Trying to understand is like straining through muddy water. Have the patience to wait! Be still and allow the mud to settle.

— Lao Tzu

Under heaven all can see beauty as beauty only because there is ugliness. All can know good as good only because there is evil.

— Lao Tzu

Watch your thoughts, they become your words; watch your words, they become your actions; watch your actions, they become your habits; watch your habits, they become your character; watch your character, it becomes your destiny.

— Lao Tzu

Water is the softest thing, yet it can penetrate mountains and earth. This shows clearly the principle of softness overcoming hardness.

— Lao Tzu

We join spokes together in a wheel, but it is the center hole that makes the wagon move. We shape clay into a pot, but it is the emptiness inside that holds whatever we want. We hammer wood for a house, but it is the inner space that makes it livable. We work with being, but non-being is what we use.

— Lao Tzu

When a nation is filled with strife, then do patriots flourish.

— Lao Tzu

When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.

— Lao Tzu

When people see some things as beautiful, other things become ugly. When people see some things as good, other things become bad.

— Lao Tzu

When the best leader's work is done the people say, 'We did it ourselves.'

— Lao Tzu

When there is silence one finds the anchor of the universe within oneself

— Lao Tzu