Amish Quotes

The opposite of love is not hate. Hate is just love gone bad. The actual opposite of love is apathy. When you don't care a damn as to what happens to the other person.

Whether a man is a legend or not is decided by history, not fortune tellers.

A person's ethics and character are not tested in good times. It is only in bad times that a person shows how steadfast he is to his dharma.

I love how you aren't weird and awkward, despite the fact that you've been severely cut off from socialization to the point where you make the Amish look trendy.

Creation and destruction are the two ends of the same moment. And everything between the creation and the next destruction is the journey of life.

Eves, on the scale from wholesome to whoresome, you're practically Amish.

If she spoke, she would tell him the truth: she was not okay at all, but horribly empty, now that she knew what it was like to be filled.

The most powerful force in a woman's life is the need to be appreciated, loved and cherished for what she is.

Truth doesn't have to be liked. It only has to be spoken. Speak it out. The truth may hurt you, but it will set you free.

Trust, once lost, could not be easily found. Not in a year, perhaps not even in a lifetime.

If you are too busy to pray, you are busier than God wants you to be.

A man becomes a Mahadev, only when he fights for good. A Mahadev is not born from his mother's womb. He is forged in the heat of battle, when he wages a war to destroy evil. Har Har Mahadev - All of us are Mahadev.

Choices made, whether bad or good, follow you forever and affect everyone in their path one way or another.

Khalil Gibran said that parents are like a bow, And children like arrows. The more the bow bends and stretches, the farther the arrow flies. I fly, not because I am special, but because they stretched for me.

his burden didn't feel any lighter. but he felt strong enough to carry it

Nothing is more important than life. Nothing. You realise the simplicity of that point only when you confront death everyday.

I don't believe in symbolic gods.I believe that god exists all around us.In the flow of the river,in the rustle of the trees,in the whisper of the winds. He speaks to us all the time.all we need to do is listen.

Hate is not the opposite of Love. It is apathy.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I want a woman who is better than I am; a woman who will compel me to bow my head in admiration.

There is your truth and there is my truth. As for the universal truth, it does not exist.

The key question isn't 'What is Evil?' The key question is 'When does the Good become Evil?

It is your karma to fight evil. It doesn't matter if the people that evil is being committed against don't fight back. It doesn't matter if the entire world chooses to look the other way. Always remember this. You don't live with the consequences of other people's karma. You live with the consequences of your own

Weak people never admit that they are responsible for their own state. They always blame either circumstances or others.

It's our greed to extract more and more from good that turns it into evil.

Standing by and doing nothing while a sin is committed is as bad as committing the sin itself

The knowing is easy. It's the doing that gives us trouble.

There are many realities. There are many versions of what may appear obvious. Whatever appears as the unshakeable truth, its exact opposite may also be true in another context. After all, one's reality is but perception, viewed through various prisms of context.

Truth is one, though the sages know it as many . God is one, though different religions approach Him differently Call Him Shiva, Vishnu, Allah, Jesus or any other form of God that you believe in . Our paths may be different. Our destination is the same.

Lord Manu had said it's not people who are evil. True evil exists beyond them. It attracts people. It causes confusion amongst its enemies. But Evil in itself is too big to be confined to to just a few.

Loving someone can be hard at times. You risk a lot when you love - your heart and soul, at the least. Love is the most important and most rewarding investment you can make in another person.

Strong people stick to their morals, no matter what the trials and tribulations, Weak people, many a times, do not even realize how low they have sunk.

People do what their society rewards them to do. If the society rewards trust, people will be trusting

Mel scoffed. “Eves, on the scale from wholesome to whoresome, you’re practically Amish.

Sometimes God calms the storm, but sometimes God lets the storm rage and calms His child.

I don't believe anything till I have seen the proof. For anything without proof, I think we should believe the theory that gives us peace. It doesn't matter whether the theory is true or not.

Fate controls only the weak, Your Highness. The strong mould the providence the want

It’s important to have a husband that lives and believes the same way you do. Otherwise, you’re asking for problems.

Say what's in your heart, Annie.' 'You're in my heart, Samuel.

