A Little Philosophy Of Life Quotes & Sayings

Life is a spiritual journey, so enjoy the expression of spirit in every little beauty. — Debasish Mridha

I want to say this to every stepmother: take it a little easier, try not to be so insistent, try not to have your desires dominate - and not just with the stepchildren, but with your husband, your family, your friends. The moment you step back from whatever it is that exasperates you, you get an unrestricted view of the situation - and you can take a breath before you move forward. — Margit Eva Bernard

I don't know whether I can say that having a career in philosophy has turned out as I imagined, since in many ways I had little idea of what such a life would be like. But philosophy is still tremendously exciting to me, and the opportunity to think, and talk, and write about these issues has been wonderful. — Hilary Kornblith

How can a man live without a standard? — Robert J. Burdette

The May sunshine makes both the trolls and the elves disappear, he thought. They burst like soap bubbles. Only human beings remain, for a little while. We are a brief song beneath the sky, laughter in the wind that ends in a sigh. Then we too are gone. — Johan Theorin

There are a lot of little lessons that can be taught around the home without sitting a child down and boring them to death with your philosophy of life! — Helen McCrory

I don't think I'm entirely on board with the 'do what you truly want to do' school of thought. Not without a little more nuance. There has to be an anchor in the wide-open space. Otherwise, 'doing what you truly want' isn't an authentic attempt at exploration -- it's just another hyper-individualistic credo masquerading as something grand. I mean we're all gung ho about pursuing personal freedom, but why do we want it? If we never constructively apply it to something beyond ourselves, and if it doesn't deepen our sense of connection and humanity, then what's the point? — Clara Bensen

Consider the whole universe whereof thou art but a very little part, and the whole age of the world together, whereof but a short and very momentary portion is allotted unto thee, and all the fates and destinies together, of which how much is it that comes to thy part and share. — Marcus Aurelius

Make a little effort to give up your insignificant quarrels and eventually a better world will follow. — Abhijit Naskar

[Buddhism and Christianity] are in one sense parallel and equal; as a mound and a hollow, as a valley and a hill. There is a sense in which that sublime despair is the only alternative to that divine audacity. It is even true that the truly spiritual and intellectual man sees it as sort of dilemma; a very hard and terrible choice. There is little else on earth that can compare with these for completeness. And he who does not climb the mountain of Christ does indeed fall into the abyss of Buddha. — G.K. Chesterton

Ah, on what little things does happiness depend! I have read all that the wise men have written, and all the secrets of philosophy are mine, yet for want of a red rose is my life made wretched. — Oscar Wilde

Human nature is so complicated. Those who have little, want a lot. Those who have a lot, think others have more. Those who lose, blame others for the loss. — Eraldo Banovac

Ah, clever clogs, but it will have happened in one of my alternative lives. You know
the lives hot-shot scientists tell us we are living at the same time as this one we know about. Which being so, how do you know that what happens in one of your alternative lives doesn't sometimes leak through into your consciousness in this life, and make you sad that you aren't living that particular alternative life instead of this one? Don't you sometimes feel depressed for no reason you can think of? I do. And maybe that's why. We've had a leak from an alternative life and want that life now. Like wanting an ice cream when you were little, which you knew was in the freezer, but your mom wouldn't let you have it. — Aidan Chambers

Oh, life, life!" Bastidas complained, sipping his drink. "What is life? A little flame at the tip of a candle, exposed to a strong wind. — Julio Ramon Ribeyro

A little exposure to the philosophy of many Eastern spiritual traditions - including yoga - could easily lead you to conclude that if you aspire to achieve goals in the material world you cannot fulfill yourself spiritually, or vice versa. However, since all of us, at some level, long for fulfillment in all aspects of our life, it is essential to understand that these two aims are not mutually exclusive. — Rod Stryker

in the most decent sometimes sun
there is the softsmoke feeling from urns
and the canned sound of old battleplanes
and if you go inside and run your finger
along the window ledge you'll find
dirt, maybe even earth.
and if you look out the window
there will be the day, and as you
get older you'll keep looking
keep looking
sucking your tongue in a little
ah ah no no maybe

some do it naturally
some obscenely
everywhere. — Charles Bukowski

I endeavor to drink deep of philosophy, and to be wise when I cannot be merry, easy when I cannot be glad, content with what cannot be mended, and patient where there is no redress. The mighty can do no more, and the wise seldom do as much ... I am resolved to make the best of all circumstances around me, that this short life may not be half lost in pains ... Between the periods of birth and burial, I would fain insert a little happiness, a little pleasure, a little peace: to-day is ours, yesterday is past, and to-morrow may never come. — Elizabeth Montagu

