Learning In Nature Quotes & Sayings

Solitude, the safeguard of mediocrity, is to genius the stern friend, the cold, obscure shelter where moult the wings which will bear it farther than suns and stars. He who should inspire and lead his race must be defended from travelling with the souls of other men, from living, breathing, reading, and writing in the daily, time-worn yoke of their opinions. "In the morning, - solitude;" said Pythagoras; that Nature may speak to the imagination, as she does never in company, and that her favorite may make acquaintance with those divine strengths which disclose themselves to serious and abstracted thought. 'Tis very certain that Plato, Plotinus, Archimedes, Hermes, Newton, Milton, Wordsworth, did not live in a crowd, but descended into it from time to time as benefactors: and the wise instructor will press this point of securing to the young soul in the disposition of time and the arrangements of living, periods and habits of solitude. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

He was partly a young man of our time - that is, honest by nature, demanding the truth, seeking it and believing in it, and in that belief demanding immediate participation in it with all the strength of his soul; demanding an immediate deed, with an unfailing desire to sacrifice everything for this deed, even life. Although, unfortunately, these young men do not understand that the sacrifice of life is, perhaps, the easiest of all sacrifices in many cases, while to sacrifice, for example, five or six years of their ebulliently youthful life to hard, difficult studies, to learning, in order to increase tenfold their strength to serve the very truth and the very deed that they loved and set out to accomplish - such sacrifice is often almost beyond the strength of many of them. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Any person whom seeks to live a historical existence must devote their efforts to learning about the world, care about people and nature, and seek to express their thoughts in the artistic methodology most appropriate to their particular talent. A person cannot fake self-awareness or imitate an artistic nature. A person must honestly earn a heightened level of conscious awareness. — Kilroy J. Oldster

I think the best life would be one that's lived off the grid. No bills, your name in no government databases. No real proof you're even who you say you are, aside from, you know, being who you say you are. I don't mean living in a mountain hut with solar power and drinking well water. I think nature's beautiful and all, but I don't have any desire to live in it. I need to live in a city. I need pay as you go cell phones in fake names, wireless access stolen or borrowed from coffee shops and people using old or no encryption on their home networks. Taking knife fighting classes on the weekend! Learning Cantonese and Hindi and how to pick locks. Getting all sorts of skills so that when your mind starts going, and you're a crazy raving bum, at least you're picking their pockets while raving in a foreign language at smug college kids on the street. At least you're always gonna be able to eat. — Joey Comeau

We spend vast amounts of our time an emotional energy in learning how not to be natural and in eluding the trap of our own nature and it therefore becomes very difficult to know exactly what is meant when we speak of the unnatural. It is not possible to have it both ways, to use nature at one time as the final arbiter of human conduct and at another to oppose her as angrily as we do. — James Baldwin

Shall there come a day when wise men are able to unite the dreams of youth and the delights of learning as reproach brings together hearts in conflict? Shall there come a day when man's teacher is nature, and humanity is his book — Kahlil Gibran

Wonder is the beginning of wisdom in learning from books as well as from nature. — Mortimer J. Adler

As a homeschooling parent, I have often wondered who learns more in our family, the parent or the child. The topic I seem to be learning the most about is the nature of learning itself. — Jan Hunt

So long as a man remains a gregarious and sociable being, he cannot cut himself off from the gratification of the instinct of imparting what he is learning, of propagating through others the ideas and impressions seething in his own brain, without stunting and atrophying his moral nature and drying up the surest sources of his future intellectual replenishment. — James Joseph Sylvester

All that time she had worked in the acquisition of Power. All that time she had been ruled by ambition. All those centuries that she had lived in such a vast yet fleeting journey, and here he was holding everything she had reached for, not striving, not continually learning to be better, not fighting to acquire any of it. He just was, the mysterious, magical rune, the riddle of a creature that nature decreed should not be able to exist, and yet he did. — Thea Harrison

Nature without learning is like a blind man; learning without Nature, like a maimed one; practice without both, incomplete. As in agriculture a good soil is first sought for, then a skilful husbandman, and then good seed; in the same way nature corresponds to the soil, the teacher to the husbandman, precepts and instruction to the seed. — Plutarch

On the hill behind her crows flew one by one into the bare trees, arranging their dark blots in the scrim of branches and adding their warnings to the drear sounds of this day. Gone, gone, they rasped. Here was a dead world learning to speak in dissonant, unbearable sounds. — Barbara Kingsolver

This seems clear enough: When truly present in nature, we do use all our senses at the same time, which is the optimum state of learning. — Richard Louv

Science is a process for learning about nature in which competing ideas about how the world works are measured against observations. — Richard P. Feynman

