Favourite bonsai quotes

[Steven]

There has been some great bonsai related quotes over the years. I thought it might be fun to build up a list of great quotes from here on AusBonsai and from other medium or 'real life'.
Here are some of my favourites;

Take your time, its the fastest way to achieve your goal.

One of the most important tools of Bonsai is patience.

Always look for the smallest tree within the tree.

If a tree falls off my Bonsai bench, and I'm not home to hear it, does it make a sound?

A bonsai is a microcosm containing within it, unchanged in everything but size, the mystery of the universe. - Colin Lewis

Think: tree. - Mr. Miyagi, The Karate Kid

If you can't find the front, instead find the back and then rotate it 180 degrees. - John Naka

Killing trees is the tuition you pay for learning bonsai. - John Naka

Listen to the tree; it tells you where it wants to go! - John Naka

The object is not to make the tree look like a bonsai, but to make the bonsai look like a tree. - John Naka

Bonsai to me: a little tree in a container that touches my soul. If it speaks to my soul much it is bonsai art. It does not matter at all how it does it as long as it does it. - Walter Pall

When a bonsai stops growing, you know it's dead. - Japanese Proverb

I have killed more trees than you will ever own... - William N. Valavanis

A pot in the hand is better than one dropped on your foot. - Anonymous

You spend more time with those $#@#% trees than you do with me. - Wife of Anonymous

My wife said I had to give up bonsai or she was going to leave me. God, am I going to miss her. - Unknown



Regards,
Steven

[Pup]

Patience is something you need only, when you are doing something you do not enjoy. Unknown

Listen to your trees, they will tell you what is best for them. again Unknown

Mrs Pup reckons, if she could grow branches and leaves I would talk more to her

[hugh grant]

"If you kill a tree, you gain a pot"
"Don't worry if you kill your tree,at least you will have gained a pot"

Hugh

[Webos]

The only "finished" tree is a dead one

[Joel]

"A bonsai should be like my wife; beautiful from all sides but I certainly know where the front is!" - (Can't remember who from. Well known artist).

[Grant Bowie]

Grow a lot; Kill a lot; learn a lot! John Naka

If you have wire scars then just rewire in the opposite direction and you will get a lovely cross-hatching effect! Me (Tongue in Cheek of course)

If you are unsure about cutting a branch off just wait 10 or 20 years and if you don't like you can then cut it off! Me again. ( This time I mean it)

Grant

[craigw60]

From my old friend Nel Saffin when I was a raw beginner "if your frightened of cutting find a new hobby now "
Craigw

[bonzaidog]

" The gentle art of Bonsai "....usually springs to mind whilst upside down in a hole cutting roots ,just prior to hauling a giant stump out of the ground.
" Don't you think you have enough trees now?" - My Wife.
" I'm minding it for my mate "...Me

[astroboy76]

Bonsai art is the display of a landscape -- without the landscape. - Nobu Kajiwara

To develop a fine Bonsai collection, make one hundred and keep two or three. - Mr. Toshio Kawamoto

[Mitchell]

Some of these quotes are directly regarding bonsai but many are general tree quotes especially the non Japanese. I feel though they are still relevant, as we are creating images of real trees.

These are general Japanese Phrases I find meaningful towards our hobby. Many resonate the beliefs held in the creation of small trees.


Saru mo ki kara ochiru- Even monkeys fall from trees
Meaning: Even an expert can make mistakes; also sometimes used as a warning that "pride comes before a fall"

Atama kakushite, shiri kakusazu- Cover/hide your head, and not cover your bottom
Meaning: Don't cover your head but expose your bottom, ie: if you are trying to cover up something, be careful not to expose something else.

Fuku sui bon ni kaerazu- Overturned water doesn't return to the tray
Meaning: What's done is done; "There's no use crying over spilt milk"

He wo hitte, shiri tsubome- Breaking wind, closing buttocks
Meaning: There's no point in squeezing your buttocks after you have farted;

Sugitaru wa oyobazaru ga gotoshi- Too much is as bad as too little

Chiri mo tsumoreba yama to naru- Great oaks from little acorns grow.

Yanagi ni kaze- Follow the path of least resistance

Iwanu ga hana- Some things are better left unsaid; Silence is golden


A few non Japanese

"Do not be afraid to go out on a limb ... That's where the fruit is." - Anonymous

"If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason." - Jack Handey

"The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn."- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"There is, I conceive, scarcely any tree that may not be advantageously used in the various combinations of form and color." - Gilpin

"Alone with myself
The trees bend to caress me
The shade hugs my heart" - Candy Polgar

"One impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man,
Of moral evil and of good,
Than all the ages can." - William Wordsworth

"The patient. - The pine tree seems to listen, the fir tree to wait: and both without impatience: - they give no thought to the little people beneath them devoured by their impatience and their curiosity." - Friedrich Nietzsche



I'll try and find some more later.

[Steven]

He wo hitte, shiri tsubome- Breaking wind, closing buttocks
Meaning: There's no point in squeezing your buttocks after you have farted;

Um, what does this have to do with bonsai mate?

[Mitchell]

It relates profoundly to bonsai mate, once a action/mistake has been committed to, there is no point in being remorseful over it.

Embrace it, re-design, re-evaluate and continue in another direction. In the time it takes to wack your self in the forehead and feel sore over the mistake, you could have discovered a whole new path for the tree better than your original design. Sometimes the best designs only come about due to an early mistake.

Hope that explains the inclusion better, plus I found it humorous.

[nealweb]

He wo hitte, shiri tsubome- Breaking wind, closing buttocks
Meaning: There's no point in squeezing your buttocks after you have farted;

Um, what does this have to do with bonsai mate?

Who cares its a rippa! (excuse the pun) I love it, I now can't help but to spend all the rest of today trying to think of a way to work that one into my next email to my Japanese friend

[Joel]

There are a lot of elderly folk into bonsai and sometimes at meetings.....

[shibui]

Tom Yamamoto, at a workshop in reply to someone explaining they had a problem with one aspect of the tree being examined:

"You have ploblem? Cut off. - No more Ploblem!"