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Train the body and develop stamina and endurance. But the spirit of competition and power that presides over them is not good, it reflects a distorted vision of life. The root of the martial arts is not there.

— Taisen Deshimaru Armed Martial Arts of Japan: Swordsmanship and Archery (1998)

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More quotes by Taisen Deshimaru

If you are not happy here and now, you never will be.

The Book of Positive Quotations (2007)

Harmonizing opposites by going back to their source is the distinctive quality of the Zen attitude, the Middle Way: embracing contradictions, making a synthesis of them, achieving balance.

Zen and the Art of Systems Analysis : Meditations on Computer Systems Development (2002)

To receive everything, one must open one's hands and give.

You must concentrate upon and consecrate yourself wholly to each day, as though a fire were raging in your hair.

Just Before Dark : Collected Nonfiction (1999)

Keep your hands open, and all the sands of the desert can pass through them. Close them, and all you can feel is a bit of grit.

Zen to Go (1989)

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Taisen Deshimaru (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.