I do not believe that my generation, my cousins who have been educated in the American way, all of whom are MDs or PhDs, have any comparable learning ... I am not saying anything so trite as that life is fuller when people have myths to live by. I mean rather that a life based on the Book is closer to the truth, that it provides the material for deeper research in and access to the real nature of things. Without the great revelations, epics, and philosophies as part of our natural vision, there is nothing to see out there, and eventually little left inside. The Bible is not the only means to furnish a mind, but without a book of similar gravity, read with the gravity of the potential believer, it will remain unfurnished. — Allan Bloom

When you are inquisitive, Jane, you always make me smile. You open your eyes like an eager bird, and make every now and then a restless movement, as if answers in speech did not flow fast enough for you, and you wanted to read the tablet of one's heart. — Charlotte Bronte

...Nature becomes your teacher, and from her you will learn what is beautiful and who you are and what is your special quest in life and whither you should go...You live on manna vouchsafed to you daily, miraculously. You stretch out arms for hidden gifts, you year toward the moonbeams and the stars, you listen with new ears to bird's songs and the murmurs of trees and streams....From day to day you keep your log, your day-book of the soul, and you may think at first that it is a mere record of travel and of facts; but something else will be entering into it, poetry, the new poetry of your life, and it will be evident to a seeing eye that you are gradually becoming an artist in life, you are learning the gentle art of tramping, and it is giving you an artist's joy in creation. — Stephen Graham

A lady must be born of unsullied blood for at least three generations, on each side of her house. Think for a minute about where you are going to fulfil that condition. Then she must be gentle by nature, and rearing. She must know all there is to learn from books, have wide experience to cover all emergencies, she must be steeped in social graces, and diplomatic by nature. She must rise unruffled to any emergency, never wound, never offend, always help and heal, she must be perfect in deportment, virtue, wifehood and motherhood. She must be graceful, pleasing and beautiful. She must have much leisure to perfect herself in learning, graces and arts - — Gene Stratton-Porter

Men and women in all parts of the world have a desperate need to take time from their demanding routines of everyday life and to quietly observe God's miracles taking place all around them. Think of what would happen if all of us took time to look carefully at the wonders of nature that surround us and devoted ourselves to learning more about this world that God created for us! — M. Russell Ballard

In any regime there is always something that one should agree with, and in Shades there are quite a few notions that, on the face of it, seem like a good thing - the strict adherence to good manners, the fact that learning a musical instrument is compulsory, as is dancing, performing musicals and an hour's Useful Work every day in order to properly discharge your duty to society. But a cage is still a cage, irrespective of the nature of its bars. — Jasper Fforde

The poet discovers that what men value as substances have a higher value as symbols; that Nature is the immense shadow of man. A man's action is only a picture-book of his creed. He does after what he believes. Your condition, your employment, is the fable of you. The world is thoroughly anthropomorphized, as if it had passed through the body and mind of man, and taken his mould and form. Indeed, good poetry is always personification, and heightens every species of force in nature by giving it a human volition. We are advertised that there is nothing to which man is not related; that everything is convertible into every other. The staff in his hand is the radius vector of the sun. The chemistry of this is the chemistry of that. Whatever one act we do, whatever one thing we learn, we are doing and learning all things, - marching in the direction of universal power. Every healthy mind is a true Alexander or Sesostris, building a universal monarchy. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Because what's the use of learning that I am one of a long row only - finding out that there is set down in some old book somebody just like me, and to know that I shall only act her part; making me sad, that's all. The best is not to remember your nature and your past doings have been just like thousands' and thousands', and that your coming life and doings'll be like thousands' and thousands'. — Thomas Hardy

Like it or not, philosophy or intellectual activity in ancient China was distinguished from manual labor, and thus philosophical texts were not only political in nature (because they normally addressed the issue of good government and social order) but also "esoteric." They were not meant to contribute to general education, but to be studied only by a small fraction of the population, i.e., by those who had access to learning and power. If we want to understand the Laozi historically, we have to accept this context and thus also the fact that, as a philosophical treatise, it did not attempt to be generally accessible. It was originally a text for the few - and it clearly shows. — Hans-Georg Moeller

But the ground of a man's culture lies in his nature, not in his calling. His powers are to be unfolded on account of their inherent dignity, not their outward direction. He is to be educated, because he is a man, not because he is to make shoes, nail, or pins. — William Ellery Channing

"Just try and remember," I said slowly," that if God had intended men to fly He'd have given us wings. So all flying is flying in the face of nature. It's unnatural, wicked and stuffed with risks all the time. The secret to flying is learning to minimize the risks." "Or perhaps - the secret of life is to choose your risks?" — Gavin Lyall