Happiness isn't wanting what you can get, but wanting what you have.

The distance between Evil and Good is a vast expanse in which many can exist without being either.

Don't turn blue all over now.

What is forgotten, however, is that many times the Good we create leads to Evil that will destroy us.

She knew that oftentimes hurtful people were hurting people, so she determined to pray for them all the more.

Often,our immediate reaction to a sudden crisis help us save ourselves. Our response to gradual crises that creep up upon us, on the other hand,may be so adaptive as to ultimately lead to self-destruction.

If you want to know the strength of a cloth, you inspect the quality of its weave. If you want to understand a person’s character, look closely at their interpersonal behaviour or their transactions.

The English judged a person so that they'd be justified in casting her out. The Amish judged a person so that they'd be justified in welcoming her back. Where I'm from, if someone is accused of sinning, it's not so that others can place blame. It's so that the person can make amends and move on.

If you’re always looking back at what you’ve lost, you’ll never discover the treasure that lies just up ahead.

Listening to your heart is not simple. Finding out who you are is not simple. It takes a lot of hard work and courage to get to know who you are and what you want.

the most powerful force in a woman’s life is the need to be appreciated, loved and cherished for what she is.

All was in God's plan, and he had to accept even as he didn't understand.

Sometimes, truth causes pain and suffering. At such times, silence is preferred.

Nobody is good or bad. They are either strong or weak. Strong people stick to their morals, no matter what the trials and tribulations. Weak people, many a times, do not even realise how low they have fallen.

The Amish are islands of sanity in a whirlpool of change.

One cannot undo what has happened. But the inexorable march of time offers the wise opportunities for redemption. I entreat you, do not escape. Stay in this world and do your karma.

When the axe entered the forest, the trees said to each other: do not worry, the handle in that axe is one of us”.

When the gardeners are good, the flower will bloom.

Facing our fears, skeletons, and mistakes is paramount in finding ourselves-in living with ourselves. Once it's done, that fear will be laid to rest, and she'll be stronger for having dealt with it and have more peace becausse she's not carrying the weight of that fear every day and night.

I respect traditional people - they have the eyes which see value in the tarnished. This is a gift in itself. Tradition requires a wealth of discipline in order to be adhered to, hence it is rarely found in youth.

She knew then that white was more than a color: It was a cold, pale shade of understanding that seems to take all of your hope away.

There's your truth and then there is my truth. As for the universal truth; it does not exist".

Don’t be afraid of the dark, my child. Light has a source. It can be snuffed out. But darkness has no source. It just exists. This darkness is a path to That, which has no source: God. Wise

any philosophy, no matter how perfect, works only for a finite period.

Swagruhe Pujyate Murkhaha; Swagraame Pujyate Prabhuhu Swadeshe Pujyate Raja; Vidvaansarvatra Pujyate. A fool is worshipped in his home. A chief is worshipped in his village. A king is worshipped in his kingdom. A knowledgeable person is worshipped everywhere.

Nature is not concerned about fairness, it only interested in efficiency.

If karma is giving you a negative signal repeatedly, then it is not testing you, it is trying to teach you.

Enjoy today because it won't come back.

The purpose is not the destination but the journey itself. Only those who understand this simple truth can experience true happiness.

Moonlight filtered in through the blinds illuminating their bedroom, but the bright glow couldn’t penetrate the darkness that surrounded her heart.

Everything in the world is maya, an illusion. The ultimate truth one has to realise is that we actually need nothing. Because to possess an illusion is as good as possessing nothing.

If the entire society was conscious of its duties, nobody would need to fight for their individual rights. Since everybodys's rights would be automatically taken care of through someone else's duties.

There are no bystanders in a dharmayudh - it is a holy war.

If you make a person believe that his misfortune in this birth is due to his sins in his previous birth, he will resign himself to his fate and not vent his fury on society at large.

Rather than the destination it is the journey that lends meaning to our lives, great Neelkanth. Being faithful to our path will lead to consequences, both good as well as bad. For that is the way of the universe.

Miracles come after a lot of hard work.

