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  "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robert-m-pirsig/zen-and-the-art-of-motorcycle-maintenance/mountains-should-be-climbed",
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  "slug": "mountains-should-be-climbed",
  "text": "Mountains should be climbed with as little effort as possible and without desire. The reality of your own nature should determine the speed. If you become restless, speed up. If you become winded, slow down. You climb the mountain in an equilibrium between restlessness and exhaustion. Then, when you are no longer thinking ahead, each footstep isn't just a means to an an end but a unique event in itself. This leaf has jagged edges. This rock looks loose. From this place the snow is less visible, even though closer. These are things you should notice anyway. To live only for some future goal is shallow. It’s the sides of the mountain that sustain life, not the top. Here's where things grow.",
  "language": "en",
  "author": {
    "name": "Robert M. Pirsig",
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  "book": {
    "title": "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance",
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    "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robert-m-pirsig/zen-and-the-art-of-motorcycle-maintenance"
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  "topics": [
    {
      "name": "the present moment",
      "slug": "the-present-moment",
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    {
      "name": "purpose",
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  "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:40:33",
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      "slug": "uncle-toms-cabin",
      "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robert-m-pirsig/zen-and-the-art-of-motorcycle-maintenance/uncle-toms-cabin",
      "text": "Uncle Tom's Cabin was no literary masterpiece but it was a culture-bearing book. It came at a time when the entire culture was about to reject slavery. People seized upon it as a portrayal of their own new values and it became an overwhelming success.\n\nThe success of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance seems the result of this culture-bearing phenomenon. The involuntary shock treatment described here is against the law today. It is a violation of human liberty. The culture has changed.",
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        "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Robert_M._Pirsig#Afterword_(1984)",
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      "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:40:34"
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      "slug": "trials-never-end",
      "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robert-m-pirsig/zen-and-the-art-of-motorcycle-maintenance/trials-never-end",
      "text": "Trials never end, of course. Unhappiness and misfortune are bound to occur as long as people live, but there is a feeling now, that was not here before, and is not just on the surface of things, but penetrates all the way through: We've won it. It's going to get better now. You can sort of tell these things.",
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      "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robert-m-pirsig/zen-and-the-art-of-motorcycle-maintenance/quality-is-better",
      "text": "Quality is better seen up at the timberline than here obscured by smoky windows and oceans of words, and he sees that what he is talking about can never really be accepted here because to see it one has to be free from social authority and this is an institution of social authority. Quality for sheep is what the shepherd says. And if you take a sheep and put it up at the timberline at night when the wind is roaring, that sheep will be panicked half to death and will call and call until the shepherd comes, or comes the wolf.",
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