In the matter of learning, the difference between the earnest and the careless student stands out clearly. The same holds true in the mastering of passion and the weaknesses to which our nature is subject, as in the acquiring of virtue. — Saint Ignatius

... A MAN WHO HAS GIVEN HIS HEART TO LEARNING AND TRUE WISDOM AND EXERCISED THAT PART OF HIMSELF IS SURELY BOUND, IF HE ATTAINS TO TRUTH, TO HAVE IMMORTAL AND DIVINE THOUGHTS, AND CANNOT FAIL TO ACHIEVE IMMORTALITY AS FULL AS IS PERMITTED TO HUMAN NATURE; AND BECAUSE HE HAS ALWAYS LOOKED AFTER THE DIVINE ELEMENT IN HIMSELF AND KEPT HIS GUARDIAN SPIRIT IN GOOD ORDER HE MUST BE HAPPY ABOVE ALL MEN — Plato

Thinking, he walked ever more slowly and asked himself, What is it now that you were hoping to learn from doctrines and teachers, and what is it that they - who taught you so much - were unable to teach you? And, he decided, It was the Self whose meaning and nature I wished to learn. It was the Self I wished to escape from, wished to overcome. But I was unable to overcome it, I could only trick it, could only run away from it and hide. Truly, not a single thing in all the world has so occupied my thoughts as this Self of mine, this riddle: that I am alive and that I am One, am different and separate from all others, that I am Siddhartha! And there is not a thing in the world about which I know less than about myself, about Siddhartha! — Hermann Hesse

Learning to pause is the first step in the practice of Radical Acceptance. A pause is a suspension of activity, a time of temporary disengagement when we are no longer moving toward any goal ... The pause can occur in the midst of almost any activity and can last for an instant, for hours or for seasons of our life ... We may pause in the midst of meditation to let go of thoughts and reawaken our attention to the breath. We may pause by stepping out of daily life to go on a retreat or to spend time in nature or to take a sabbatical ... You might try it now: Stop reading and sit there, doing "no thing," and simply notice what you are experiencing. — Tara Brach

Art is unquestionably one of the purest and highest elements in human happiness. It trains the mind through the eye, and the eye through the mind. As the sun colors flowers, so does art color life. — John Lubbock

There is a sort of knowledge beyond the power of learning to bestow, and this is to be had in conversation; so necessary is this to the understanding the characters of men, that none are more ignorant of them than those learned pedants whose lives have been entirely consumed in colleges and among books; for however exquisitely human nature may have been described by writers the true practical system can be learned only in the world. — Henry Fielding

At the opposite pole to this nature of shadows, madness fascinates because it is knowledge. It is knowledge, first, because all these absurd figures are in reality elements of a difficult, hermetic, esoteric learning. These strange forms are situated, from the first, in the space of the Great Secret, and the Saint Anthony who is tempted by them is not a victim of the violence of desire but of the much more insidious lure of curiosity; he is tempted by that distant and intimate knowledge which is offered, and at the same time evaded, by the smile of the gryllos; his backward movement is nothing but that step by which he keeps from crossing the forbidden limits of knowledge; he knows already - and — Michel Foucault

Scientists believe that sharks are one of the oldest species of animals still in existence. Nature built them as perfect predators. Perfect killing machines. Nature hasn't had to revise or update them much. They were built right the first time.

Dolphins are very different. Scientists say that millions of years ago, dolphins were land animals. Sea mammals not very different from humans and other mammals. They evolved their way back into the ocean. Part of that evolution included learning to cope with predators, with killer whales and sharks.

I don't now what sea the Taxxon race evolved in. I don't know what natural predators they faced there. But they were not ready for this ocean. They were not ready to go one-on-one with the masters of Earth's deep seas. They were no match for dolphin or shark.

-Animorphs #4, The Visitor page 69 — K.A. Applegate

I am losing precious days. I am degenerating into a machine for making money. I am learning nothing in this trivial world of men. I must break away and get out into the mountains to learn the news — John Muir

True meaning in life comes through understanding your own nature and learning to accept all aspects of yourself. — Kristine Carlson

We could sit here and get super-high and talk about the illusory nature of reality, drawing back the veil, and so on, but what I'm learning is this: that loving anything or anyone this much requires you to hold conflicting thoughts in your head and heart. I want to look at [my daughter's] dear, dear little face forever; [but] nothing lasts forever...I will die, her father will die, my little family that is the whole heart of me is the tiniest of tiny blips in the sweep of space and time. We are nothing. We are part of something so grand we cannot hope to apprehend it. We are all lost. We are all floating in space. We were never lost. We will go home. — Emily Flake

I can't make head or tail of Life. Love is a fine thing, Art is a fine thing, Nature is a fine thing; but the average human mind and spirit are confusing beyond measure. Sometimes I think that all our learning is the little learning of the maxim. To laugh at a Roman awe-stricken in a sacred grove is to laugh at something today. — Wallace Stevens

How silly then to imagine that the human mind, which is formed of the same elements as divine beings, objects to movement and change of abode, while the divine nature finds delight and even self-preservation in continual and very rapid change. — Seneca.

