Haruki Murakami Quotes

The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.

Life is too short to wonder where you hid your waffle maker.

Nature has neither kernel Nor shell

So for thy spirit did devise Its Maker seemly garniture, Of its own essence parcel pure.-- From grave simplicities a dress, And reticent demureness, And love encinctured with reserve; Which the woven vesture would subserve. For outward robes in their ostents Should show the soul's habiliments. Therefore I say,--Thou'rt fair even so, But better Fair I use to know.

Paint the flying spirit of the bird rather than its feathers.

Life is so much easier than you think it is, and as you come to understand the way life works, and the power you have inside you, you will experience the magic of life in its fullness.

Pick three key attributes or features, get those things very, very right, and then forget about everything else… By focusing on only a few core features in the first version, you are forced to find the true essence and value of the product.

Beauty is the purgation of superfluities.

The essence of life will never be captured by even the greatest of formulas.

The simple fact of yourself... there it is... just you... no excitement about it... a very simple fact... the only thing you have... keep it as clear as you can.

You don't have to do everything; just do what really matters.

Let things taste of what they are.

When you paint Spring, do not paint willows, plums, peaches, or apricots - just paint Spring.

I do not wish to be any more busy with my hands than is necessary.

Those who are wise won't be busy, and those who are too busy can't be wise.

Observe your cat. It is difficult to surprise him. Why? Naturally his superior hearing is part of the answer, but not all of it. He moves well, using his senses fully. He is not preoccupied with irrelevancies. He's not thinking about his job or his image or his income tax. He is putting first things first, principally his physical security. Do likewise.

Be - don't try to become.

Would do well to slow down a little... focus on the significant... and truly see the things that matter most.

Simplicity, to me, has always been the essence of good taste.

Focusing is about saying No.

There are too many ideas and things and people. Too many directions to go. I was starting to believe the reason it matters to care passionately about something, is that it whittles the world down to a more manageable size.

Finally, everybody agrees that no one pursuit can be successfully followed by a man who is preoccupied with many things-eloquence cannot, nor the liberal studies-since the mind, when distracted, takes in nothing very deeply, but rejects everything that is, as it were, crammed into it. There is nothing the busy man is less busied with than living: there is nothing that is harder to learn.

What makes Steve [Jobs'] methodology different from everyone else's is that he always believed the most important decisions you make are not the things you do, but the things you decide not to do. He's a minimalist.

Let us shun everything, which might tend to efface the primitive lineaments of our individuality. Let us reflect that each one of us is a thought of God.