Isn’t that the way God works? She’d thought. He takes the things in our lives that are ugly, disgusting, and downright wicked, and transforms them into something magnificent.

You will need to be mature and pragmatic. You must use your heart to decide the destination, but use your head to plot the journey.

A relationship is not just for fun, it is also about trust and acknowledge that you can depend on your partner. Relationships based on passion and excitement do not last.

People do what their society rewards them for doing. If the society rewards trust, people will be trusting.

Sometimes, simple faith could lead to profound peace.

God knows, I’m no expert on relationships, but I do know when something’s good. And this thing we’ve created between us is precious and rare. I only hope it’s not fleeting, because for the first time in my adult life, I’ve given someone the power to hurt me.

Ati sarvatra varjayet: Excess of anything is bad. Some of us are attracted to Good. But the universe tries to maintain balance. So what is good for some may end up being bad for others... Agriculture is good for us humans as it gives us an assured supply of food, but it is bad for the animals that lose their forest and grazing land.

Satisfaction comes from giving up wishing I was somewhere else or doing something else.

Do not rush to the “right answer”,’ clarified Vashishta. ‘The key, always, is to ask the “right question”.

it’s more important to be right than to be first.

If you spend enough time with anything, you start liking it, even sadness.

Regrets over yesterday and the fear of tomorrow are twin thieves that rob us of the moment.

Evil is never in a rush. It creeps up slowly. It doesn't hide, but confronts you in broad daylight. It gives decades of warnings, even centuries at times. Time is never the problem when you battle Evil. The problem is the will to fight it.

My task is to simplify and then go deeper, making a commitment to what remains. That's what I've been after. To care and polish what remains till it glows and comes alive from loving care.

It is attachment that makes people forget not only their moral duties but even who they really are.

Not everyone has the spirit to keep their character strong when their stomachs are empty.’ Sunaina

The moment that every unrealised heart craves for. The unforgettable instant that a soul, clinging on to the purest memory of its previous life, longs for. The second, that in spite of a conspiracy of the gods, only a few lucky men experience. The moment when she enters his life.

Civilization is very fragile, all it takes is a few decades of chaos for us to forget humanity and turn into animals. Our base natures can take over very fast. We can forget that we are sentient beings, with laws and codes and ethics.

It would still be a long way until she was completely free, but the door had been cracked open and a smidgen of hope broke through the darkness.

If the universe is trying to maintain balance, we must aid this by ensuring that Good is not enjoyed excessively. Or else the universe will re-balance itself by creating Evil to counteract Good. That is the purpose of Evil: it balances the Good.

We don't become gods because we think we are gods. That is only a sign of ego. We become gods when we realise that a part of the universal divinity lives within us; when we understand our role in this great world and when we strive to fulfil that role. That makes you a God. And remember, gods don't fail. You cannot fail.

How come you write the way you do?” an apprentice writer in my Johns Hopkins workshop once disingenuously asked Donald Barthelme, who was visiting. Without missing a beat, Don replied, “Because Samuel Beckett was already writing the way he does.” Asked another, smiling but serious, “How can we become better writers than we are?” “Well," DB advised, “for starters, read through the whole history of philosophy, from the pre-Socratics up through last semester. That might help.” “But Coach Barth has already advised us to read all of literature, from Gilgamesh up through last semester...” “That, too,” Donald affirmed, and twinkled that shrewd Amish-farmer-from-West-11th-Street twinkle of his. “You’re probably wasting time on things like eating and sleeping. Cease that, and read all of philosophy and all of literature. Also art. Plus politics and a few other things. The history of everything.

Where were you while we were growing up? Did you not listen at all? We cannot understand God's plan for us. Everything is His will. It might seem like things are falling apart sometimes, but often God has something better in store for us down the line. You will enjoy life much better if you will just relax.

