“If you think of someone's good qualities as the umeboshi in an onigiri it's as if their qualities are stuck to their back! Maybe the reason people get jealous of each other is because they can see so clearly the umeboshi on other people's backs.”

“Tohru(thinking): There is an umeboshi-- on your back. Tohru (outloud): Maybe the reason people get jealous of eachother is because they can clearly see the umeboshi on other people's backs. I can see them too. I can see them perfectly. There is an amazing umeboshi on your back, Kyo-kun.”

“The part of a person that's remarkable is like the umeboshi on the back of a rice ball. All around the world, there are different colors, shapes, and flavors, but because it's stuck to the back, they might not be able to see their precious umeboshi. 'I'm not special,' each one would think, 'just plain ole rice.' Even though that's not true, and there is an umeboshi on the back. The reason people get jealous of one another is because they can see the umeboshi on other people's backs. Even now, someone might be feeling envious of something you don't recognize in yourself.”

“Many people fail in their career, business and relationship, and others get stuck because of their inability to make quality decisions.”

“Or if he takes whatever dull job he's stuck with -- and they are all, sooner or later, dull -- and, just to keep himself amused, starts to look for options of Quality, and secretly pursues these options, just for their own sake, thus making an art out of what he is doing, he's likely to discover that he becomes a much more interesting person and much less of an object to the people around him because his Quality decisions change him too. And not only the job and him, but others too because the Quality tends to fan out like waves. The Quality job he didn't think anyone was going to see is seen, and the person who sees it feels a little better because of it, and is likely to pass that feeling on to others, and in that way the Quality tends to keep on going.”

“There are people who, on meeting a successful rival, no matter in what, are at once disposed to turn their backs on everything good in him, and to see only what is bad. There are people, on the other hand, who desire above all to find in that lucky rival the qualities by which he has outstripped them, and seek with a throbbing ache at heart only what is good.”