Life is a dream with a little touch of reality. — Debasish Mridha

Little Pessimism in life reminds of staying alive and not wandering in a fairy land. — Vikram Adhikari

A philosopher knows that in reality he knows very little. That is why he constantly strives to achieve true insight. Socrates was one of these rare people. He knew that he knew nothing about life and about the world. And now comes the important part: it troubled him that he knew so little. — Jostein Gaarder

To be a good writer, you not only have to write a great deal but you have to care. You do not have to have a complicated moral philosophy. But a writer always tries, I think, to be a part of a solution, to understand a little about life and to pass this on. — Anne Lamott

In trying to explain life we have reduced it to a series of chemical reactions, whether it be the burning of glucose in mitochondria to create energy, or the folding of proteins to make bile, or pollen, or blood. Zoom out to where we perceive things, the titanic mathematics of it all is silent. We have twisted our thoughts and feelings into all sorts of psychological origami about whether these things are a result of evolution, intelligent design, or creation ex nihilo, and for all we know, our little planet is the only place that holds all of this wonder in a void that is too staggeringly huge to conceive. — Sean J Halford

Life is full of joy and beauty. Look around and notice it. Notice the little butterfly, a little baby with a smile, and the white rose in the garden. Notice a drop of dew on a green leaf in the morning sun. Touch the wind, smell the rain, and feel the joy. Live your life with beauty and joy. — Debasish Mridha

I am a little child
I am the symbols of peace
I am the symbols of love
I am your future, just for you
I will be hear for ever
I am your love
I am your hope
I am really the reflection of you
So just for me
Save the peace, keep alive the hope
Light the lamp, whatever you do. — Debasish Mridha

He who expects from a great name in politics, in philosophy, in art, equal greatness in other things, is little versed in human nature. Our strength lies in our weakness. The learned in books are ignorant of the world. He who is ignorant of books is often well acquainted with other things; for life is of the same length in the learned and unlearned; the mind cannot be idle; if it is not taken up with one thing, it attends to another through choice or necessity; and the degree of previous capacity in one class or another is a mere lottery. — William Hazlitt

On the top of Cadair Idris,
I felt how happy a man might be
with a little money and a sane intellect,
and reflected with astonishment and pity
on the madness of the multitude. — Thomas Love Peacock

Maybe man is nothing in particular,' Cross said gropingly. 'Maybe that's the terror of it. Man may be just anything at all. And maybe man deep down suspects this, really knows this, kind of dreams that it is true; but at the same time he does not want really to know it? May not human life on this earth be a kind of frozen fear of man at what he could possibly be? And every move he makes might not these moves be just to hide this awful fact? To twist it into something which he feels would make him rest and breathe a little easier? What man is is perhaps too much to be borne by man ... — Richard Wright

The conundrum of sanity and insanity, is that it serves us to be some of each. It's really only a question of degrees. You cannot possibly be 100% adjusted and live in this INSANE world. A little bit of crazy is a coping skill. — Kelli Jae Baeli

He who has little communication with people is seldom a misanthrope. True misanthropes are not found in solitude, but in the world. This is because it is practical experience of life, and certainly not philosophy, that makes people hate their fellows. — Giacomo Leopardi

Once upon a time, thirty thousand years ago, there lived a little boy in the Rhine valley. He was a tiny part of nature, a tiny ripple on an endless sea. You too. Sophie, you too are living a tiny part of nature's life. There is no difference between you and that boy.'
'Except that I'm alive now.'
'Yes, but that is precisely what I wanted you to try and imagine. Who will you be in thirty thousand years? — Jostein Gaarder

As it turns out, Plutarch, consciously or unconsciously, touched on a truth that most of us feel, but rarely meditate upon: the little things in behaviour are the door not only to the real character of people but also to their soul. — Nicos Hadjicostis

