Daryl Downs > Daryl's Quotes

“Why can't we simply borrow what is useful to us from Buddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, especially Zen, as we borrow from Christianity, science, American Indian traditions and world literature in general, including philosophy, and let the rest go hang? Borrow what we need but rely principally upon our own senses, common sense and daily living experience.”
― Edward Abbey, Postcards from Ed: Dispatches and Salvos from an American Iconoclast

“The decay and disintegration of this culture is astonishingly amusing if you are emotionally detached from it. I have always viewed it from a safe distance, knowing I don't belong; it doesn't include me, and it never has. no matter how you care to define it, I do not identify with the local group. Planet, species, race, nation, state, religion, party, union, club, association, neighborhood improvement committee; I have no interest in any of it. I love and treasure individuals as I meet them, I loathe and despise the groups they identify with and belong to.”
― George Carlin, Brain Droppings

“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.”
― Oscar Wilde

“When a man gives his opinion, he's a man. When a woman gives her opinion, she's a bitch.”
― Bette Davis

“So no one cares - and that protects your personal privacy. At least most of the time no one cares. I'm not making the argument that if we're doing nothing wrong, then we shouldn't be afraid of the government monitoring us. That's a stupid, bad argument. We should always be afraid of any government monitoring us. The fact that no one cares what we're talking about is an argument for keeping it that way. We don't want the government to be able to care. Any power you give the government, the government will abuse. George Washington almost said that.”
― Penn Jillette, Penn & Teller's How to Play in Traffic

“When another person makes you suffer, it is because he suffers deeply within himself, and his suffering is spilling over. He does not need punishment; he needs help. That's the message he is sending.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh

“It is said that God has created man in his own image. But it may be that humankind has created God in the image of humankind.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh, Going Home: Jesus and Buddha as Brothers

“Attachment to views is the greatest impediment to the spiritual path.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh, Old Path White Clouds: Walking in the Footsteps of the Buddha

“The kingdom of God is available to you in the here and the now. But the question is whether you are available to the kingdom. Our practice is to make ourselves ready for the kingdom so that it can manifest in the here and the now. You don't need to die in order to enter the kingdom of heaven. In fact, you have to be truly alive in order to do so.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh

“This is why I'm here on this planet, at this time, Francesca. Not to travel or make pictures, but to love you. I know that now. I have been falling from the rim of a great, high place, somewhere back in time, for many more years than I have lived in this life. And through all of those years, I have been falling toward you.”
― Robert James Waller

“If you're going to say what you want to say, you're going to hear what you don't want to hear.”
― Roberto Bolaño, The Insufferable Gaucho