Quotes About Self-discovery

I will be unneeded, and gladly so, when you realize that the vitality and reinforcement and joy are your own, and rise from the fountain of your own beings; when you realize that you do not need me for protection, for there is nothing you need protect yourself against.

You would be much better off in reading this book if you asked yourself who you are, rather than asked who I am, for you cannot understand what I am unless you understand the nature of personality and the characteristics of consciousness.

We've all done things we wish we hadn't, made choices we didn't even know were choices at that time. but that doesn't mean we have to stick by them. In life, you find out who you are gradually, not all at once. You made a bad choice, okay? But you can still get out of it.

I began to listen to myself more... Trusting myself, I discovered, meant giving up control over my decisions. The choice came from me, but not from the part of me that used to decide—the mind that weighed, the mind that projected scenarios, the mind that controlled.

I always wanted to be somebody, but I should have been more specific.

In spite of the honestest efforts to annihilate my I-ity, or merge it in what the world doubtless considers my better half, I still find myself a self-subsisting and alas! self-seeking me.

In spite of honest efforts to annihilate my I-ity, or merge it in what the world doubtless considers my better half, I still find myself a self-subsisting and alas! self-seeking me.

The people who denied who they were or where they had been were in the greatest danger. They were blind sleepwalkers on tightropes, fingers scoring thin air.

If you expect to find people who will understand you, you will grow murderous with disappointment. The best you'll ever do is to understand yourself, know what it is that you want, and not let the cattle stand in your way.

And when I shed my old skin, what soft and tender flesh did I expose?

I did not know my own identity. I was burgled of body and hung in the sky like a woman of straw.

I matter. I fly lone, apart from the flock, on long journeys through storm and clear skies to another summer. Hear me!

To be given permission to be confused -- and remain confused -- for as long as it takes would have been a huge gift.

You can never be happy until you understand why you're doing what you're doing.

Perhaps I wasn't going crazy after all. Perhaps I was just becoming a writer.

Neither of them noticed Jane for a moment, which was for the best, as Jane looked like parts of her had been ripped up and flung into the wind. While Hunter smiled at Savannah, little pieces of Jane fluttered down to the parking lot. ... She waded through the litter of her old self and climbed into the battered Taurus.

That girl peering back at me from the water was me, just me. The real me. Not the other versions I tried to be to win anyone over. I took a breath and exhaled. I forgave myself for my prior judgments of not being good enough to be just who I was. The truth was I was just doing the best I could with what I knew at the time. But now I knew better.

If we are to move towards our collective bliss, it's time we shed our focus on the physical.

At least we know we tend to be afraid. If you object to my plural noun, I'll retract it.

There is an incredible feeling of strength that comes with walking through the fires of Hell and coming out with the prize. The prize, that part of oneself that is rescued, is the confidence that comes with facing down seemingly insurmountable odds and coming out better than when you went in.

I find out a lot about myself by sleeping. Dreams, they are who I am when I'm too tired to be me.

One day as we were doing our bookwork, a teacher suddenly asked us to help him remove all the desks and chairs from the center of the classroom. Then he sat us all down in a circle, brought out his guitar, and sang songs. We recognized the lyrics—the poems and stories we ourselves had written! After that I wrote more, searching dictionaries for new words to express myself. Every day we walked out of class believing that what we did mattered.

I began to appreciate myself more by breaking the rules. I was putting myself in charge of why I was not going home, so having no home didn't hurt the way pain does when you have no control.

If the child's unique qualities are not mirrored or supported, they are not available for her as a foundation. Instead of becoming grounded in her own nature, she adapts to what she thinks she is supposed to be, taking on a false self. For some people, this false self (which we all have to some degree) so obscures everything else that it's all they know.