...of two simple men I saw today on the pier in the midst of the crowd, parting the parting of dear friends, the one to remain hung on the other's neck and passionately kissed him. While the one to depart tightly pressed the one to remain in his arms.
If everyone there just lived their lives and let others do the same, God would be in every moment, in every grain of mustard, in the fragment of cloud that is there and then gone the following moment. God was there and yet people believed they still had to go on looking, because it seemed too simple to accept that life was an act of faith.
I didn't want to work. It was as simple as that. I distrusted work, disliked it. I thought it was a very bad thing that the human race had unfortunately invented for itself.
Zen is really extraordinarily simple as long as one doesn't try to be cute about it or beat around the bush! Zen is simply the sensation and the clear understanding ... that there is behind the multiplicity of events and creatures in this universe simply one energy -- and it appears as you, and everything is it. The practice of Zen is to understand that one energy so as to "feel it in your bones.
You don't need to be an expert in order to achieve satisfactory investment returns. But if you aren't, you must recognize your limitations and follow a course certain to work reasonably well. Keep things simple and don't swing for the fences.
The master was an old Turtle--we used to call him Tortoise--' Why did you call him Tortoise, if he wasn't one?' Alice asked. We called him Tortoise because he taught us,' said the Mock Turtle angrily; 'really you are very dull!' You ought to be ashamed of yourself for asking such a simple question,' added the Gryphon; and then they both sat silent and looked at poor Alice, who felt ready to sink into the earth.
One of the reasons I think the population question is important, if we want to be as green as possible, any of our energy that is truly renewable is limited. Solar and wind are intermittent and they're so diffuse, it's difficult to harness them in a significant way. But one thing we could be doing is making it a law (like it is in Israel and Cyprus) to take every building eight stories or under and heat all of the water in those buildings with solar energy. It's absolutely simple and cheap technology.
It is fatal to be a man or woman pure and simple; one must be woman-manly or man-womanly. It is fatal for a woman to lay the least stress on any grievance; to plead even with justice any cause; in any way to speak consciously as a woman. And fatal is no figure of speech; for anything written with that conscious bias is doomed to death. It ceases to be fertilized.
I think that I am among the few lucky ones who are exploiting complexity. Most people are unhappy with the emergence of complexity, they would prefer it if the world were very simple, but then it would be a doom for a cryptographer like myself.
A return to first principles in a republic is sometimes caused by the simple virtues of one man. His good example has such an influence that the good men strive to imitate him, and the wicked are ashamed to lead a life so contrary to his example.