Quotes about the-self

Hence it is a superficial view (which presumably has never seen a person in despair, not even one’s own self) when it is said of a man in despair, "He is consuming himself." For precisely this it is he despairs of, and to his torment it is precisely this he cannot do, since by despair fire has entered into something that cannot burn, or cannot burn up, that is, into the self.

Conflict is the essence of the self.

The beauty of theatre was that it was a moving, changing art form—only those who watch the same performance night in after night out see the real naturalistic drama at work—the small changes, adjustments, changes in articulation or intonation, the addition of a cough or hiccup, a longer pause rife with more (or less) meaning, the character’s movement across the stage a step slower, a step closer to the audience, the change of a word here and there, an overall change in mood and tone, the actors

We are the mountains we must cross.

Lord, how excellent are Thy ways, and how devious and dark are the ways of man. Show us how to die, that we may rise again to newness of life. Rend the veil of our self-life from the top down as Thou didst rend the veil of the Temple. We would draw near in full assurance of faith. We would dwell with Thee in daily experience here on this earth so that we may be accustomed to the glory when we enter Thy heaven to dwell with Thee there. In Jesus' name, Amen.

But if I am to let my life speak things I want to hear, things I would gladly tell others, I must also let it speak things I do not want to hear and would never tell anyone else! My life is not only about my strengths and virtues; it is also about my liabilities and my limits, my trespasses and my shadow. An inevitable though often ignored dimension of the quest for 'wholeness' is that we must embrace what we dislike or find shameful about ourselves as well as what we are confident and proud of.

Everybody calls me "Marty." I never know what to call myself.

The self is the class (not the collection) of the experiences (or autopsychological states). The self does not belong to the expression of the basic experience, but is constructed only on a very high level.

The price we paid for the volumes of ourselves that we suffocated in the dark.

Polarities of the 'authentic' vs. the 'inauthentic' are easily discernible in recreational modes. The criteria of authenticity are not necessarily objective but rather have to do with the rules by which the self allows or disallows its own experience.

The very fact that you can observe this thinking mind is proof that you are not this thinking mind.

Be what you are not. The true self is no one.

Any casual observer can tell at a glance I'm not the person I think I am.

Whatever we may be or seem to others, to ourselves we are always just ourselves

There is this question of otherness….So just as it is blood alone that binds people to defend one another in the face of danger, on the spiritual plane one person will struggle to help another only if this person is not ‘different’, and if, quite aside from opinions and convictions, they share similar natures at the deepest level.

It is important to realize that we so often define ourselves by what is in opposition to ourselves.

This constant mental diatribe and the frustrations, worries, insecurities and muscular tension that ensues are the self.

That nagging state of constant thought that exists somewhere between the ears and behind the eyes is the self.

We tend to view ourselves as this, lying in contradiction with everything that is not ourselves, that.

A life of joy awaits the man who sits alone quietly in a room and determines what he himself believes rather than simply adopting the values of another.

The self is a self-made Procrustean bedof little comfort

If you do not worship God, you worship something, and nine times out of ten it will be yourself. You have a duty to worship God, not because He will be imperfect and unhappy if you do not, but because you will be imperfect and unhappy.

An eminent philosopher among my friends, who can dignify even your ugly furniture by lifting it into the serene light of science, has shown me this pregnant little fact. Your pierglass or extensive surface of polished steel made to be rubbed by a housemaid, will be minutely and multitudinously scratched in all directions; but place now against it a lighted candle as a centre of illumination, and lo! the scratches will seem to arrange themselves in a fine series of concentric circles round that l

The more we have outside ourselves the harder it is to get inside ourselves.

The embodiment of his mystic precepts, he appeared at any given moment to be on the verge of an amazing disintegration, his particular complex of atoms ready to go shooting off into the great void like a burst of fireworks.

Look up at the moon don't think about yourself.

When the tendencies (vruti) that were wandering around since time immemorial come within & enter into the Self’s (Soul’s) abode it is known as freedom from all wanderings (nivruti).

Gnani Purush’ [the enlightened one] has become ‘Soul’ (Atma Self) while staying with the body.

Thus he has two standpoints from which he can consider himself...: first, as belonging to the world of sense, under the laws of nature (heteronomy), and, second, as belonging to the intelligible world under laws which, independent of nature, are not empirical but founded only on reason.

