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Cultivate peace of mind which does not separate one's self from one's surroundings. When that is done successfully, then everything else follows naturally.

Robert M. Pirsig

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Robert M. Pirsig
Age: 88 †
Born: 1928
Born: September 6
Died: 2017
Died: April 24
Autobiographer
Novelist
Philosopher
Writer
Minneapolis
Minnesota
Robert Maynard Pirsig
Doe
Successfully
Everything
Cultivate
Self
Surroundings
Done
Follows
Mind
Naturally
Separate
Peace
Else

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I think now the trace of egotism may have been the beginning of all his troubles
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If a revolution destroys a systematic government, but the systematic patterns of thought that produced that government are left intact, then those patterns will repeat themselves in the succeeding government.
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If you stare at a wall from four in the morning till nine at night and you do that for a week, you are getting pretty close to nothingness.
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The solutions all are simple - after you have arrived at them. But they're simple only when you know already what they are.
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I think metaphysics is good if it improves everyday life otherwise forget it.
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A motorcycle functions entirely in accordance with the laws of reason, and a study of the art of motorcycle maintenance is really a miniature study of the art of rationality itself.
Robert M. Pirsig
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You've got to keep close to your spouse I think, which is a very hard thing to do in America, with everything always pulling you away. I would advise all married people to spend two hours talking to each other. That's my moral for the day.
Robert M. Pirsig
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What's new? is an interesting and broadening eternal question, but one which, if pursued exclusively, results only in an endless parade of trivia and fashion, the silt of tomorrow.
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Of course, the laws of science contain no matter and have no energy either and therefore do not exist except in people's minds. It's best to be completely scientific about the whole thing and refuse to believe in either ghosts or the laws of science. That way you're safe. That doesn't leave you very much to believe in, but that's scientific too.
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The world comes to us in an endless stream of puzzle pieces that we would like to think all fit together somehow, but that in fact never do.
Robert M. Pirsig
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Programs of a political nature are important end products of social quality that can be effective only if the underlying structure of social values is right. The social values are right only if the individual values are right. The place to improve the world is first in one's heart and head and hands, and then work outward from there.
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It is always good policy to tell the truth unless of course you are an exceptionally good liar. Jerome K. Jerome It is a puzzling thing. The truth knocks on the door and you say, go away, I'm looking for the truth. and so it goes away. Puzzling.
Robert M. Pirsig
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The logic of science was infallible, and if the scientists were sometimes mistaken, this was assumed to be only from their mistaking its rules.
Robert M. Pirsig
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What I mean (and everybody else means) by the word 'quality' cannot be broken down into subjects and predicates. This is not because Quality is so mysterious but because Quality is so simple, immediate and direct.
Robert M. Pirsig
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A person who follows the dharma is unpredictable because the dharma is unpredictable.
Robert M. Pirsig
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Substance is a subspecies of value. When you reverse the containment process and define substance in terms of value the mystery disappears: substance is a stable pattern of inorganic values. The problem then disappears. The world of objects and the world of values is unified.
Robert M. Pirsig
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Physical distance between people has nothing to do with loneliness. It's psychic distance.
Robert M. Pirsig
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Religious mysticism is intellectual garbage. It’s a vestige of the old superstitious Dark Ages when nobody knew anything...It is one of those delusions that isn’t called insane only because there are so many people involved.
Robert M. Pirsig
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The test of the machine is the satisfaction it gives you. There isn't any other test. If the machine produces tranquility it's right. If it disturbs you it's wrong until either the machine or your mind is changed.
Robert M. Pirsig
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Sometimes it's a little better to travel than to arrive
Robert M. Pirsig