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Time to Die:
by Zen Koan

Time to Die:
A Zen teacher had a rare and priceless teacup.
One day, his precocious student accidentally broke the cup.
Hearing the footsteps of his teacher,
the student held the pieces of the cup behind his back.
When the master appeared, he asked: "Why do people have to die?"
"This is natural," explained the teacher.
"Everything has to die and has just so long to live."
The student showed the shattered cup, saying,
"It was time for your cup to die."
- Traditional Zen Koan

The True Path is the path on which
there is no coming and no going.
- Traditional Zen Koan

What is the Sound of One Hand Clapping?
- Traditional Zen Koan

Overflowing Cup of Tea:
The Zen Master poured his visitor's teacup full, and then kept pouring.
The visitor watched until he could no longer restrain himself.
"It is overfull. No more will go in!"
"Like this cup," the Zen Master said,
"you are full of your own opinions and assumptions.
How can you learn truth until you first empty your cup?"
- Traditional Zen Koan

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Thank you for joining me on this journey we call life,
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The Sweetest Strawberry:
A man traveling across a field encountered a tiger.
He fled, the tiger after him.
Coming to a precipice,
he caught hold of the root of a wild vine
and swung himself over the edge.
The tiger sniffed at him from above.
Trembling, the man looked down to where,
far below, another tiger was waiting to eat him.
Only the vine sustained him.
Two mice, one white and one black,
little by little started to gnaw away the vine.
The man then saw a luscious strawberry near him.
Grasping the vine with one hand,
he plucked the strawberry with the other.
How sweet it tasted.
- Zen Koan

The Moon Cannot Be Stolen:
A thief entered the little hut of a Zen Master,
but discovered there was nothing to steal.
The Zen Master discovered the thief.
"You have come a long way to visit me," he told the prowler,
"and you should not return empty-handed.
Please take my clothes as a gift."
The thief was bewildered,
but he took the clothes and slunk away.
The Zen Master sat naked, watching the moon.
"Poor fellow," he mused,
"I wish I could have given him this beautiful moon."
- Traditional Zen Koan

Time, like life itself, has no inherent meaning.
We give our own meaning to time as to life.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.
- Lao Tzu

No good comes from hurrying.
- Yiddish Proverb

The bad news is time flies.
The good news is you're the pilot.
- Michael Althsuler

There is only one time that is important - NOW!
It is the most important time because
it is the only time that we have any power.
- Leo Tolstoy

One does not discover new lands without consenting
to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.
- Andre Gide

A time for work, a time for play -
balance in all things.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Who forces time is pushed back by time;
who yields to time finds time on his side.
- The Talmud

You will never find time for anything.
If you want time you must make it.
- Charles Buxton

Footprints in the sands of time...
Where have you been?
Where are you going?
Why are you going there?
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough.
- Rabindranath Tagore

Do you feel stuck?
Whether in a project, a job, a relationship,
or some other situation,
there is a time for perseverance,
and a time for letting go and moving on.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The way lies in softness and patience,
as the softest water cuts through the hardest rock.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Find a time and place of solitude.
Look into the distance, and into the future.
Visualize the tomorrow you are going to build -
and begin to build that tomorrow, today.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

To say "too busy" is merely
to say "confused priorities."
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Take time to play!
Ask for what you want.
Laugh.
Live loudly.
Be avid.
Learn a new thing.
Be Yourself!
- Mary Anne Radmacher

When you feel the need to hurry,
remember that everything in life is a CHOICE.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Service is the rent we pay for being.
It is the very purpose of life,
and not something you do in your spare time.
- Marion Wright Edelman

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority,
it is time to pause and reflect.
- Mark Twain

We must use time as a tool, not as a crutch.
- John F. Kennedy

Never give up, for that
is just the place and time
that the tide will turn.
- Harriet Beecher Stowe

Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood.
Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.
- Marie Curie

The time is always right to do what is right.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

The time to repair the roof is when the sun is shining.
- John F. Kennedy

Urgent? Why?
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The River of Life knows no obstacles.
The River can cut through solid rock - in its own time.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

