Idries Shah Quotes
When you realise the difference between the container and the content, you will have knowledge
When Fortune knocks, open the door, ' they say. But why should one make fortune knock, by keeping the door shut?
Show me a person who really knows what 'good' is, and I will show you that he almost never uses the word.
If a Manx cat tells you that it is trying to preserve its long, beautiful tail, you don't have to believe it - especially if you have eyes.
Q: What is a fundamental mistake of man's?A: To think that he is alive, when he has merely fallen asleep in life's waiting-room.
Real generosity is anonymous to the extent that a man should be prepared even to be considered ungenerous rather than explain it to others.
Deep in the sea are riches beyond compare. But if you seek safety, it is on the shore.
Saying of the ProphetInk and BloodThe ink of the learned is holier than the blood of the martyr.
Progress comes through capacity to learn, and is irresistible.
The real generosity is when a man does something generous when nobody knows about it.
...action is in fact knowledge in operation. Right action stems from right knowledge. Right knowledge is acquired through the teacher.
Why did I do such-and-such a thing?' is all very well. But what about 'How otherwise could I have done it?
All approaches to a study or an individual may start with a desire for attention. However they start, they must never end up in this manner.
You have come a long way, and you do not know it. You have a long way to do, and you do know what that means.
They say: 'Seek wisdom while you have the strength, or you may lose the strength without gaining wisdom.
The person that you feel yourself to be, according to the Sufis, is a false person, which has no true reality.
He who knows himself, knows his Lord' means, among other things, that self-deception prevents knowledge.
It has truly been said that 'Humility is not so much a virtue as a necessity, in order to learn.
Words have to die if humans are to live.
Study institutions may become visible when the head is more emptied of imaginings.
The Sufi is 'One who does not care when something is taken from him, but who does not cease to seek for what he has not.
Man (and woman) has an infinite capacity for self-development. Equally, he has an infinite capacity for self-destruction.
Never follow any impulse to teach, however strong it might be. The command to teach is not felt as an impulsion.
To copy a virtue in another is more copying than it is virtue. Try to learn what that virtue is based upon.
If you seek a teacher, try to become a real student. If you want to be a student, try to find a real teacher.
If you cannot laugh frequently and genuinely, you have no soul.
Assume that you are part-hypocrite and part heedless, and you will not be far wrong.
There is no wisdom where there is no common sense: it cannot under those conditions find any expression.
You have come a long way, and you do not know it. You have a long way to go, and you do know what that means.
The Sufis are unanimous that a Guide (Sheikh) is absolutely essential, though never available on demand: 'the Sufis are not merchants'.
Inner Knowledge -- You want to become wise in one lesson: First become a real human being.
None should say : 'I can trust, ' or 'I cannot trust' until he is a master of the option, of trusting or not trusting.
Because there is a word for perfection, people will always imagine that they know it.
When you are still fragmentated, lacking certainty — what difference does it make what your decisions are?
Neither imagine that you are false, nor lash yourself, for both may be forms of self-indulgence.
I will not serve God like a labourer, in expectation of my wages. Rabia
When the human being says:'It is not true...'He may mean:'I don't know about it, so I think it is untrue.'Or:'I don't like it.
A man is deficient in understanding until he perceives that there is a whole cycle of evolution possible within himself: repeating endlessly, offering opportunities for personal development.
Talent is the presence of ability and absence of understanding about the source and operation of knowledge.
People are always trying to understand.There is only one way to do that.It is to discover < + i + >why< + i + > you want to understand.
We are adjured not to burn the candle at both ends.But how many people have verified that physically possible?
Sufism is therefore not 'Do as I say and not as I do', or even 'Do as I do', but 'Experience it and you will know'.
Day and NightThe night is long: do not shorten it by sleep. The day is fair: do not darken it with wrongdoing.