I hear people everywhere saying that the trouble with our time is that we have no great leaders any more. If we look back we always had them. But to me it seems there is a very profound reason why there are no great leaders any more. It is because they are no longer needed. The message is clear. You no longer want to be led from the outside. Every man must be his own leader. He now knows enough not to follow other people. He must follow the light that's within himself, and through this light he will create a new community.
Laurens van der PostOften I have found that the one thing that can save is the thing which appears most to threaten ... one has to go down into what one most fears and in that process ... comes a saving flicker of light and energy that, even if it does not produce the courage of a hero, at any rate enables a trembling mortal to take one step further.
Laurens van der PostLife is its own journey, presupposes its own change and movement, and one tries to arrest them at one's eternal peril.
Laurens van der PostThat is the trouble, everybody is giving everything in the world a piece of their minds. Whereas what we want is not a piece of somebody's mind, even the best mind, so much as an open heart and an open spirit.
Laurens van der Post