Once I knew, then I forgot. It was as if I had fallen asleep in a field only to discover at waking that a grove of trees had grown up around me. “Doubt nothing, believe everything,” was my friend’s idea of metaphysics, although his brother ran away with his wife. He still bought her a rose every day, sat in the empty house for the next twenty years talking to her about the weather. I was already dozing off in the shade, dreaming that the rustling trees were my many selves explaining themselves a

He sees her looking at him with interest, and is encouraged to go on. 'I wouldn't be here with you now. This wouldn't be real - something else would. You'd have been another you, instead of the one you are now. You can't be tied down to a predestined fate when you change according to your situation, and your fate must change too. Everything depends on circumstances - on which "you" you happen to be at a given time...

The goal and meaning of individual life (which is the only real life) no longer lie in individual development but in the policy of the State, which is thrust upon the individual from outside and consists in the execution of an abstract idea which ultimately tends to attract all life to itself.

Begin. . . where you are, NOT where you want to be. Begin stuck in the doldrums of your false story--if that is where you are. Begin there because, in truth, there is no other place to start from. Tell yourself that you are going to listen for the sound of your own voice--and remind yourself when you forget. And you will forget, over and over again.

Society is a collection of selves perpetuating their myth.

The peculiar predicament of the present-day self surely came to pass as a consequence of the disappointment of the high expectations of the self as it entered the age of science and technology. Dazzled by the overwhelming credentials of science, the beauty and elegance of the scientific method, the triumph of modern medicine over physical ailments, and the technological transformation of the very world itself, the self finds itself in the end disappointed by the failure of science and technique

The State in particular is turned into a quasi-animate personality from whom everything is expected. In reality it is only a camouflage for those individuals who know how to manipulate it.

You are the space in which these thoughts arise, but not the thoughts themselves.

It's the words we whisper to ourselves that make us who we are.

What fear do you have? You, yourself are the absolute Self! If absolute-Self becomes fearful, then the whole universe will have fear! ‘We’ are on the other side of the prakruti [relative self’s world].

In a sense who you are has always been a story that you told to yourself. Now your self is a story that you tell to others.

Whatever we may be or not be to others, to ourselves we are always just ourselves.

Artifacts are alive. Each has a voice. They remind us what it means to be human - that it is our nature to survive, to create works of beauty to be resourceful, to be attentive to the world we live in.

Those dreaming of the perfect match are outnumbered by those who don't really want it at all, though perhaps they can't admit it. After all, our culture makes individual freedom, autonomy and fulfillment the very highest values, and thoughtful people know deep down that any love relationship at all means the loss of all three. You can say, 'I want someone who will accept me just as I am,' but in your heart of hearts you know that you are not perfect, that there are plenty of things about you tha

In Ephesians 5, Paul shows us that even on earth Jesus did not use his power to oppress us but sacrificed everything to bring us into union with him. And this takes us beyond the philosophical to the personal and the practical. If God had the gospel of Jesus's salvation in mind when he established marriage, then marriage only 'works' to the degree that approximates the pattern of God's self-giving love in Christ.

When one sees his own faults, he will not have the time to see the others’ faults.

Books are a portable kind of time travel. We go back as well as forward when we read them. When we come back into the now, after being immersed in worlds previously unknown to us, we find ourselves, transformed. Touched by their magic, nothing we ever perceived beforehand remains quite the same.

The modern age, with its growing world-alienation, has led to a situation where man, wherever he goes, encounters only himself. All the processes of the earth and the universe have revealed themselves either as man-made or as potentially man-made. These processes, after having devoured, as it were, the solid objectivity of the given, ended by rendering meaningless the one over-all process which originally was conceived in order to give meaning to them, and to act, so to speak, as the eternal tim

Chit impurity is due to the relative vision. When the vision becomes real (enlightened), purification of chit occurs.

In order to make the egoism non-existent [zero], the Gnani Purush [the enlightened one] establishes the awareness of the Pure Soul within.

The mind is the foundation for the next life. The foundation of the body will diminish [in this life itself].

Chit’s tendencies can become pure [transparent] in front of God, but people don’t have this knowhow. The easiest solution to purify chit’s tendencies is to associate with a person who has the least amount of desires and the ultimate solution to make them pure is the inner visual contemplation (niddidhyasan) of the Vitarag (the enlightened ones who are free of all attachments).

One enjoyed the mental pleasures through ignorance (of the Self), and that is cause of the worldly life. Only the bliss of the ‘Knowledge’ [of the Soul, one’s True Self] is to be enjoyed.

As long as one is involved in worldly interactions, there is pleasure of the mind; and after knowing the Self (Soul), there is bliss of the Soul.

If one were to worship the Soul (self) for even a moment, he will attain moksha without fail. Such is the elegance of the body-complex (paudgalik ramanta) in this world!

When one sees one’s own faults, he attains a state of an abode of Self-illuminated Bliss!