12 quotes by Confucius that will uplift your life
Whenever you are down, depressed, disapointed, unsuccessful or in trouble in your life, somehow, it is always necessary to go back to the ancient wisdom so you can start all over or continue what you do if it is just, helpful, true and beautiful, and it fulfills you.
One of the ancients that I truly admire and consider one of the greatest martial artist of philosophy is Confucius (latin name), by his real name Kông Fūzî, who was also a great politician, and a true one, unlike those we have today. His wisdom is not only inspirational, but uplifting, empowering, reminding us that no matter how bad our life turns out to be, no matter how much we struggle, if we keep our feet on the ground and we keep looking to the sky, we can keep going, because we didn’t forget our goal, our purpose.
So, let’s dive right into them:
„Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.”
I wanted to start with this one because I think it’s the basis of the wisdom of life that brings us knowledge and the Path to greatness, to self-actualization, to self-realization.
We all fall. But it is not important how many times we fall, but rather how many times we rise and keep walking, keep walking the walk and talking the talk.
We all have struggles and bad days. But if we remind ourselves that after a rainy day and above the overcast sky, there is the sun shining, then we can keep going and doing what belongs to us, our job or fulfilling our vocation.
Negative people don’t want to rise. Positive people want to rise and they DO rise. Everything is reversible if we know how to return.
„It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.”
Talking about getting up and going on your way, you need to go, no matter how slow. Just remember! The journey of a thousand steps begins with a first step, so every step is like the first step, is one step. Thus you make one step and then the other, whether you’re at the beginning of your journey or you started a while ago. You stil need to make a step but don’t wait too long, don’t hesitate and don’t procrastinate, otherwise you’ll not make it in this lifetime.
Walk the path of your own Being and achieve success in everything you do that you will benefit from and mankind as well. Fulfillment is always tied to how much good you brought to the world. So, be ethical and give others what you would like others to give to you! And this brings us to the third:
„Do not impose on others what you yourself do not desire.”
Kindness cannot be imposed by force, by coercion. Kindness is like the soothing summer rain with the sun still shining through the clouds.
So, whenever you want to teach someone something, remember to do it in the manner you would like to be thought. Whenever you want to do something for someone, do it like you would want to be done unto you. Whenever you treat someone, remember to treat them how you would like to be treated. This is self-respect which is reflected on respecting others. Just as you respect yourself, in the same way you will respect others.
People want to be treated nicely, to have a nice talk, a very good relationship, want to make friends, want to socialize, want to be together with as many good people as possible. Are you one of them? If so, you are on the path of building a wonderful community around you of like-minded people, and you will inspire them all to do what you do and how you do it. This is the force that brings all of you together, the force of unity: kindness.
The next one is one of my personal favourites and also one that has inspired me to build the Cydrone Archetypal Academy:
„Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.”
How many times have we complicated our lives that we found it is impossible to pull through and manage to get by? We don’t like to live a simple life, don’t we?
But in reality, life is really simple and there are no such thing as outside enemies trying to get us, but ourselves. We live with our guard up constantly believing the world is going to get us, or Nature is going to get us, or God will give us what we deserve or not at His whim. This is, unfortunately and fortunately, at the same time, how we think. And we complicate things due to our complicated system of thinking.
As the ocean is made up of tiny drops or water, so is life, made up of small circumstances that constitute it in what it really is: life. And it’s lessons are never complicated, even though some of them are difficult. Quality is not quantity. Being hard to understand is not too much to bear, but how we see it.
So, Confucius is really inviting us to make one step at the time, focused on the present moment.
„He who learns but does not think, is lost! He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.”
Learning finishes when we understand the lesson. There is also another great quote, like a universal saying, that tells us the master gives the exam first to his disciples before teaching the lesson. Because he needs to see if they have the ground for understanding within themselves. And this understanding is universal.
Paraphrasing, I can say that he who understands, know what he is doing. Understanding is the birth of faith in the knowledge.
However, there are people who learn the lessons of life, but they don’t develop their personality. They remain disconnected from the social world and lack balance between being and thinking.
I think we need to be balanced in thinking and acting. Sure, we can be conscious beings, like many saints or monks are mostly, living in the mountains, meditating in a cave, outside the so-called real world, but once we step into the city, so to say, we are confrunted with something we’ve never been challenged before: the difficulties of living amidst others.
„When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don’t adjust the goals, adjust the action steps.”
I think that when we see no end, we better go the other way. Often times we are stubborn and keep going on a path that is not for us.