What was most surprising, she was giving him the hardest thing to do first, but by failure at the great one he was learning the easier tasks with infallible power and skill. How different that is from our human way of training people, with the easiest always first. In nature animals cannot afford such long drawn-out step-by-step training. Animal children cannot be segregated in the schoolroom from the sharp experiences of life. They have to be educated in the heart of life itself. The easy and the difficult befall them without any sequence. It is a pity that in civilisation man has made the business of education so sequestered and slow. — Dhan Gopal Mukerji

In time, we will have to recognise that it is not 'nature' that we need to protect, but ourselves, and we can only do this by abandoning the old, grandiose, profit-seeking schemes so beloved of our masters and learning to till the soil, live to scale, and live within our means. — John Burnside

This type of man who is devoted to the study of wisdom is always most unlucky in everything, and particularly when it comes to procreating children; I imagine this is because Nature wants to ensure that the evils of wisdom shall not spread further throughout mankind. — Desiderius Erasmus

Free human dialogue, wandering wherever the agility of the mind allows, lies at the heart of education. If teachers do not have the time, the incentive, or the wit to produce that; if students are too demoralized, bored, or distracted to muster the attention their teachers need of them, then THAT is the educational problem which has to be solved ... That problem ... is metaphysical in nature, not technical — Neil Postman

The psychologists and the metaphysicians wrangle endlessly over the nature of the thinking process in man, but no matter how violently they differ otherwise they all agree that it has little to do with logic and is not much conditioned by overt facts. — H.L. Mencken

A summer rain had left the night clean and sparkling with drops of water. I leaned against the end pillar of the gallery, my head touching the soft tendrils of a jasmine which grew there in a constant battle with a wisteria, and I thought of what lay before me throughout the world and throughout time, and resolved to go about it delicately and reverently, learning that from each thing which would take me best to another. — Anne Rice

The most used program in computers and education is PowerPoint. What are you learning about the nature of the medium by knowing how do to a great PowerPoint presentation? Nothing. It certainly doesn't teach you how to think critically about living in a culture of simulation. — Sherry Turkle

Arab civilizations had been of an abstract nature, moral and intellectual rather than applied; and their lack of public spirit made their excellent private qualities futile. They were fortunate in their epoch: Europe had fallen barbarous; and the memory of Greek and Latin learning was fading from men's minds. — T.E. Lawrence

In classes, the more lively and uninhibited ones will "suck away the air" from those with a more passive nature, despite all the efforts of the teacher. It is also a special danger in large groups that you will hear your fellow students' bad pronunciation more than the teacher's perfected speech. — Kato Lomb

Life is a self-correcting, negative regulatory system because it is always moving toward a specific target destination in the future. This target destination we call 'self preservation'.

Achieve this goal it must constantly reduce the probabilities that interfere with its movement toward that future target.

Hence, it conserves by self-regulating, like a thermostat set at a specific temperature, as it advances, all the while seeking to re-adapt in accordance with the changes it incurs.

Putting this principle to work in our daily life means learning to adapt to new information while always adhering to a basic plan that can, in general, be modified according to alterations in the data encountered.

Thoughts from; SPIRAL FORECASTING: Nature's Inside Track to Future Success — Nahu Lanham

If nothing else, school teaches that there is an answer to every question; only in the real world do young people discover that many aspects of life are uncertain, mysterious, and even unknowable. If you have a chance to play in nature, if you are sprayed by a beetle, if the color of a butterfly's wing comes off on your fingers, if you watch a caterpillar spin its cocoon
you come away with a sense of mystery and uncertainty. The more you watch, the more mysterious the natural world becomes, and the more you realize how little you know. Along with its beauty, you may also come to experience its fecundity, its wastefulness, aggressiveness, ruthlessness, parasitism, and its violence. These qualities are not well-conveyed in textbooks. — Michael Crichton

It is that holy poetry and singing we are after ... It is the wild singing we are after, our chance to use the wild language we are learning by heart under the sea. When a woman speaks her truth, fires up her intention and feeling, staying tight with the instinctive nature, she is singing, she is living in the wild breath-stream of the soul. To live this way is a cycle in itself, one meant to go on, go on, go on. — Clarissa Pinkola Estes

Nature is a self-made machine, more perfectly automated than any automated machine. To create something in the image of nature is to create a machine, and it was by learning the inner working of nature that man became a builder of machines. — Eric Hoffer

