Robert S Ellwood famous quotes

Theosophy occupies a central place in the history of new spiritual movements, for the writings of Blavatsky and some of her followers have had a great influence outside of her organization. … The importance of Theosophy in modern history should not be underestimated. Not only have the writings of Blavatsky and others inspired several generations of occultists, but the movement had a remarkable role in the restoration to the colonial peoples of nineteenth century Asia of their own spiritual heritage.
-- Robert S Ellwood

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In [Yogananda's] celebrated Autobiography of a Yogi, he offers a stunning account of the 'cosmic consciousness' reached on the upper levels of yogic practice, and numerous interesting perspectives on human nature from the yogic and Vedantic points of view.
-- Robert S Ellwood

#Practice #Views #Interesting

If after accepting the spiritual master and being initiated one does not follow the rules and regulations of devotional service, then he is again fallen.

A bona fide spiritual master, under the guidance of authorities, can turn anyone to the Vaisnava cult so that naturally he may come to the topmost position of a brahmana.

The spiritual master and Krishna are two parallel lines. The train, on two tracks, moves forward. The spiritual Master and Krishna are like these two tracks. They must be served simultaneously. Krishna helps one to find bona fide Spiritual Master and bona fide Spiritual Master helps one to understand Krishna. If one does not get bona fide Spiritual Master, then how he can ever understand Krishna ? You cannot serve Krishna without Spiritual Master, or serve just Spiritual Master without serving Krishna. They must be served simultaneously.

If the English language had been properly organized ... then there would be a word which meant both 'he' and 'she', and I could write, 'If John or Mary comes heesh will want to play tennis', which would save a lot of trouble.

The primary requisite for writing well about food is a good appetite.

I can write better than anybody who can write faster, and I can write faster than anybody who can write better.

The fighter (like the writer) must stand alone. If he loses he cannot call an executive conference and throw off on a vice president or the assistant sales manager. He is consequently resented by fractional characters who cannot live outside an organization.

There's a lot of pride that business owners have. It's actually really critical that pride and ownership extends to everyone in the organization. I think of everyone is in the same boat in driving the company forward.

Leaders are active instead of reactive, shaping ideas instead of responding to them. Leaders adopt a personal and active attitude toward goals. The influence a leader exerts in altering moods, evoking images and expectations, and in establishing specific desires and objectives determines the direction an organization takes. The net result of this influence is to change the way people think about what is desirable, possible, and necessary. In other words, leaders are visionaries and managers operate within those established visions.

The young [Nazi] movement is in its nature and inner organization anti-parliamentarian; that is, it rejects... a principle of majority rule in which the leader is degraded to the level of mere executant of other people's wills and opinion.