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Two things can get people to make efforts: if people want to get something, or if they want to get rid of something. Only, in ordinary conditions, without knowledge, people do not know what they can get rid of or what they can gain.

P.D. Ouspensky

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P.D. Ouspensky
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More quotes by P.D. Ouspensky

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A symbol may serve to transfer our intuitions and to suggest new ones only so long as its meaning is not defined.
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Desire is when you do what you want, will is when you can do what you do not want.
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Can one alter one´s chief feature? asked someone else. First it is necessary to know it. If you know it, much will depend on the quality of your knowing. If you know it well, then it is possible to change it.
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One cannot keep all old views and opinions and acquire new ones.
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Our ancestors were very rich and eminent people, and they left us an enormous inheritance, which we have completely forgotten, especially since the time when we began to consider ourselves the descendants of a monkey.
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If you want to remember yourself, the best thing is not to think about yourself. As long as you think about yourself, you will not remember yourself.
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There is something in us that keeps us where we find ourselves. I think this is the most awful thing of all.
P.D. Ouspensky
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If a man gives way to all his desires, or panders to them, there will be no inner struggle in him, no 'friction,' no fire. But if, for the sake of attaining a definite aim, he struggles with desires that hinder him, he will then create a fire which will gradually transform his inner world into a single whole.
P.D. Ouspensky
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It is by overcoming obstacles that man develops those qualities he needs.
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Love is the eternally burning fire in which humanity & all the world are being purified.
P.D. Ouspensky
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Understanding is always the understanding of a smaller problem in relation to a bigger problem.
P.D. Ouspensky
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When a man begins to know himself a little he will see in himself many things that are bound to horrify him. So long as a man is not horrified at himself he knows nothing about himself.
P.D. Ouspensky
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Man has no permanent and unchangeable I. Every thought, every mood, every desire, every sensation says I. And in each case it seems to be taken for granted that this I belongs to the Whole, to the whole man, and that a thought, a desire, or an aversion is expressed by this Whole.
P.D. Ouspensky
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I've found that the chief difficulty for most people was to realize that they had really heard new things: that is things that they had never heard before. They kept translating what they heard into their habitual language. They had ceased to hope and believe there might be anything new.
P.D. Ouspensky
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The problem of Eternity, of which the face of the Sphinx speaks, takes us into the realm of the impossible. Even the problem of Time is simple in comparison with the problem of Eternity.
P.D. Ouspensky
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Possibly the most interesting first impression of my life came from the world of dreams.
P.D. Ouspensky
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Philosophy is based on speculation, on logic, on thought, on the synthesis of what we know and on the analysis of what we do not know. Philosophy must include within its confines the whole content of science, religion and art.
P.D. Ouspensky
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There is no tyranny more ferocious than the tyranny of morality. Everything is sacrificed to it.
P.D. Ouspensky
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There is no possibility of remembering what has been found and understood, and later repeating it to oneself. It disappears as a dream disappears. Perhaps it is all nothing but a dream.
P.D. Ouspensky
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Seek the Path, do not seek attainment, Seek for the Path within yourself. Do not expect to hear the truth from others, nor to see it, or read it in books. Look for the truth in yourself, not without yourself.
P.D. Ouspensky