-It is possible to vastly compress most learning. In a surprising number of cases, it is possible to do something in 1-10 months that is assumed to take 1-10 years.
-The more you compress things, the more physical limiters become a bottleneck. All learning is physically limited. The brain is dependent on finite quantities of neurotransmitters, memories require REM and non-REM (NREM) sleep for consolidation, etc. The learning graph is not unlike the stress-recovery-hyperadaptation curves of weight training.
-The more extreme your ambition, just as in sports, the more you need performance enhancement via unusual schedules, diet, drugs, etc.
-Most important: due to the bipolar nature of the learning process, you can forecast setbacks. If you don't, you increase the likelihood of losing morale and quitting before the inflection point. — Timothy Ferriss

Learning chiefly in mathematical sciences can so swallow up and fix one's thought, as to possess it entirely for some time; but when that amusement is over, nature will return, and be where it was, being rather diverted than overcome by such speculations. — Gilbert Burnet

In this new world, you and I make it up as we go along, not because we lack expertise or planning skills, but because that is the nature of reality. Reality changes shape and meaning because of our activity. And it is constantly new. We are required to be there, as active participants. It can't happen without us and nobody can do it for us. — Margaret J. Wheatley

You make a decision whether you just work on the script and believe in every moment and pick out every moment, or if you sit down and memorize lines. Once you really dig into a script, learning lines becomes almost second nature. — Adria Arjona

The whole secret of the study of nature lies in learning how to use one's eyes ... — George Sand

Love others as you love yourself.'"1 Learning to love unselfishly is not an easy task. It runs counter to our self-centered nature. That's why we're given a lifetime to learn it. Of course, God wants us to love everyone, but he is particularly concerned that we learn to love others in his family. As we have already seen, this is the second purpose for your life. Peter tells us, "Show special love for God's people."2 Paul echoes this sentiment: "When we have the opportunity to help anyone, we should do it. But we should give special attention to those who are in the family of believers."3 — Rick Warren

Here I, for instance, quite naturally want to live, in order to satisfy all my capacities for life, and not simply my capacity for reasoning, that is, not simply one twentieth of my capacity for life. What does reason know? Reason only knows what it has succeeded in learning (some things, perhaps, it will never learn; this is a poor comfort, but why not say so frankly?) and human nature acts as a whole, with everything that is in it, consciously or unconsciously, and, even if it goes wrong, it lives. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

I've read about this in books, imagined it in my mind countless times since I've been here, but to actually witness it is something entirely different. I thought I was prepared, but nothing - no amount of book learning or supposed life experience or bravado - can make you invulnerable to the sight of a vampire drinking blood. — Melika Dannese Lux

The advances of biology during the past 20 years have been breathtaking, particularly in cracking the mystery of heredity. Nevertheless, the greatest and most difficult problems still lie ahead. The discoveries of the 1970's about the chemical roots of memory in nerve cells or the basis of learning, about the complex behavior of man and animals, the nature of growth, development, disease and aging will be at least as fundamental and spectacular as those of the recent past. — H. Bentley Glass

In Sweden they have a very different approach. There, preschool children are encouraged to play and relax without any structured learning for the first six years of their lives. They go for nature walks every day, even in the bitter Scandinavian winter. They are not taught to read until they are seven years of age, yet by the age of ten, Swedish children consistently lead European literacy rankings. — Goldie Hawn

A learned parson, rusting in his cell at Oxford or Cambridge, will reason admirably well on the nature of man; will profoundly analyse the head, the heart, the reason, the will, the passions, the sentiments, and all those subdivisions of we know not what; and yet, unfortunately, he knows nothing of man ... He views man as he does colours in Sir Isaac Newton's prism, where only the capital ones are seen; but an experienced dyer knows all their various shades and gradations, together with the result of their several mixtures. — Lord Chesterfield

Satan so vehemently despises what Christ has done for mortals that one of his chief objectives is to make the clean feel unclean. Oh, how he desires to stain the beautiful bride of Christ. Satan can't make the bride do anything, so he does everything he can to get her to. How is this best accomplished? He tries to corrupt thoughts to manipulate feelings. Satan knows that the nature of humankind is to act out of how we feel rather than what we know. One of our most important defenses against satanic influence will be learning how to behave out of what we know is truth rather than what we feel. Satan's desire is to modify human behavior to accomplish his unholy purposes. Second Timothy 2:26 tells us that Satan's objective in taking people captive is to get them to do his will. If we have received Christ as our Savior, Satan is forced to work from the outside rather than the inside. Thus, he manipulates outside influences to affect the inside decision-makers of the heart and mind. — Beth Moore

