To become learned, each day add something. To become enlightened, each day drop something
Interpretation
Continuous learning is essential for knowledge, while enlightenment comes from letting go of ignorance.
This quote by Laozi emphasizes the dual nature of personal growth: acquiring knowledge through learning new things every day while also achieving enlightenment by shedding unnecessary thoughts or beliefs. It suggests that wisdom involves both the accumulation of information and the discernment to know what to release, fostering a balanced approach to personal development.
In practice
During a seminar on personal development, the speaker used this quote to encourage attendees to embrace both learning and letting go of old beliefs.
If you understand others you are smart._x000D_ If you understand yourself you are illuminated._x000D_ If you overcome others you are powerful._x000D_ If you overcome yourself you have strength._x000D_ If you know how to be satisfied you are rich._x000D_ If you can act with vigor, you have a will._x000D_ If you don't lose your objectives you can be long-lasting._x000D_ If you die without loss, you are eternal.
When nothing is done, nothing is left undone.
A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving.
Knowing others is wisdom, knowing yourself is enlightenment.
In the world there is nothing more submissive and weak than water. Yet for attacking that which is hard and strong nothing can surpass it.
Rule your mind with serenity rather than with force and manipulation.
Youth is impulsive. When our young men grow angry at some real or imaginary wrong, and disfigure their faces with black paint, it denotes that their hearts are black, and that they are often cruel and relentless, and our old men and old women are unable to restrain them. Thus it has ever been.
I will be unneeded, and gladly so, when you realize that the vitality and reinforcement and joy are your own, and rise from the fountain of your own beings; when you realize that you do not need me for protection, for there is nothing you need protect yourself against.
What a man can be, he must be. This need we call self-actualizat ion.
When the mind is turbulent, uncontrolled and restless, it is like a pond of water that is filled with mud. Therefore when we look within ourselves, all we perceive is the mud of our material conceptions of life. But when the mind is still through discipline, and through yoga, it is like a pond that has no waves and no turbulence. Then we can perceive through that crystal clear water the eternal nature of our soul.
If you protect a man from folly, you will soon have a nation of fools.
Thy words, I grant are bigger, for I wear not, my dagger in my mouth.
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