We sense a dangerous disease infecting our modern culture and eroding hope: an increasingly prevalent view that greatness owes more to circumstance, even luck, than to action and discipline
that what happens to us matters more than what we do. In games of chance like a lottery or roulette, this view seems plausible. But taken as an entire philosophy, applied more broadly to human endeavor, it's a deeply debilitating life perspective, one that we can't imagine wanting to teach young people. Do we really believe that our actions count for little, that those who create something great are merely lucky, that our circumstances imprison us? Do we want to build a society and culture that encourage us to believe that we aren't responsible for our choices and accountable for our performance? — James C. Collins

All that is required of you is an open mind and a little patience. — F.K. Preston

Peace is a beautiful flower of love, harmony and joy
Peace is a dancing bird, a joyful smile of a poor boy
Peace is a little child's innocent smile and loving kiss
For a war torn mother, peace is a divine bliss.
Peace starts with a heart that is caring
Peace starts with a smile that is loving
Peace starts with power of love not with love of power
Peace starts with a desire to bloom like a flower. — Debasish Mridha

Even this little moment is a blessing.
Life is always full of hope, if you only let it in — Atle Jarnaes Leroy

To attempt to describe how music pervades and flavors a life feels a little like an invasion of privacy, even if the privacy is my own. Listening to music, ... is finally the most inward of acts
so inward that even language, even the language of thought, can come to seem intrusive ... After all these procedures the unbreachable mysteriousness of music remains intact. The book can never be more than an interruption. Afterward, the listening begins again, to generate, in turn, other and completely different books. — Geoffrey O'Brien

Giants of literature, philosophy, and the arts have influenced my life, but what have I done with this life? I remain a speck in a tumultuous universe that has little concern for me. I am no more than dust, a mote - dust to dust. I am a blade of grass upon which the stormtrooper's boot stomps. — Rabih Alameddine

I am only about half alive a large part of my strength is consumed in sitting up or walking. My nervous system is a shattered wreck, and I am absolutely bored & listless save when I come upon something which peculiarly interests me. However so many things do interest me, & interest me intensely, in science, history, philosophy, & literature; that I have never actually desired to die, or entertained any suicidal designs, as might be expected of one with so little kinship to the ordinary features of life. — H.P. Lovecraft

It might be a little silly for someone getting to be my age to put this into words, but I just want to make sure I get the facts down clearly : I'm the kind of person who likes to be by himself. To put a finer point on it, I'm the type of person who doesn't find it painful to be alone. I find spending an hour or two everyday running alone, not speaking to anyone as well as four of five hours at my desk, to be neither difficult or boring. — Haruki Murakami

Without knowledge of what I am and why I am here, it is impossible to live, and since I cannot know that, I cannot live either. In an infinity of time, in an infinity of matter, and an infinity of space a bubble-organism emerges while will exist for a little time and then burst, and that bubble am I. — Leo Tolstoy

You know what my philosophy of life is? That it's important to have some laughs, but you got to suffer a little too, because otherwise you miss the whole point to life. — Woody Allen

We humans can never learn everything. The purpose of human life is not to learn everything. Rather it is to learn from every single walk of life and put that knowledge into practice in the pursuit of making human life a little better. — Abhijit Naskar

Nothing is working. Nothing in my life is working. Giants of literature, philosophy, and the arts have influenced my life, but what have I done with this life? I remain a speck in a tumultuous universe that has little concern for me. I am no more than dust, a mote - dust to dust. I am a blade of grass upon which the stormtrooper's boot stomps. I had dreams, and they were not about ending up a speck. I didn't dream of becoming a star, but I thought I might have a small nonspeaking role in a grand epic, an epic with a touch of artistic credentials. I didn't dream of becoming a giant - I wasn't that delusional or arrogant - but I wanted to be more than a speck, maybe a midget. I could have been a midget. All our dreams of glory are but manure in the end. — Rabih Alameddine

Who knew what evil lurked in the hearts of men? A copper, that's who. ( ... )You saw how close men lived to the beast. You realized that people like Carcer were not mad. They were incredibily sane. They were simply men without a shield. They'd looked at the world and realized that all the rules didn't have to apply to them, not if they didn't want them to. They weren't fooled by all the little stories. They shook hands with the beast. — Terry Pratchett

What I have been asking myself for years is: WHY?!
Why kill yourself in the gym? Why try to avoid a little bit of a gut? Why feel bad for eating half of a cake? This doesn't mean that I killed somebody, plus I left the other half of the cake for tomorrow, I didn't finish all of it! — Sara Anzellotti

