Meditation is not passive sitting in silence. It is sitting in awareness, free from distraction, and realizing the clear understanding that arises from concentration.
– Thich Nhat Hanh
http://www.themindfulword.org/2013/meditation-quotes-quotations/
He who has injured thee was either stronger or weaker than thee. If weaker, spare him; if stronger, spare thyself.
– William Shakespeare, or perhaps, Seneca
http://quotations.about.com/od/shakespearequotes/a/shakespeare1.-_pD.htm
It’s easy to look at people and make quick judgments about them, their present and their past, but you’d be amazed at the pain and tears a single smile hides. What a person shows to the world is only one tiny facet of the iceberg hidden from sight. And more often then not, it’s lined with cracks and scars that go all the way to the foundation of their soul.
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/171400-it-s-easy-to-look-at-people-and-make-quick-judgments
You get what anybody gets – you get a lifetime.
– Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 1: Preludes and Nocturnes
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/37817-you-get-what-anybody-gets—you-get-a-lifetime
On reflection, it all came down to nylon —
stockings, bras, pants.
Of course there were the other things —
swing of buttocks, flap of breasts,
a whole shape of arc and indent.
But, somehow, it was the synthetics,
hitched nylon, an erotic mechanics,
that set us light years apart.
What did we have when we undressed?
Socks. Jockeys. A string vest.
But when they stepped out
of shoes, blouses, and skirt —
voila! The French maid: that circumflex
of taut stocking-band; knickers
sheeny as a courtesan’s; the stripper’s
unhooking acrobatics; and the Lautrec
girl stooping as puckered hose slithers.
They held us in a man-made scissors.
The Woman Underneath by Robert Maitre
My ears hear what others cannot hear; small faraway things people cannot normally see are visible to me. These senses are the fruits of a lifetime of longing, longing to be rescued, to be completed. Just as the skirt needs the wind to billow, I’m not formed by things that are of myself alone. I wear my father’s belt tied around my mother’s blouse, and shoes which are from my uncle. This is me. Just as a flower does not choose its color, we are not responsible for what we have come to be. Only once you realize this do you become free, and to become an adult is to become free.
– India Stoker
I have loved to the point of madness. That, which is called madness. That, which to me, is the only sensible way to love.
http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/303187-i-have-loved-to-the-point-of-madness-that-which