The sage desires no desire, does not value rare treasures, learns without learning, recovers what people have left behind.

The noble must make humility his root.

Those who know do not talk. Those who talk do not know.

The weak overcomes the strong. The soft overcomes the hard. Everybody in the world knows this, still nobody makes use of it.

There is a big misunderstanding about the idea of naturalness. Most people who come to us believing in some freedom or naturalness, but their understanding is what we call [heretical naturalness] ... a kind of "let-alone policy" or sloppiness... For a plant or stone to be natural is no problem. But for us there is some problem, indeed a big problem. To be natural is something we must work on.

The forceful and violent will not die from natural causes.

Whatever is fluid, soft, and yielding will overcome whatever is rigid and hard. What is soft is strong.