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Self Expression Quotes

    “A bird doesn’t sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song.” ~ Zen Poetry

      “Closing down in the midst of pain is a denial of a man’s true nature.  A superior man is free in feeling and action, even amidst great pain and hurt.  If necessary, a man should live with a hurting heart rather than a closed one.  He should learn to stay in the wound of pain and act with spontaneous skill and love even from that place.” ~ David Deida, The Way of the Superior Man

        “The music went on and on, minute after minute, with astonishing variations, never once repeating itself, almost as though the bird were deliberately showing off its virtuosity.  Sometimes it stopped for a few seconds, spread out and resettled its wings, then swelled its speckled breast and again burst into song.  Winston watched it with a sort of vague reverence.  For whom, for what, was that bird singing?  No mate, no rival was watching it.  What made it sit at the edge of the lonely wood and pour its music into nothingness?” ~ George Orwell, 1984

          “‘I’m not very creative’ doesn’t work.  There’s no such thing as creative people and non-creative people.  There are only people who use their creativity and people who don’t.  Unused creativity doesn’t just disappear.  It lives within us until it’s expressed, neglected to death, or suffocated by resentment and fear.” ~ Brené Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection

            “You can only be you when you do your best. When you don’t do your best you are denying yourself the right to be you. That’s a seed that you should really nurture in your mind. You don’t need knowledge or great philosophical concepts. You don’t need the acceptance of others. You express your own divinity by being alive and by loving yourself and others.” ~ Don Miguel Ruiz, The Four Agreements

              “Action is about living fully. Inaction is the way that we deny life. Inaction is sitting in front of the television every day for years because you are afraid to be alive and to take the risk of expressing what you are. Expressing what you are is taking action.” ~ Don Miguel Ruiz, The Four Agreements

                “Wonder, and its expression in poetry and the arts, are among the most important things which seem to distinguish men from other animals, and intelligent and sensitive people from morons.” ~ Alan Watts, The Book

                  “Action is about living fully. Inaction is the way that we deny life. Inaction is sitting in front of the television every day for years because you are afraid to be alive and to take the risk of expressing what you are. Expressing what you are is taking action.” ~ don Miguel Ruiz, The Four Agreements

                    “Being is so significant that it is irreplaceable. You are just yourself. Do something that comes out of you – not to assert, but to express! Sing your song, dance your dance, rejoice in being whatever nature has chosen you to be.”

                    Osho, The Book of Understanding (page 180)

                      “To live is to express, and to express you have to create.  Creation is never merely repetition. To live is to express oneself freely in creation.” ~ Bruce Lee, Striking Thoughts

                        “Life is painful. It has thorns, like the stem of a rose. Culture and art are the roses that bloom on the stem. The flower is yourself, your humanity. Art is the liberation of the humanity inside yourself.” ~ Daisaku Ikeda