The Sound Of One Hand Clapping Quotes & Sayings

If you have a great idea, you should be able to communicate it as well. It's like the sound of one hand clapping. You have a great idea but aren't able to express it - well, how great was the idea? — Douglas Coupland

A wise man once asked me, "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" I thought for a minute, then I slapped him across the face. That got him off my back. — Matthew Diamond

We say, "To hear the sound of one hand clapping." Usually the sound of clapping is made with two hands, and we think that clapping with one hand makes no sound at all. But actually, one hand is sound. Even though you do not hear it, there is sound. If you clap with two hands, you can hear the sound. But if sound did not already exist before you clapped, you could not make the sound. Before you make it there is sound. Because there is sound, you can make it, and you can hear it. Sound is everywhere. If you just practice it, there is sound. Do not try to listen to it. If you do not listen to it, the sound is all over. Because you try to hear it, sometimes there is sound, and sometimes there is no sound. Do you understand? Even though you do not do anything, you have the quality of zazen always. But if you try to find it, if you try to see the quality, you have no quality. — Shunryu Suzuki

I love the sound of one hand clapping. — Sienna McQuillen

What is the sound of one hand clapping? What is the weight of a single grain of sand? The answer is equal to my interest in the message you are about to leave so make it short.
Mitch Hertzog's voice mail message. — Meg Cabot

He said he'd heard the sound of one hand clapping. He said, once his mind took in the wondrous no-sound of holy oneness, the empty echo of eternal bliss, he was never the same. He could hear it still, he said, resounding in the ether and tickling the back of his brain.
Something not normal was going on with his brain. No argument there. — Brenda Marie Smith

When you are not near me, I make the sound of one hand clapping. — Dan Fogelberg

You know the sound of two hands clapping; tell me, what is the sound of one hand? — Hakuin Ekaku

Scientific results that aren't reported might as well not exist. They're like the sound of one hand clapping. For scientists, communication isn't only a responsibility, it's our chief pleasure. — Robert O. Becker

[ ... ] dGT: Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. My concern here is that the philosophers believe they are actually asking deep questions about nature. And to the scientist it's, what are you doing? Why are you concerning yourself with the meaning of meaning?"
(another) interviewer: I think a healthy balance of both is good.
dGT: Well, I'm still worried even about a healthy balance. Yeah, if you are distracted by your questions so that you cannot move forward, you are not being a productive contributor to our understanding of the natural world. And so the scientist knows when the question "what is the sound of one hand clapping?" is a pointless delay in our progress.
(Neil deGrasse Tyson - EPISODE 489: NERDIST PODCAST, 20m19s) — Neil DeGrasse Tyson

What is the sound of one hand? — Hakuin Ekaku

Nerve, not talent, is the one necessary and sufficient trait for success. (Wouldn't it be ideal if it were talent? But talent with no nerve is like the sound of one hand clapping. — Lynda Obst

Eight people show up. The emcee is warm, friendly, and about as funny as Shoah. I take the stage to the sound of, my hand to God, one person clapping once and only once, and then I start into my act. — Patton Oswalt

A truly extraordinary work: vivid, passionate and utterly compelling. The Sound of One Hand Clapping is raw as a wound. It opens a world that is strange, brutal and poetic at once and ultimately achieves the kind of spirit-healing few novels do — Niall Williams