Guidance, mentoring and advice is lacking when one comes from a narcissistic family. Please see the wisdom below from an emperor of Rome, poets, the wife of an American president and other philosophers.
Rumi
“Don’t move the way fear makes you move” is a quote from an 800 year old poem by the Sufi poet Rumi. Please see the full poem below:
Keep Walking
Keep walking, though there’s no place to get to.
Don’t try to see through the distances.
That’s not for human beings.
Move within, but don’t move the way fear makes you move.
Today, like every other day, we wake up empty & frightened.
Don’t open the door to the study and begin reading.
Take down a musical instrument.
Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.
‘The Guest House’ talks about welcoming aspects of ourselves, our emotional states, as though they were guests in a guest house. We need to observe and understand all aspects of ourselves, this enables us to then change what we want to and keep what we want to. As long as we ignore or reject parts of ourselves, we are unconscious to what drives us.
The Guest House
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honourably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.
More quotes by Rumi:
The wound is where the light enters you
Once you conquer your selfish self, all your darkness will change to light
The inspiration you seek is already within you. Be silent and listen
Yesterday I was clever so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself
Your heart knows the way. Run in that direction
When I run after what I think I want, my days are a furnace of stress and anxiety; if I sit in my own place of patience, what I need flows to me and without pain. From this I understand that what I want also wants me, is looking for me and attracting me. There is a great secret here for anyone who can grasp it.
Your task is not to seek love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it
It’s your road and yours alone. Others may walk it with you, but no one can walk it for you
Eleanor Roosevelt
We gain strength, and courage, and confidence by each experience in which we really stop to look fear in the face, we must do that which we think we cannot.
I can’t tell you how to succeed but I can tell you how to fail…..try to please everybody.
Do what you feel in your heart to be right, for you will be criticised anyway. You’ll be damned if you do and damned if you don’t.
No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, small minds discuss people.
For our own success to be real, it must contribute to the success of others.
It is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.
Some people are going to leave a mark on this world while others will leave a stain.
Happiness is not a goal, it is a by-product.
Carl Jung
Do not compare, do not measure. No other way is like yours. All other ways deceive and tempt you. You must fulfill the way that is in you.
Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darkness’s of other people. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious. The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely. Your visions will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.
You are what you do, not what you say you’ll do.
Real liberation comes not from glossing over or repressing painful states of feeling, but only from experiencing them to the full.
A man likes to believe that he is the master of his soul. But as long as he is unable to control his moods and emotions, or to be conscious of the myriad secret ways in which unconscious factors insinuate themselves into his arrangements and decisions, he is certainly not his own master.
We are not what happened to us, we are what we wish to become.
People will do anything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own souls. They will practice Indian yoga and all its exercises, observe a strict regimen of diet, learn the literature of the whole world – all because they cannot get on with themselves and have not the slightest faith that anything useful could ever come out of their own souls.
God enters through the wound (alternatively – the wound is where the light enters you, by Rumi)
Marcus Aurelius
Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.
It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.
You have power over your mind — not outside events. Realise this, and you will find strength.
The best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury.
The soul becomes dyed with the colour of its thoughts.
Do not indulge in dreams of having what you have not, but reckon up the chief of the blessings you do possess, and then thankfully remember how you would crave for them if they were not yours.
Let each thing you would do, say, or intend, be like that of a dying person.
Because a thing seems difficult for you, do not think it impossible.
You have been formed of three parts—body, breath, and mind. Of these, the first two are yours insofar as they are only in your care. The third alone is truly yours.
Dig deep within yourself, for there is a fountain of goodness ever ready to flow if you will keep digging.
The first rule is to keep an untroubled spirit. The second is to look things in the face and know them for what they are.
Live out your life in truth and justice, tolerant of those who are neither true nor just.
This is the mark of perfection of character—to spend each day as if it were your last, without frenzy, laziness, or any pretending.
Whenever you are about to find fault with someone, ask yourself the following question: What fault of mine most nearly resembles the one I am about to criticise?
Sun Tzu
Sun Tzu is the author of the book ‘The Art of War’ which was written in 5 BC. It is estimated to have sold 20 million copies or more. The principles can be applied to many areas of life and please see quotes from the book below:
Know Your Enemy
Appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak
The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting
If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle
To know your Enemy, you must become your Enemy
Know yourself and you will win all battles
If ignorant both of your enemy and yourself, you are certain to be in peril
He who relies solely on warlike measures shall be exterminated; he who relies solely on peaceful measures shall perish
Anon
Build a life you do not need to take a holiday from.
Lao Tzu
Those who know do not speak. Those who speak do not know.
Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.
When you are content to be simply yourself and don’t compare or compete, everyone will respect you
Knowing others is intelligence, knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength, mastering yourself is true power
Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them; that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like
Time is a created thing. To say, ‘I don’t have time,’ is like saying, ‘I don’t want to’
A man with outward courage dares to die, a man with inner courage dares to live
Rudyard Kipling
Hafiz / Hafez
You yourself are your own obstacle, rise above yourself
What we speak becomes the house we live in