How big is a man's life?" asked Ultan.
"I have no way of knowing, but isn't it larger than that?"
"You see it from the beginning, and anticipate much. I, recollecting it from its termination, know how little there has been. I suppose that is why the depraved creatures who devour the bodies of the dead seek more. — Gene Wolfe

And this is not the happiness of a magazine writer who sends in his gay little philosophy of life to the editor for the one paragraph spread in front of the magazine: This is a serious happiness full of doubts and strengths. I wonder if happiness is possible. It is a state of mind, but I'd hate to be a bore all my life, if only because of those I love around me. Happiness can change into unhappiness just for the sake of change. — Jack Kerouac

The stupidest people suddenly become a little cleverer when we learn that they think well of us — Jude Morgan

Nick watched her intently as he tried to sort through the anarchy of his thoughts. His usual appetite had vanished after their walk this morning. He had not eaten breakfast ... had not done anything, really, except to wander around the estate in a sort of daze that appalled him. He knew himself to be a callous man, one with no honor, and no means of quelling his own brutish instincts. So much of his life had been occupied with basic survival that he had never been free to follow higher pursuits. He had little acquaintance with literature or history, and his mathematical abilities were limited to matters of money and betting odds. Philosophy, to him, was a handful of cynical principles learned through experience with the worst of humanity. By now, nothing could surprise or intimidate him. He didn't fear loss, pain, or even death.
But with a few words and one awkward, innocent kiss, Charlotte Howard had devastated him. — Lisa Kleypas

Embrace it. Live it. Life's too short. Even looking at it from my end, when I've had more chances than many, I wish
actually even more so now
that I could go back and tinker with a few things ... do a little more of this, a little less of that. But the things about which I feel no regret are those that I did with passion. Those things I remember in living colour. The good and the bad. The rest have faded to black and white. They don't matter. Maybe they never did. — Ella J. Fraser

If we knew when we woke up that it would be the last day of our lives, we would transform every little act of our daily humdrum into small farewells. — Alexandre A. Loch

Life," said Simone St. James ... "is stitched together from a series of mistakes, some little, some big, like the patches on the clothes we wore growin' up, you know — Suzanne Palmieri

Ancient philosophy was framed by prodigies,
Aristotle, Plato and Socrates.
And even though their thoughts were deemed the aristocratic voice,
they also had a thing for little boys.

Katherine the Great so it's been said,
needed large animals to be fulfilled in bed.
From historic rulers to the Ancient Greeks,
we're standing on the shoulders of freaks.

Isn't life pretty? Earnest Hemingway once said,
then he a bullet through his head.
Salvador Dali's surreal paintings were God sent,
you'd never know he ate his own excrement.

Then there's Da Vinci for whom it required,
dressing in women's underwear to be inspired.
From the great romantics to the Ancient Greeks,
we're standing on the shoulders of freaks.

Truman Capote needless to say,
would be intoxicated 20 hours a day.
From the modern authors to the Ancient Greeks,
we're standing on the shoulders of freaks. — Henry Phillips

The Truth Is That I Was Recognized For Stubbornness And Not Goodness. Even, Though I Was Very Intelligent And Sent To School By A Little Few Supports From Sponsors And My Mother. My Brain Was Never Ever Cool. Due To All The Mistakes I Saw From A Very Tender Age From All Those Whom I Looked Upon As Elders And Shinning Examples. Although They Where Some Good Examples Which Still Live On. Still The Early Damaged As Already Been Done. So It Led Me Dropping Out Of School In To Working And Using The Great Ancient Vedic Philosophies I Have Been Hearing From The Very Beginning Of My Conception In My Mother Womb Till The Day I Was Born And Forever. I Used Them All To Materialize Many Of My Dreams And Practice Mysticism Coupled With Spiritualism To Keep My Self Secured And Keep Cool Depending On God. — Baba Tunde Ojo-Olubiyo

A man woke up at midnight and wanted to smoke. Therefore he looked for some fire, for which he went to a neighbor's house and knocked at the door. The neighbor opened the door and asked him what he wanted. The man said, I wish to smoke. Can you give me a little fire? The neighbor replied, O.M.G.! What the heck is wrong with you? You have taken so much trouble to come and wake us up at the middle of the night, while in your own hand you have a lantern! The God that human beings so keenly seek, lives within the human biology, yet they wander hitherto searching for it. — Abhijit Naskar

