Top 500 Laozi Quotes (2026 Update)
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151. “Even the longest journey must begin where you stand.”

— Laozi

152. “Always be on the lookout for ways to turn a problem into an opportunity for success. Always be on the lookout for ways to nurture your dream.”

— Laozi

153. “The real key to health and happiness and success is self knowledge.”

— Laozi

154. “In the Universe the difficult things are done as if they were easy.”

— Laozi

155. “For all things difficult to acquire, the intelligent man works with perseverance.”

— Laozi

156. “The great Way is easy, yet people prefer the side paths. Be aware when things are out of balance. Stay centered within the Tao.”

— Laozi

157. “Failure is an opportunity. If you blame someone else, there is no end to the blame. Therefore the Master fulfills her own obligations and corrects her own mistakes. She does what she needs to do and demands nothing of others.”

— Laozi

158. “Man at his birth is supple and tender, but in death, he is rigid and hard. Thus, suppleness and tenderness accompany life, but rigidity and hardness accompany death.”

— Laozi

159. “Can you step back from your own mind and thus understand all things?”

— Laozi

160. “He who knows enough is enough will always have enough.”

— Laozi

161. “Watch your thoughts, they become words...”

— Laozi

162. “Those who are highly evolved, maintain an undiscriminating perception. Seeing everything, labeling nothing, they maintain their awareness of the Great Oneness. Thus they are supported by it.”

— Laozi

163. “No thought, no action, no movement, total stillness: only thus can one manifest the true nature and law of things from within and unconsciously, and at last become one with heaven and earth.”

— Laozi

164. “Give evil nothing to oppose and it will disappear by itself.”

— Laozi

165. “Use the light to return to clarity.”

— Laozi

166. “Remember: if you can cease all restless activity, your integral nature will appear.”

— Laozi

167. “Silence is a source of great strenght.”

— Laozi

168. “The best soldier does not attack. The superior fighter succeeds without violence. The greatest conqueror wins without struggle. The most successful manager leads without dictating. This is intelligent non aggressiveness.”

— Laozi

169. “Softness triumphs over hardness, feebleness over strength. What is more malleable is always superior over that which is immoveable. This is the principle of controlling things by going along with them, of mastery through adaptation.”

— Laozi

170. “Going back to the origin is called peace; it means reversion to destiny. Reversion to destiny is called eternity. Those who know eternity are called enlightened.”

— Laozi

171. “The living are soft and yielding; the dead are rigid and stiff. Living plants are flexible and tender; the dead are brittle and dry.”

— Laozi

172. “The best people are like water, which benefits all things and does not compete with them. It stays in lowly places that others reject. This is why it is so similar to the Way.”

— Laozi

173. “Use your light, but dim your brightness.”

— Laozi

174. “If one desires to receive one must first give. This is called profound understanding.”

— Laozi

175. “Tao in the world is like a river flowing home to the sea.”

— Laozi

176. “When the ancient Masters said, “If you want to be given everything, give everything up,” they weren’t using empty phrases. Only in being lived by the Tao can you be truly yourself.”

— Laozi

177. “Take time to listen to what is said without words, to obey the law too subtle to be written, to worship the unnameable and to embrace the unformed.”

— Laozi

178. “Mask your brightness. Be at one with the dust of the earth. This is primal union.”

— Laozi

179. “ALL things in Nature work silently. They come into being and possess nothing. They fulfil their functions and make no claim.”

— Laozi

180. “Thus an army without flexibility never wins a battle. A tree that is unbending is easily broken.”

— Laozi

181. “Without the tao, Kindness and compassion are replaced by law and justice; Faith and trust are supplanted by ritual and ceremony.”

— Laozi

182. “A scholar who cherishes the love of comfort is not fit to be deemed a scholar.”

— Laozi

183. “Find a teacher who is an integral being, a beacon who extends his light and virtue with equal ease to those who appreciate him and those who don’t. Shape yourself in his mold, bathe in his nourishing radiance, and reflect it out to the rest of the world.”

— Laozi

184. “Cultivate virtue in yourself, and it will be true.”

— Laozi

185. “Act without expectation.”

— Laozi

186. “Nature’s way is simple and easy, but men prefer the intricate and artificial.”

— Laozi

187. “If you go searching for the Great Creator, you will come back empty-handed. The source of the universe is ultimately unknowable, a great invisible river flowing forever through a vast and fertile valley. Silent and uncreated, it creates all things.”

— Laozi

188. “He who defends with love will be secure; Heaven will save him, and protect him with love.”

— Laozi

189. “Just as the value of a house lies in its location, The value of a mind lies in its depth, The value of giving lies in the presence of a generous spirit, The value of words lies in their reliability.”

— Laozi

190. “The Tao never acts with force, yet there is nothing that it can not do.”

— Laozi

191. “Nurture the spontaneous peaceful life.”

— Laozi

192. “If you want to accord with the Tao, just do your job, then let go.”

— Laozi

193. “The more laws and restrictions there are, the poorer the people become.”

— Laozi

194. “To attain knowledge, add things every day To attain wisdom, remove things every day.”

— Laozi

195. “Behave simply and hold on to purity.”

— Laozi

196. “Do your work, then step back. The only path to serenity.”

— Laozi

197. “Battles are followed by years of famine.”

— Laozi

198. “Who can rest until the moment of action?”

— Laozi

199. “Dualistic thinking is a sickness.”

— Laozi

200. “First and last follow each other.”

— Laozi