William Butler Yeats’s “Second Coming” seems perfectly to render our present predicament: “The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity.” This is an excellent description of the current split between anaemic liberals and impassioned fundamentalists. “The best” are no longer able to fully engage, while “the worst” engage in racist, religious, sexist fanaticism. However, are the terrorist fundamentalists, be they Christian or Muslim, really fundamentalists in the authentic sense of the term? Do they really believe? What they lack is a feature that is easy to discern in all authentic fundamentalists, from Tibetan Buddhists to the Amish in the U.S.: the absence of resentment and envy, the deep indifference towards the non-believers’ way of life. If today’s so-called fundamentalists really believe they have their way to truth, why should they feel threatened by non-believers, why should they envy them? When a Buddhist encounters a Western hedonist, he hardly condemns him. He just benevolently notes that the hedonist’s search for happiness is self-defeating. In contrast to true fundamentalists, the terrorist pseudo-fundamentalists are deeply bothered, intrigued, fascinated by the sinful life of the non-believers. One can feel that, in fighting the sinful Other, they are fighting their own temptation. These so-called Christian or Muslim fundamentalists are a disgrace to true fundamentalists. It is here that Yeats’s diagnosis falls short of the present predicament: the passionate intensity of a mob bears witness to a lack of true conviction. Deep in themselves, terrorist fundamentalists also lack true conviction-their violent outbursts are proof of it. How fragile the belief of a Muslim must be, if he feels threatened by a stupid caricature in a low-circulation Danish newspaper. The fundamentalist Islamic terror is not grounded in the terrorists’ conviction of their superiority and in their desire to safeguard their cultural-religious identity from the onslaught of global consumerist civilization. The problem with fundamentalists is not that we consider them inferior to us, but rather that they themselves secretly consider themselves inferior. This is why our condescending, politically correct assurances that we feel no superiority towards them only make them more furious and feeds their resentment. The problem is not cultural difference (their effort to preserve their identity), but the opposite fact that the fundamentalists are already like us, that secretly they have already internalized our standards and measure themselves by them. (This clearly goes for the Dalai Lama, who justifies Tibetan Buddhism in Western terms of the pursuit of happiness and avoidance of pain.) Paradoxically, what the fundamentalists really lack is precisely a dose of that true “racist” conviction of one’s own superiority.

I love you. I love you for when you buy me chocolate and put it in my backpack as a surprise. For when we're having pizza, and you always get me an extra big glass of soda because you know the pepperoni makes me thirsty. I love you for how you hold my hand so tight when I'm scared. How you laugh at my jokes, and you make me laugh. I love the way you never get mad when I mess up and cut a plank the wrong size. The way you always leave the last cookie for me." Smiling, David shook his head. "But that stuff's nothing." "No." Isaac brushed their lips together tenderly. "That stuff's everything.

[L]iberals insist that children should be given the right to remain part of their particular community, but on condition that they are given a choice. But for, say, Amish children to really have a free choice of which way of life to choose, either their parents’ life or that of the “English,” they would have to be properly informed on all the options, educated in them, and the only way to do what would be to extract them from their embeddedness in the Amish community, in other words, to effectively render them “English.” This also clearly demonstrates the limitations of the standard liberal attitude towards Muslim women wearing a veil: it is deemed acceptable if it is their free choice and not an option imposed on them by their husbands or family. However, the moment a woman wears a veil as the result of her free individual choice, the meaning of her act changes completely: it is no longer a sign of her direct substantial belongingness to the Muslim community, but an expression of her idiosyncratic individuality, of her spiritual quest and her protest against the vulgarity of the commodification of sexuality, or else a political gesture of protest against the West. A choice is always a meta-choice, a choice of the modality of choice itself: it is one thing to wear a veil because of one’s immediate immersion in a tradition; it is quite another to refuse to wear a veil; and yet another to wear one not out of a sense of belonging, but as an ethico-political choice. This is why, in our secular societies based on “choice,” people who maintain a substantial religious belonging are in a subordinate position: even if they are allowed to practice their beliefs, these beliefs are “tolerated” as their idiosyncratic personal choice or opinion; they moment they present them publicly as what they really are for them, they are accused of “fundamentalism.” What this means is that the “subject of free choice” (in the Western “tolerant” multicultural sense) can only emerge as the result of an extremely violent process of being torn away from one’s particular lifeworld, of being cut off from one’s roots.