Rational Thought Quotes

The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation but your thoughts about it.

Let them get at the books themselves, and do not let them be flooded with diluted talk from the lips of their teacher. The less the parents 'talk-in' and expound their rations of knowledge and thought to the children they are educating, the better for the children...Children must be allowed to ruminate, must be left alone with their own thoughts.

Rationality of thought imposes a limit on a person's concept of his relation to the cosmos.

If you have a bad thought about yourself, tell it to go to hell because that is exactly where it came from.

The intuitive mind is a sacred gift.

I never made one of my discoveries through the process of rational thinking

So, let us, you and I, for the sake of our brother man, individually strive by example and influence to lift the standard of thought and conduct from the low level of selfishness and self-indulgence up to the lofty realms of aspirational thought and self-denial.

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.

I have often thought that if a rational Fascist dictatorship were to exist, then it would choose the American system.

I cannot imagine a God who rewards and punishes the objects of his creation, whose purposes are modeled after our own -- a God, in short, who is but a reflection of human frailty. Neither can I believe that the individual survives the death of his body, although feeble souls harbor such thoughts through fear or ridiculous egotisms.

I suspect that most of the individuals who have religious faith are content with blind faith. They feel no obligation to understand what they believe. They may even wish not to have their beliefs disturbed by thought.

Your worst enemy cannot harm you as much as your own unguarded thoughts.

More than ambition, more than ability, it is rules that limit contribution;

rules are the lowest common denominator of human behavior. They are a substitute for rational thought.

For me, each game is a new challenge, which has to be dealt with rationally and systematically. At that time, every other thought fades into oblivion.

It is not the world that is absurd, nor human thought: the absurd arises when the human need to understand meets the unreasonableness of the world, when 'my appetite for the absolute and for unity' meets 'the impossibility of reducing this world to a rational and reasonable principle.'

How amazing is it to find someone who wants to hear about all the things that go in your head.

To unfold the secret laws and relations of those high faculties of thought by which all beyond the merely perceptive knowledge of the world and of ourselves is attained or matured, is a object which does not stand in need of commendation to a rational mind.

I believe that words uttered in passion contain a greater living truth than do those words which express thoughts rationally conceived. It is blood that moves the body. Words are not meant to stir the air only: they are capable of moving greater things.

At 42, I decided to become a photographer because it offered a means of creative thought and action. I didn't rationalize this, I just felt it intuitively and followed my intuition, which I have never regretted.

Empty Minds Make The Most Noise!

It is the job of conscious rational thought to decide what you want, select the goals you wish to achieve-and concentrate upon these rather than upon what you do not want. To spend time and effort concentrating upon what you do not want is not rational.

Manic depression distorts moods and thoughts, incites dreadful behaviors, destroys the basis of rational thought, and too often erodes the desire and will to live.

Rationality is not just something you do so that you can make more money, it is a binding principle. Rationality is a really good idea. You must avoid the nonsense that is conventional in one's own time. It requires developing systems of thought that improve your batting average over time.

One small positive thought in the morning can change you whole day.

It seems to me that my lack of faith is not, as I once thought, a triumph of the rational mind, but rather a failure of the imagination - an inability to tolerate mistery.

All changes, even positive ones, are scary.

Attempts to reach goals through radical or revolutionary means often fail because they heighten fear. But the small steps of kaizen disarm the brain's fear response, stimulating rational thought and creative play.

I'm an extremely private dude and all this is happening so damn quick.

I really haven't had any time to rationalize it. But it's nothing that I'm going to let freak me out or take control of me or my thoughts or my real life.

Be the silent watcher of your thoughts and behavior. You are beneath the thinker. You are the stillness beneath the mental noise. You are the love and joy beneath the pain.

We should exterminate all rational thought.

Rationalism is an adventure in the clarification of thought.

The sheer folly of trying to defend a nation by destroying all life on the planet must be apparent to anyone capable of rational thought. Nuclear capability must be reduced to zero, globally, permanently. There is no other option.

Integrity is choosing your thoughts and actions based on values rather than personal gain.

Reason flows from the blending of rational thought and feeling.

If the two functions are torn apart, thinking deteriorates into schizoid intellectual activity and feeling deteriorates into neurotic life-damaging passions.

The genuine values in America arose from rational thought and breaking with tradition, not from blind allegiance to dirt and cloth.

-But rational thoughts lead only to rational thoughts, whereas irrational thoughts lead to new experiences.

If you wouldn't say it to a friend, don't say it to yourself.

Painting quickly is a calculated act to block out rational thought.

The task of a university is the creation of the future, so far as rational thought and civilized modes of appreciation can affect the issue.

The real University... has no specific location. It owns no property, pays no salaries, and receives no material dues... The real University is a state of mind. It is that great heritage of rational thought that has been brought down to us through the centuries.

Once you replace negative thoughts with positive ones, you'll start having positive results.

It is quite deplorable to see how many rational creatures, or at least who are thought so, mistake suffering for sanctity, and think a sad face and a gloomy habit of mind propitious offerings to that Deity whose works are all light and lustre and harmony and loveliness.

Zen is based on the recognition of two incompatible types of thought: rational and intuitive.

Unlike rational thought, intuition cannot be 'taught' or even turned on.

In fact, it is impossible to find or manipulate this intuitive consciousness using our rational mind—any more than we can grasp our own hand or see our own eye.

I no longer idolize reason. I have come to accept that ninety percent of what we do is irrational and that we spend what little rational thought we have in justifying our irrationality.

Water creates a neurosis in golfers. The very thought of this harmless fluid robs them of their normal powers of rational thought, turns their legs to jelly, and produces a palsy of the upper limbs.