Scripture As Text: Learning What God Reveals," was an orientation in the personal, revelatory nature of Holy Scripture. All these words are person-to-person - the three-personed God addressing himself personally to us in our full capacity as persons-in-relationship. The Holy Trinity provided a way of understanding the irreducible personal and relational nature of this text, and affirmed that the only reading congruent with what is written is also personal and participatory.
In this chapter, "Scripture As Form: Following the Way of Jesus," I want to observe the way in which these personal words arrive in our lives and connect the Jesus way with the way in which we now live them. I want to attend to the way that the form of Scripture is also the form of our lives. — Eugene H. Peterson

Bring your attention to your breathing and realize that you are not doing it. It is the breath of nature. You reconnect with nature in the most intimate and powerful way by becoming aware of your breathing and learning to hold your attention there.
This is a healing and deeply empowering thing to do. It brings about a shift in consciousness from the conceptual world of thought to the inner realm of unconditioned consciousness. — Eckhart Tolle

But I'm learning it's human nature to want the things you can't have. What changes is how you go about pursuing the things you want. When you're a little kid and you're told no, you scream and throw a temper tantrum. When you're a teenager and your parents tell you no, you're old enough to internalize your temper tantrum. But you're smarter and you're sneakier this time around. So you nod and act like you care when they say no, when they tell you who you can be friends with, when they say the know what's best.
But then you go behind their backs to do it anyway.
Because at some point, you need to start calling the shots. At some point, you need to start believing you know whats best. Or, I thought with a smile, you just stop asking for their permission in the first place. — Katie Kacvinsky

The gift of learning to meditate is the greatest gift you can give yourself in this life. For it is only through meditation that you can undertake the journey to discover your true nature, and so find the stability and confidence you will need to live, and die, well; Meditation is the road to enlightenment. — Sogyal Rinpoche

There is an herb named in Latine Convolvulus (i.e. with wind), growing among shrubs and bushes, with carrieth a flower not unlike to this Lilly, save that it yeeldeth no smell nor hath those chives within; for whitenesse they resemble one another very much, as if Nature in making this floure were a learning and trying her skill how to frame the Lilly indeed. — Pliny The Elder

...I always took the rearmost seat in the classroom - it gave me a good view of things. And I must confess, the location taught me more about human nature and justice than could be learned from the professors' lectures. — Rohinton Mistry

I was interested in science or, at least, nature from an early age, learning the names of planets, cutting cartoons with facts about animals out of the newspaper and gluing them into a scrapbook, and, with a friend when I was five or six, trying to design a submarine. — Martin Chalfie

While nature thus very early and very abundantly feeds us, she is very late in tutoring us as to the proper methodization of our diet. — Herman Melville

But a mother is like a broomstick or like the sun in the heavens, it does not matter which as far as one's knowledge of her is concerned: the broomstick is there and the sun is there; and whether the child is beaten by it or warmed and enlightened by it, it accepts it as a fact in nature, and does not conceive it as having had youth, passions, and weaknesses, or as still growing, yearning, suffering, and learning. — George Bernard Shaw

One of the most interesting histories of what comes of rejecting science we may see in Islam, which in the beginning received, accepted, and even developed the classical legacy. For some five or six rich centuries there is an impressive Islamic record of scientific thought, experiment, and research, particularly in medicine. But then, alas! the authority of the general community, the Sunna, the consensus - which Mohammed the Prophet had declared would always be right - cracked down. The Word of God in the Koran was the only source and vehicle of truth. Scientific thought led to 'loss of belief in the origin of the world and in the Creator.' And so it was that, just when the light of Greek learning was beginning to be carried from Islam to Europe - from circa 1100 onward - Islamic science and medicine came to a standstill and went dead ... — Joseph Campbell

Anything, everything, can be learned if you can just get yourself in a little patch of real ground, real nature, real wood, real anything ? and just sit still and watch. — Lauren Hutton

Schools are even less efficient in the arrangement of the circumstances which encourage the open-ended, exploratory use of acquired skills, for which I will reserve the term "liberal education." The main reason for this is that school is obligatory and becomes schooling for schooling's sake: an enforced stay in the company of teachers, which pays off in the doubtful privilege of more such company. Just as skill instruction must be freed from curricular restraints, so must liberal education be dissociated from obligatory attendance. Both skill-learning
and education for inventive and creative behavior can be aided by institutional arrangement, but they are of a different, frequently opposed nature. — Ivan Illich

