Moderation.
Middle Path.

Pride should not be allowed to grow; the desires should not be indulged; the will should not be gratified to the full; pleasure should not be carried to excess (...) Confucius, quoted after: Novak Philip, The World's Wisdom, P.122.

For governing a country well there is nothing better than moderation. The mark of a moderate man is freedom from his own ideas. Tolerant like the sky, all-pervading like sunlight, firm like a mountain, supple like a tree in the wind, he has no destination in view and makes use of anything life happens to bring his way. Nothing is impossible for him. Because he has let go, he can care for the people's welfare as a mother cares for her child. Tao Te Ching 59, quoted after: Novak Philip, The World's Wisdom. P.159.

Kill not your heart with excess of eating and drinking. Quran, quoted after: Novak Philip, The World's Wisdom, P.319.

(The Buddha) finally determined that the path to enlightenment, and therefore to the end of suffering, is the Middle Way. It (...) strives to balance the interacting forces of samsara (worldly engagement) and nirvana (release from worldly engagement). Jack Maguire. (2001). Essential Buddhism. P.90.

Anything untimely or pushed to excess is short-lived and harmful rather than helpful. St. Evagrios the Solitary (345-399 C.E.), quoted in: The Philokalia, Vol. I., P.54

(Abba Moses said:) 'We should therefore make every effort to acquire for ourselves that gift of discrimination which is able to keep us from excess in either direction. For, as the fathers have said, all extremes are equally harmful. (...)' St. John Cassian (360-435), quoted in: The Philokalia, Vol. I., P.107-8.

(…) Correct your attitude to your body and leave it alone. Don’t pamper, don’t torture. Just keep it going, most of the time below the threshold of conscious attention. Sri Maharaj Nisargadatta. (2005). I am That. P.49.


See also the related subjects: Discipline, Humbleness, Materialism, Renunciation, Simplicity and Thankfulness.

Last updated: 2013/05/20

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