Quotes About Authenticity

We can lead our life so as to become more awake to who we are and what we're doing rather than trying to improve or change or get rid of who we are or what we're doing.

We're not trying to be something we aren't; rather, we're rediscovering, reconnecting with who we are.

We can drop the fundamental hope that there is a better "me" who one day will emerge. We can't just jump over ourselves as if we were not there. It's better to take a straight look at all our hopes and fears.

When people start to meditate or to work with any kind of spiritual discipline, they often think that somehow they're going to improve, which is a sort of subtle aggression against who they really are.

As long as we don't want to be honest and kind with ourselves, then we are always going to be infants. When we begin just to try to accept ourselves, the ancient burden of self-importance lightens up considerably. Finally there's room for genuine inquisitiveness, and we find we have an appetite for what's out there.

Real safety is your willingness to not run away from yourself.

Giving up hope is encouragement to stick with yourself, to make friends with yourself, to not run away from yourself, to return to the bare bones, no matter what's going on.

Self-improvement can have temporary results, but lasting transformation occurs only when we honor ourselves as the source of wisdom and compassion.

When you hold a fixed idea of yourself, you have to leave out all the parts that you find boring, embarrassing, difficult, or sad. You leave out the emotions you don't want to feel. And then when you do that, when you leave out all those parts, when those parts are not acceptable, then it eats away at you underneath. These unacknowledged parts are like a hum in the background that's eating away at you, and you have to find an escape to get away from that.

But honesty without kindness makes us feel grim and mean

If you have to shout to prove your point, you're probably wrong.

Why are you so angry?"His question surprised me, and I laughed a little. "This isn't angry, " I smirked. "This is just me. Get used to it.

Your anger and emotional outbursts usually result when someone penetrates to the core of what you do not like about yourself or still cannot accept.

Genuine expressions of emotion rarely persist longer than five seconds and almost never longer than 10. A fixed smile is likely to conceal anger, anxiety, or some other negative emotion.

Our willingness to openly reveal our feelings in our argument nearly always builds our credibility.

By being natural and sincere, one often can create revolutions without having sought them.

And it's possible to monetize your art without compromising the integrity of it for commerce.

Art is not the possession of the few who are recognized writers, painters, musicians; it is the authentic expression of any and all individuality.

Once you take yourself too seriously the art will suffer.

It's silly when girls sell their souls because it's in.

It can become an exercise in trying to get the reader to like and admire you instead of an exercise in creative art.

I prefer to leave the paintings to speak for themselves.

However fake the subject, once photographed, it's as good as real.

Art only begins where Imitation ends.