Can the same nature be a lover of wisdom and a lover of falsehood? Never. The true lover of learning then must from his earliest youth, as far as in him lies, desire all truth? Assuredly. But then again, as we know by experience, he whose desires are strong in one direction will have them weaker in others; they will be like a stream which has been drawn off into another channel. True. He whose desires are drawn towards knowledge in every form will be absorbed in the pleasures of the soul, and will hardly feel bodily pleasure - I mean, if he be a true philosopher and not a sham one. That is most certain. Such — Plato

Our forefathers looked upon nature with more reverence and horror, before the world was enlightened by learning and philosophy, and loved to astonish themselves with the apprehensions of witchcraft, prodigies, charms, and inchantments. There was not a village in England that had not a ghost in it, the church-yards were all haunted, every large common had a circle of fairies belonging to it, and there was scarce a shepherd to be met with who had not seen a spirit. — Joseph Addison

Love is life is love. There is no way to envision life without love, and at this point in my life, I don't think there is anything more important - love of family, love of nature, love of travel, love of learning, love of life in every way - all of it. Love is being thankful, love is paying attention, love is being open and compassionate. Love is using all the privileges you possess to help those who are in need. Love is giving voice to those who don't have one. Love is a way of feeling alive and respecting life. I have been in love many times, but — Diane Von Furstenberg

Some folk learned the nature of God, that He was merciful, having spared a husband or some cattle, that He was strict, having meted out hard punishment for small sins, that He was attentive, having sent signs of the hunger beforehand, that He was just, having sent the hunger in the first place, or having sent the whales and the teeming reindeer in the end. Some folk learned that He was to be found in the world-in the richness of the grass and the pearly beauty of the Heavens, and others learned that He could not be found in the world, for the world is always wanting, and God is completion. — Jane Smiley

Sometimes I feel I don't want to know anything more about [history] than I know already. [ ... ] Because what's the use of learning that I am one of a long row only
finding out that there is set down in some old book somebody just like me, and to know that I shall only act her part; making me sad, that's all. The best is not to remember that your nature and you past doings have been kist like thousands' and thousands', and that your coming life and doings'll be like thousands' and thousands'. [ ... ] I shouldn't mind learning why
why the sun do shine on the just and the unjust alike, [ ... ] but that's what books will not tell me. — Thomas Hardy

I could not possibly have been placed in circumstances more highly favorable for study and exploration than those which I now enjoy. I am free from the distractions constantly arising in civilized life from social claims. Nature offers unceasingly the most novel and fascinating objects for learning. The only drawbacks to this solitude are the want of information on the progress of scientific discovery in Europe and the lack of all the advantages arising from an interchange of ideas. — Alexander Von Humboldt

I feel free. Like some whimsical child in an enchanted forest, I feel free.
Amazed at the power of the colors that surround me, I feel free. The cool water that quenches my thirst also warms my skin as I bathe, my pores opening to the pleasure of the clear pools embracing my soul. The colors reflect on the mirrored glass that supports me. I can see beauty all around. Here I float, effortlessly, and here I will remain.
I feel free. I make my commitments and my agreements in complete liberation. I love freely, openly, within the bounds of my own moral compass. I give, and I take, learning to do each with equal excitement, with equal vigor.
The odd thing about receiving is how hard it can be. Yet, we owe it to those we love, who love us back, to do just that. Then, we can explore the vibrant colors of our enchanted forests together, and bathe one another in the refreshing springs of nature's own charity.
I love, and therefore am safe in all things. — Tom Grasso

sacred pathways Naturalist - finds God in nature Ascetic - is drawn to disciplines Traditionalist - loves historical liturgies Activist - comes alive spiritually in a great cause Caregiver - meets God in serving Sensate - senses God through five senses Enthusiast - loves to grow through people Contemplative - is drawn to solitary reflection and prayer Intellectual - loves God by learning (For more information on these categories, read — John Ortberg

I speak of that learning which wakes us acquainted with the boundless extent of nature, and the universe, and which even while we remain in this world, discovers to us both heaven, earth, and sea. — Marcus Tullius Cicero

Self-development is a way of Life. Our Self-Development never ends. We are never too young or too old for personal growth.
We have an amazing potential to reach our highest potential, to have truly inspiring careers and loving relationships.
Unfortunately, often we walk through our lives asleep, we let our habits rule us, and find it difficult to change our beliefs. Recognizing the power of our Mind and the power of our Soul, learning the art of Concentration and Love, we are learning to Live with the Flow, not against it.
It is in our nature to learn and grow. For happiness we need to learn to Love, we need to learn to Concentrate and we should keep the flow and energy of inspiration within our lives. — Natasa Nuit Pantovic

Learning is, in too many cases, but a foil to common sense; a substitute for true knowledge. Books are less often made use of as spectacles to look at nature with, than as blinds to keep out its strong light and shifting scenery from weak eyes and indolent dispositions. The learned are mere literary drudges. — William Hazlitt

