Evolution Quotes by Idries Shah

“Opportunity's precious, and time is a sword.”

— Idries Shah

Worry is a cloud which rains destruction.

— Idries Shah

No practice exists in isolation.

— Idries Shah

“Words have to die if humans are to live.”

— Idries Shah

“Remember that greed includes greed for being not greedy.”

— Idries Shah

“One of the great Sufis said: 'A saint is a saint unless he knows that he is one.”

— Idries Shah

“When people believe that the form is more important than the Truth, they will not find truth, but will stay with form.”

— Idries Shah

When a belief becomes more than an instrument, you are lost. You remain lost until you learn what 'belief' is really for.

— Idries Shah

“The Sufis,' runs the saying, 'understand with their hearts what the most learned scholars cannot understand with their minds”

— Idries Shah

“Progress comes through capacity to learn, and is irresistible.”

— Idries Shah

“Inner Knowledge -- You want to become wise in one lesson: First become a real human being.”

— Idries Shah

“If you seek small things to do, and do them well, great things will seek you, and demand to be performed.”

— Idries Shah

“Sufis are those who have expunged from their minds the human tendencies of envy and enmity.”

— Idries Shah

“...action is in fact knowledge in operation. Right action stems from right knowledge. Right knowledge is acquired through the teacher.”

— Idries Shah

“There can be no spirituality, according to the Sufi masters, without psychology, psychological insight and sociological balance.”

— Idries Shah

“The automatism of man is overcome, in the words of Dhun'Nun, by aiming for 'being as you were, where you were, before…

— Idries Shah

“HE is a Master who may teach without it being totally labelled teaching; HE is a student who can learn without being…

— Idries Shah

“You can learn more in half an hour's direct contact with a source of knowledge (no matter the apparent reason for the…

— Idries Shah

“if... says: 'Do not be greedy, be generous', you may inwardly interpret this in such a manner that you will develop a…

— Idries Shah

“A man is deficient in understanding until he perceives that there is a whole cycle of evolution possible within himself: repeating endlessly,…

— Idries Shah

“Sufis hold that the superior experience and knowledge comes to a man or woman in exact accordance with his worth,capacity,and earning of…

— Idries Shah

“The Sufi way is through knowledge and practice, not through intellect and talk. As Prince Dara Shikoh says, in a Persian poem:…

— Idries Shah

“Definition of a Sufi To learn, people must give up a great deal, and this includes ritual as something from which they…

— Idries Shah

“Why did I do such-and-such a thing?' is all very well. But what about 'How otherwise could I have done it?”

— Idries Shah

“You can perceive a person's aspiration if it is genuine, because this creates a change in the emanations from such a person.”

— Idries Shah

“Show me a person who really knows what 'good' is, and I will show you that he almost never uses the word.”

— Idries Shah

“Laziness - The laziness of adolescence is a rehearsal for the incapacity of old age.”

— Idries Shah

“They say: 'Seek wisdom while you have the strength, or you may lose the strength without gaining wisdom.”

— Idries Shah

“When humility is exercised, people begin to realise that they do not, as it were, exist at all.”

— Idries Shah

If your desire for 'good' is based on greed, it is not good, but greed.

— Idries Shah

“Our objective is to achieve, by the understanding of the Origin, the Knowledge which comes through experience.”

— Idries Shah

“There is no wisdom where there is no common sense: it cannot under those conditions find any expression.”

— Idries Shah

“There is a saying that, according to what a person's mentality is, even an angel may seem to him to have a…

— Idries Shah

“If you are 'humble', it may help you in ordinary life. If you are not, you will get nowhere in higher things.”

— Idries Shah

The Sufi is One who does not care when something is taken from him, but who does not cease to seek for…

— Idries Shah

“...most systems end up by making imagined humility into a form of vanity, so they end up with vanity just the same.”

— Idries Shah

“Greed harms you: generosity helps you. This is why it has been said: 'Greed is the mother of incapacity'.”

— Idries Shah

“Sufism is transmitted by means of the human exemplar, the teacher.”

— Idries Shah

Mediation - Before you learn how to meditate, you must unlearn what you think meditation might be.

— Idries Shah

“If you cannot laugh frequently and genuinely, you have no soul.”

— Idries Shah