There is also another great quote by Einstein who said that one cannot solve a problem with the same mentality that created it in the first place.
I’m also thinking about the fact that sometimes we do things, we work at a job we weren’t supposed to be working, it is not for us. We don’t practice our vocation.
We should be doing something else that fulfills us and everybody around us. But that comes from changing one’s thoughts, feelings and habbits if their faulty. If they bring you to a sort of dead-end, than you know what you have to do. Do something else, feel something else, think something else. It’ll shape your character and, believe me, you wouldn’t want it to be a bad and difficult one.
„Do what you love and you will never work a day in your life.”
Yeah, but this doesn’t mean I encourage lazyness, nor that Confucius ever did. As I wrote one day, work is a punishment, but service is bliss.
This is another one of my favourites. It’s actually the essence of what I do, or a significant part of it.
Service to others is never enslaving mankind. Work means working for others. But service comes from the freedom of being.
Teach people to fish, speaking in christian terms, and you will help them be happy. Give them fish and you will make them be dependent of you and what you give them, always having to provide for their day-to-day needs, especially feeding them. They will be your slaves and you will have to produce for them, to work for them. Most of the big corporations of the world are not filled with happy free people, but with modern slaves at all their levels.
When you teach them the ways to get by and more, to prosper, you will make them independent and free, and they will live a happy life having everything they need and more, because they took care of themselves. But first YOU have to be free. And to be that, you have to know yourself. Knowing your talents is part of it. Knowing who you are and what you do, is another. You don’t just KNOW, you DO. It’s a habbit, your nature, is who you are. And this will give the world your inspirational voice. And this is not work, but service. Servants of humanity are free conscious people.
I also wrote about ikigai, the reason for being, and what keeps you awake at night is not as much as a part of it as it is what wakes you up in the morning. It is a part of who you are. You could be going to a job, or having a meeting in the morning, being anxious for it and you get up very early, if you barely slept last night. Or you could be going on a trip. But if you wake up happy and ready to give something to the world that will benefit all, then THAT is ikigai. What get’s you up in the morning? Is it life?
„Only the wisest and stupidest of men never change.”
So, this is about learning which always draws a curve into eternity. Once you go up, then you must come down in order to go up again. This is the curve or learning. As another sage used to say: „The champions win, and those who do not win, learn.”
The next one is just about the same with a few minor changes, but still about learning:
„I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.”
You see, we need to dissect this a little bit. There are parts which we need to, yes… understand.
When we hear things, we tend to forget, it passes through our ears like it was never there, leaving no trace. But when we see, a picture’s worth more than a thousand (spoken or written) words, right?
Subsequently, when we do things, we put them into practice. So, we have a clear picture in our mind what we want to do and what we can achieve.. like a causality of the things. And when we do, we finally understand because we see the outcome and we keep it stored in our own consciousness. We become aware of our own creation. This is the process of learning!
„If I am walking with two other men, each of them will serve as my teacher. I will pick out the good points of the one and imitate them, and the bad points of the other and correct them in myself.”
How masterly said is that, huh?
Well, guys, correction is not about stopping, but rather about doing things so differently that is exactly the opposite most of the times. This is AFTER we learnt.
Before this, as many of us can give testimony, is almost all about trial and error, unless we learn from other people’s mistakes.
But there is another way, that of intuition. This way is not memory, nor experience, but rather instant knowing. How do we come to this? By being aware as often as we can until it becomes constant.
„I am not one who was born in the possession of knowledge; I am one who is fond of antiquity, and earnest in seeking it there.”
The reason why I started the Cydrone Archetypal Academy is because I wanted to find the superior knowledge into the ancient ways. And I found it thousandfold.
There are successful models in the past that can guide us today in everything we do. Be it men, women, models of politics, economics, society, citizenship, environmental protective and nurturing activities and whatnot. I set my course to bringing them to you!
„Virtue is not left to stand alone. He who practices it will have neighbors.”
Last, but not least! This is what I seek next, people of value, of virtue, of knowledge to create with. If you are one of them, then join me!
I’m all about value and I look for value in everything we do. I want to create for the future, to set the course for the next age of virtue in mankind. It is not much, it is the first step in the journey of a thousand steps. It is the basis.
If you stick to virtue, to doing good to others around you, then you will have disciples, meaning you will have followers. Those are the neighbourghs Confucius is telling us about. People will gather to your cause.
We all have to understand, virtue is not something we do at whim anymore. It’s a necessity in these times we live. We need to recreate ourselves to recreate the world that is dying.
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