Friday writings for Randos - Quality

{Friday Writings for Randos - A weekly post that features pieces from other writers that touch some facet of the Randonneuring experience, even if that was not the author's intent. It's stuff that's best read out loud - slowly.} This week it's . . .

An excerpt from:

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance -

An inquiry into values

by Robert M. Pirsig

You want to know how to paint a perfect picture? It's easy. Make yourself perfect and then just paint naturally. That's the way all the experts do it. The making of a painting or the fixing of a motorcycle isn't separate from the rest of your existence. If you're a sloppy thinker the six days of a week you aren't working on your machine, what trap avoidances, what gimmicks, can make you all of a sudden sharp on the seventh? It all goes together.

But if you're a sloppy thinker six days a week and you really try to be sharp on the seventh, then maybe the next six days aren't going to be quite as sloppy as the preceding six . . .

The real cycle you're working on is a cycle called yourself. The machine that appears to be "out there"and the person that appears to be "in here" are not two separate things. They grow toward Quality of fall away from Quality together.