Left and Right are monolithic ideas - colossal, abstract, and, as their religious origins suggest, cosmic. They are part of the darker side of humanity that replaces the specific with the general, the personal with the impersonal. If you wanted to find a way of making certain that people would have as little as possible in common, there would be no better way than to divide them, not into ten or three or four, but into two. Dual division turns the largest possible sections of humanity against one another, often causing neighbors and compatriots to have nothing to say to one another. No regeneration of community can begin without a careful demolition of Left and Right; nor can this tearing down be relinquished to academic abstraction, technical philosophy, government, corporations, or ideology. Nothing can be built without a new politics - least of all with a politics that refers outward to ideas of Heaven and Hell rather than inward to the experience of daily life. — Hugh Graham

Always tell yourself that you are as good as anyone that breathes; that you have two hands and a brain, and a little time in which to use them. But they are enough, and no one has any more. And if you train and force them to serve you well, you can reach any height to which you aspire. But to waste any of them is to betray yourself. — Robert M. Stroud

It was Don Paolo's birthday and all the people of the village were gathered in the piazza to celebrate him. The band played, the wine flowed, the children danced, and, as he stood for a moment alone under the pergola, a little girl approached the the beloved priest. "But Don Paolo, are you not happy?" she asked him. "Of course I am happy," he assured the little girl. "Why, then, aren't you crying? — Marlena De Blasi

You spend your whole life looking for answers because you think the next answer will solve all your problems: make you a little less miserable, because when you run out of questions you don't just run out of answers ... you run out hope. — House

And even to me, one who likes life, it seems butterflies and soap bubbles and whatever is of their kind among human beings know most about happiness.
To see these light, foolish, delicate, sensitive little souls fluttering
that seduces Zarathustra to tears and songs.
I would only believe in a god who knew how to dance.
And when I saw my devil, there I found him earnest, thorough, deep, somber; it was the spirit of gravity
through him all things fall.
Not by wrath does one kill, but by laughing. Up, let us kill the spirit of gravity! — Friedrich Nietzsche

Gratitude is something of which none of us can give too much. For on the smiles, the thanks we give, our little gestures of appreciation, our neighbors build their philosophy of life. — A.J. Cronin

Everyone in this world is Abhimanyu, the difference being that most of us are trapped in a labyrinth of our own creation. It takes a lifetime for people to realise that the way out lies in their own hands. All it requires is a little introspection. — Anurag Shourie

I am only astonished that, while so many women have intelligent things to say and so many men are still unknown, a publisher cared to print such a little book, and at such a price. That confirms what Schopenhauer reveals to us, among other truths: philosophy is a matter of death. A philosopher living and thinking life is a priori suspect in our philosophical culture. — Luce Irigaray

President Truman had a little sign on his desk. I've always admired its philosophy. It read: THE BUCK STOPS HERE. I've envied certain people, too, the great majority of my colleagues whose sole mission in life is to attain the goal of mediocrity. They sail into a safe harbor, button up and conveniently and quietly sort their paper clips, avoiding responsibility and decisions. I can't explain, Nicole, why I was singled out and am unable to avoid conflict, but I can't run or plug my ears or close my eyes or turn my back. I often envy those who can. — Leon Uris

I don't like purely philosophical works. I think a little philosophy should be added to life and art by way of seasoning, but to make it one's specialty seems to me as strange as eating nothing but horseradish.
- Lara, from Doctor Zhivago — Boris Pasternak

It is always the little things that build up. Often there is no dramatic reason for discontent in marriages. It seeps in slowly over the years.
You don't even notice it creeping in. It happens, trickle by trickle.
You do not realise when or how the easy familiarity gets replaced by a 'taken-for-granted' attitude over the years. By the time you do, it is often late. Habits have been formed, patterns have been set. And a comfort-zone have been established.
A zone that is hard to get out of. — Preeti Shenoy

Where has Arnold been?' I said. '... the Westwoods get in the papers.'
'Patting the orphans.'
'Getting homes for the homeless.'
'Legs for the legless.' She was laughing as she said it.
'Blind dogs,' I said. 'Dogs for the blind, that is.'
'Patting blind dogs.' We both laughed and drank. 'Getting legs for them.'
'Homes for legless, blind orphan dogs.' Maybe we were both a little drunk, on bourbon or on the past. — James Ferron Anderson