This is no time for ease and comfort.
It is time to dare and endure.
- Winston Churchill

The season of failure is the best time
for sowing the seeds of success.
- Paramahansa Yogananda

Our Lord has written the promise of the resurrection,
not in books alone, but in every leaf in spring-time.
- Martin Luther

I must uphold my ideals,
for perhaps the time will come
when I shall be able to carry them out.
- Anne Frank

For time and the world do not stand still.
Change is the law of life.
And those who look only to the past or the present
are certain to miss the future.
- John F. Kennedy

Put some distance between yourself
and whatever is concerning you.
Distance in space or time
always creates a new perspective.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Little minds have little worries,
big minds have no time for worries.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

There may be times when we are powerless
to prevent injustice, but there must never
be a time when we fail to protest.
- Elie Wiesel

An invasion of armies can be resisted,
but not an idea whose time has come.
- Victor Hugo

When I am getting ready to reason with a man,
I spend one-third of my time thinking about myself
and what I am going to say
and two-thirds about him and what he is going to say.
- Abraham Lincoln

The River of Life can cut through solid rock - in its own time.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Time cures all things.
- Proverb

Look at everything as though you were seeing it
either for the first or last time.
Then your time on earth will be filled with glory.
- Betty Smith

A sloth lives a pretty good life, s-l-o-w-l-y.
Maybe we have something to learn from him.
Some days, being sloth-like may be just what you need
to avoid being consumed by urgency.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

When you think you're out of time,
smile, and turn back the clock.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

To everything there is a season,
and a time to every purpose under heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die.
- Ecclesiastes 3:1

No idea is so outlandish that it should not be considered
with a searching but at the same time a steady eye.
- Winston Churchill

You can fool all the people some of the time,
and some of the people all the time,
but you cannot fool all the people all the time.
- Abraham Lincoln (sometimes attributed to P. T. Barnum)

A wise man will make haste to forgive,
because he knows the true value of time,
and will not suffer it to pass away in unnecessary pain.
- Samuel Johnson

Keep moving. Don't stop. But don't rush.
Don't race around.
Sure and steady gets you there every time.
- Neale Donald Walsch

Instead of worrying about what people say of you,
why not spend time trying to accomplish
something they will admire.
- Dale Carnegie

Determine never to be idle.
No person will have occasion to complain
of the want of time who never loses any.
It is wonderful how much may be done if we are always doing.
- Thomas Jefferson

The finest workers in stone are not copper or steel tools,
but the gentle touches of air and water
working at their leisure with a liberal allowance of time.
- Henry David Thoreau

Every time you smile at someone,
it is an action of love,
a gift to that person, a beautiful thing.
- Mother Teresa

Who hears me, who understands me, becomes mine,
a possession for all time.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

The dream you are living is your creation.
It is your perception of reality that you can change at any time.
- don Miguel Ruiz

Habits age men before their time.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Our greatest weakness lies in giving up.
The most certain way to succeed
is always to try just one more time.
- Thomas A. Edison

The wise man looks back into the past,
and does not grieve over what is far off,
nor rejoice over what is near;
for he knows that time is without end.
- Lao Tzu

A big part of letting go is recognizing
when it is time to stay in a situation
and when it is time to move on.
- Darren L. Johnson

Does thou love life? Then do not squander time;
for that's the stuff life is made of.
- Benjamin Franklin

The sum of wisdom is that
time is never lost that is devoted to work.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

This is our moment, this is our time.
- Bono

We must use time wisely and forever realize
that the time is always ripe to do right.
- Nelson Mandela

Spend some time alone every day.
- Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

We must use time creatively.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Time stays long enough for anyone who will use it.
- Leonardo da Vinci

Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time,
for that is the stuff that life is made of.
- Benjamin Franklin

Gardening is all about optimism.
I put a seed in the ground.
I consistently tend it,
confident I will see the results, in time,
of the nurture I have provided.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

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May the world be kind to you, and may your own thoughts be gentle upon yourself.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie