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Sometimes a pessimist is only an optimist with extra information.
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
Pessimist
Optimist
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Extras
Information
Sometimes
More quotes by Idries Shah
The chicken had his wish, and was magically transformed into a fox. Then he found that he could not digest grain.
Idries Shah
You need not wonder whether you should have an unreliable person as a friend. An unreliable person is nobody's friend.
Idries Shah
When you realize the difference between the container and the content, you will have knowledge.
Idries Shah
Anyone can see that an ass laden with books remains a donkey. A human being laden with the undigested results of a tussle with thoughts and books, however, still passes for wise.
Idries Shah
Worry is a cloud which rains destruction.
Idries Shah
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.
Idries Shah
One of the tragedies of modern times is that people have come to believe that something said by someone in the past, perhaps for illustrative or provocation purposes, actually represents that person's beliefs at the time.
Idries Shah
Materialism, attachment to things of the world, includes pride. Many religious people suffer from pride: taking pleasure or even delight in being good, or religious.
Idries Shah
It is not only a matter of not caring who knows - it is also a matter of knowing who cares.
Idries Shah
A generous person may not have wisdom: but, unlike others, he has the means to gain it.
Idries Shah
Better to be safe than to be sorry' is a remark of value only when these are the actual alternatives.
Idries Shah
Trying to force something is the best way to stop it happening.
Idries Shah
When the ignorant have become numerous or powerful enough, they have been referred to by a special name. This names is 'the Wise'.
Idries Shah
A man who believes the word of a donkey in preference to my word does not deserve to be lent anything.
Idries Shah
None should say: 'I can trust' or 'I cannot trust' until he is a master of the option, of trusting or not trusting.
Idries Shah
The Path is not to be found anywhere except in human service
Idries Shah
The more you look at 'common knowledge', the more you realise that it is more likely to be common than it is to be knowledge. No real knowledge is common.
Idries Shah
Have you noticed how many people who walk in the shade curse the Sun?
Idries Shah
Dramatic. A well developed sense of the dramatic has values beyond what people usually imagine. One of these is to realise the limitations of a sense of the dramatic.
Idries Shah
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.
Idries Shah