If they [companies] believe they are in business to serve people, to help solve problems, to use and employ the ingenuity of their workers to improve the lives of people around them by learning from the nature that gives us life, we have a chance. — Paul Hawken

Human beings are accustomed to think of intellect as the power of having and controlling ideas and of ability to learn as synonymous with ability to have ideas. But learning by having ideas is really one of the rare and isolated events in nature. — Edward Thorndike

I believe human beings mark a threshold in the development of the planet, of course, but it is only part of the picture. What Big History can do is show us the nature of our complexity and fragility and the dangers that face us, but it can also show us our power, with collective learning. — David Christian

Repentance is not just the beginner course; repentance is lifetime learning. The goal of Christian living is not to get past the point of needing to repent, but to realize that God has made us capable through Christ of doing repentance well - repentance that the Bible calls "godly" in nature - what the apostle Paul described as "repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth" (2 Tim. 2:25) - repentance that leads to real change. At the root level. Where it can grow us up into character and consistency and confidence in Jesus' power and strength, fully at work in our pitiful weakness. That's not shame and loss. Bad Christian. That's mercy and grace. From a good, redeeming God. — Matt Chandler

W. H. Auden articulated this tension beautifully: Between the ages of twenty and forty we are engaged in the process of discovering who we are, which involves learning the difference between accidental limitations which it is our duty to outgrow and the necessary limitations of our nature beyond which we cannot trespass with impunity. — Gretchen Rubin

When we use such metaphorically derived inference patterns to reason about morality, the principles we get and use are inextricably tied up with ends, goals, and purposes. In such cases, therefore, the deontological picture of ethical deliberation just doesn't fit.
The deontologist will no doubt respond by insisting that we can keep morality (as a source of moral principles) entirely separate from other domains (such as well-being) whenever we are reasoning about morals. This view entails that learning morality is just learning preexisting patterns of moral reasoning and learning how to apply them to concrete cases.
However, it is important to see that this is an empirical issue about the nature of human reasoning, and it cannot be decided a priori. — George Lakoff

Still men be clever and in an hundred centuries or more, perchance will have found a way to journey thither; when that they have discovered and understood all things on the earth. What will a man be like in the xxvii century, or even the xx? Very like unto us, I do expect; I do not think that man's nature shall change; nor do I anticipate that he will be the wiser than we, for all his learning, for 'tis a part of that nature which is ours that we do not heed the lessons of history: neither our own, nor the world's. — Chico Kidd

Some 2,600 years ago the ancient Greek poet Pindar wrote, "Become who you are by learning who you are." What he meant is the following: You are born with a particular makeup and tendencies that mark you as a piece of fate. It is who you are to the core. Some people never become who they are; they stop trusting in themselves; they conform to the tastes of others, and they end up wearing a mask that hides their true nature. If you allow yourself to learn who you really are by paying attention to that voice and force within you, then you can become what you were fated to become - an individual, a Master. — Robert Greene

Since there is no single set of abilities running throughout human nature, there is no single curriculum which all should undergo. Rather, the schools should teach everything that anyone is interested in learning. — John Dewey

A shower of rain rejuvenates nature; similarly a Good Teacher rejuvenates learners with the beauty of knowledge. A shower of rain in the desert rejuvenates the most barren wasteland and helps hibernating flowers to bloom with an explosion of colour and eagerness; similarly a Great Teacher rejuvenates hibernating learners to bloom with an explosion of love for learning, curiosity and eagerness to explore the world without fear and inhibitions. — Kavita Bhupta Ghosh

Learning to live on less pride has been a great investment in my future. — Katerina Stoykova Klemer

The pretention that some of us are better than others, I don't think is a very good thing. And who is contributing what to our progress in science is not so obvious and many who don't get that Nobel Prize are better than people than some of us that do get the Nobel Prize ... I think we should not be interested in prizes, we should be interested in learning about nature. — Jack Steinberger

Labels are OK for marketing something, but does the Unschooling philosophy of life need any marketing? No. In so many ways, Unschooling stands for a refusal of marketing and a rejection of any consumerist approach to learning.
Your learning IS your life, not something you purchase subject by subject in the big education supermarket to hang on the wall like a diploma or certificate. Unschooling by its nature does not need to set up an 'Institute of Unschooling' or an 'Unschooling Foundation': that would be the purest contradiction-in-terms, to institutionalize the very practice that most undermines institutionalization! — Kytka Hilmar-Jezek

Unintended consequences get to the heart of why you never really understand an adaptive problem until you have solved it. Problems morph and "solutions" often point to deeper problems. In social life, as in nature, we are walking on a trampoline. Every inroad reconfigures the environment we tread on. — Richard Pascale