“When humility is exercised, people begin to realise that they do not, as it were, exist at all.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“One of the basic Sufi needs is to enable people to see themselves as they really are.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Show me a person who really knows what 'good' is, and I will show you that he almost never uses the word.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Learning how to learn involves examining assumptions. Mulla Nasrudin tales very often fulfil this funcition.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Remedy Your medicine is in you, and you do not observe it. Your ailment is from yourself, and you do not register… — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Never follow any impulse to teach, however strong it might be. The command to teach is not felt as an impulsion.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Si realmente quieres aprender, no te sorprendas si alguien trata de enseñarte. Y no rechaces el método a la ligera.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Laziness - The laziness of adolescence is a rehearsal for the incapacity of old age.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“...action is in fact knowledge in operation. Right action stems from right knowledge. Right knowledge is acquired through the teacher.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Q: How can I help myself? A: By remembering the proverb: ‘The Path is not to be found anywhere except in human… — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“The existence of relative truth does not prove the non-existence of universal truth.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
When a belief becomes more than an instrument, you are lost. You remain lost until you learn what 'belief' is really for. — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“The Sufis,' runs the saying, 'understand with their hearts what the most learned scholars cannot understand with their minds” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Alguien dice que no le he enseñado nada que pueda recordar. Aún no puede comprender que eso es precisamente a lo que… — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Our heads are filled with ‘knowledge’, a knowledge that in some areas pre-empts our seeing anything at all.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Service I will not serve God like a labourer, in expectation of my wages. Rabia el-Adawia.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“One of the great Sufis said: 'A saint is a saint unless he knows that he is one.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“To be a Sufi is to detach from fixed ideas and from preconceptions; and not to try to avoid what is your… — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Recuerda que virtualmente todas las organizaciones que conoces funcionan gracias a tu codicia. Te atraen porque apelan a tu codicia.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“You may be able to get the bone down your throat But if it reaches your stomach it will tear your navel.… — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Forms are vehicles and instruments, and vehicles and instruments cannot be called good or bad without context.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“When people believe that the form is more important than the Truth, they will not find truth, but will stay with form.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“If you really want to learn, do not be surprised if someone tries to teach you. And do not lightly reject the… — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“The teacher works in accordance with the prospects of his students and the possibility of maintaining the community of Sufis.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Inner Knowledge -- You want to become wise in one lesson: First become a real human being.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Sufism, the "secret tradition," is not available on the basis of assumptions which belong to another world, the world of intellect.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Sufism is therefore not 'Do as I say and not as I do', or even 'Do as I do', but 'Experience and… — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“If you seek small things to do, and do them well, great things will seek you, and demand to be performed.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“If you will not reprove yourself,’ Saadi says, ‘you will not welcome reproof from another.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Los Sufis consideran mecánicos y degenerados a los sistemas que tratan a todos de la misma forma.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Whoever might perfume a scorpion Will not thereby escape its sting. Bahaudin Naqshband” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“¿No se te ha ocurrido que, al contrario, otras personas no tienen tus dificultades porque no reaccionan a lo que les sucede… — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Quienquiera que perfume a un escorpión no por ello escapará a su aguijonazo. Bahaudin Naqshband” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Any society which enjoins its members to adhere to both of these (politeness and truth) is a fraud.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
When Fortune knocks, open the door,' they say. But why should one make fortune knock, by keeping the door shut? — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Do not tell your secrets to everyone in this headquarters, Earth. We have surveyed it well. There was nobody to whom to… — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Q: What is a fundamental mistake of man's? A: To think that he is alive, when he has merely fallen asleep in… — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“Cuando se ejercita la humildad, la gente comienza a advertir que, por así decirlo, no existe en modo alguno.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“The major barrier to understanding is wishful thinking and following that which pleases one.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“It is your duty to do your best. It is not, however, your birth-right to prevail.” — Idries Shah Copy Share Image
“To be a Sufi is to detach from fixed ideas and from preconceptions; and not to try to avoid what is your lot.” — Idries Shah Copy Share
Prescribing hard work for the soft, or easy work for the hardy, is generally nonsense. What is always needed in any aim is right… — Idries Shah Copy Share
A king who feared wasps once decreed that they were abolished. As it happened, they did him no harm. But he was eventually stung… — Idries Shah Copy Share
“Do not tell your secrets to everyone in this headquarters, Earth. We have surveyed it well. There was nobody to whom to entrust secrets.” — Idries Shah Copy Share
“Sufis are those who have expunged from their minds the human tendencies of envy and enmity.” — Idries Shah Copy Share
The human being, whether he realises it or not, is trusting someone or something every moment of the day. — Idries Shah Copy Share
“You may be able to get the bone down your throat But if it reaches your stomach it will tear your navel. (Gulistan)” — Idries Shah Copy Share
“People are always trying to understand. There is only one way to do that. It is to discover < + i + >why< +… — Idries Shah Copy Share
We view Sufism not as an ideology that molds people to the right way of belief or action, but as an art or science… — Idries Shah Copy Share
