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You need not wonder whether you should have an unreliable person as a friend. An unreliable person is nobody's friend.

Idries Shah

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Idries Shah
Age: 72 †
Born: 1924
Born: June 16
Died: 1996
Died: November 23
Author
Collector Of Fairy Tales
Teacher
Writer
Simla
Arkon Daraul
Nobody
Wonder
Whether
Persons
Person
Need
Needs
Unreliable
Friend

More quotes by Idries Shah

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It is not only a matter of not caring who knows - it is also a matter of knowing who cares.
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One cannot learn from someone whom one distrusts.
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But one may say something and yet not be able to do it. Try, for instance, lifting yourself up by the bootstraps.
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When the Higher Man does something worthy of admiration, it is an evidence of his Mastership, not the object of it.
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History is not usually what has happened. History is what some people have thought to be significant.
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You are adrift while you still think that a means is an end.
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Opinion is usually something which people have when they lack comprehensive information.
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Have you noticed how many people who walk in the shade curse the Sun?
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People today are in danger of drowning in information but, because they have been taught that information is useful, they are more willing to drown than they need be. If they could handle information, they would not have to drown at all.
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The learned person who only talks will never Penetrate to the inner heart of humans.
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To be obsessed by the idea of freedom, for instance, is itself a form of slavery. Such people are in the chains of the hope of freedom, and are therefore able to do little else than struggle with them.
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If, from time to time, you give up expectation, you will be able to perceive what it is you are getting.
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The secret of Sufism is that it has no secret at all'.
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It is not important to have said a thing first, or best - or even most interestingly. What is important is to say it on the right occasion.
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Learn to be as analytical about things of which you are credulous as you are of those which you criticise.
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Knowledge is not gained, it is there all the time. It is the veils which have to be dissolved in the mind.
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When a belief becomes more than an instrument, you are lost. You remain lost until you learn what 'belief' is really for.
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Like the bat, the Sufi is asleep to 'things of the day' - the familiar struggle for existence which the ordinary man finds all-important - and vigilant while others are asleep. In other words, he keeps awake the spiritual attention dormant in others. That 'mankind sleeps in a nightmare of unfulfillment' is a commonplace of Sufi literature
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There is a Persian proverb: 'To test that which has been tested is ignorance.' To try to test something without the means of testing is even worse.
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He that is purified by love is pure and he that is absorbed in the Beloved and hath abandoned all else is a Sufi.Sirdar Ikbal Ali Shah.
Idries Shah