Quotes about Mastery

Discipline, strictly speaking, is activity carried on to prepare us indirectly for some activity other than itself. We do not practice the piano to practice the piano well, but to play it well.

Those who continue to be mastered by their feelings—whether it is anger, fear, sexual attraction, desire for food or for "looking good," the residues of woundedness, or whatever—are typically persons who in their heart of hearts believe that their feelings must be satisfied. They have long chosen the strategy of selectively resisting their feelings instead of that of not having them—of simply changing or replacing them.

Our aim here is not to prove that Jesus is superior to other spiritual masters and traditions. But he really is different, and we should acknowledge it.

The top experts in the world are ardent students. The day you stop learning, you're definitely not an expert.

The strict competences of independence, the formal mastery, the complexities of attitude and know-how necessary to life on the farm, which have been in the making in the race of farmers since before history, all are replaced by the knowledge of some fragmentary task that may be learned by rote in a little while.

The good artist believes that nobody is good enough to give him advice. He has supreme vanity. No matter how much he admires the old writer, he wants to beat him.

I'm against the picture of the artist as a starry-eyed visionary not really in control or knowing what he does. I'd almost prefer the word 'craftsman'. He's like one of those old-fashioned ship builders who conceived the build of the boat in their mind and after that touched every single piece that went into the boat.

An old Scot used to say to us, 'If He is not Lord of all, He is not Lord at all.

High Standards for High Achievement.

Excellence in any department can be attained only by the labor of a lifetime; it is not to be purchased at a lesser price.

Whatever your life's work is, do it well.

Before you dismiss a beginner's work, remember how much you sucked when you started. You probably sucked worse, actually.