Quotes About Self-awareness

Not knowing humiliation, you are ignorant of what it is to arrive at the last stage of yourself.

Wherever I go, my evils accompany me. That is the capital gift of my existence.

I've lived too long as a parasite of my moods.)

There are moments when the inner life actually 'pays,' when years of self-scrutiny, conducted for no ulterior motive, are suddenly of practical use.

Humility is a strange thing. The minute you think you've got it, you've lost it.

Middle age is when your broad mind and narrow waist begin to change places.

Our business in life is not to get ahead of others, but to get ahead of ourselves.

Some days you must learn a great deal. But you should also have days when you allow what is already in you to swell up and touch everything. If you never let that happen, then you just accumulate facts, and they begin to rattle around inside of you.

I can't forget things, or ignore them-bad things that happen," I said. "I'm a lay-it-all-out person, a dwell-on-it person, an obsess-about-it person. If I hold things in and try to forget or pretend, I become a madman and have panic attacks. I have to talk.

My problem is I can think whatever I think—girl power, solidarity, Gloria Steinem rah rah rah — but I still feel the way I feel. Which is jealous. And pissy about little things.

I sit around too much, waiting for other people to do stuff and angsting about stuff they've done, without doing anything myself.

Don't pretend you would never hurt anybody.

Jule had many rare talents. She worked hard and really had so damn much to offer. She knew all that. So why did she feel worthless at the same time?

He would take up the shit lovingly, literally pick it up in his arms, and he'd say, Oh, I see it all now. I am the one who caused this shit to be so very shitty. This shit is all my fault,

How amazing to be able to play an instrument, Jule thought. Whatever happened to you, whatever else went on in your life, you could look downat your hands an think, I play the piano. You'd always know that about yourself. It was like being able to fight, she realized. And being able to change accents. They were powers that lived in your body. They would never leave you, no matter how you looked, no matter who loved or didn't love you.

He wasn't much of a dancer, but he knew it, and the faces he pulled when he danced gave him a perpetually startled look-as if he were, at regular intervals, surprised to find himself dancing.

How easy it is to be "deep": all you have to do is let yourself sink into your own flaws.

For our vanity is such that we hold our own characters immutable, and we are slow to acknowledge that they have changed, even for the better.

I see no way out of the problems that organized religion and tribalism create other than humans just becoming more honest and fully aware of themselves.

Whenever you think or you believe or you know, you're a lot of other people: but the moment you feel, you're nobody-but-yourself.

if we want to avoid suffering, we must start with ourselves, because all suffering comes from our own desires.

I asked this question: How can I think about my brain when it's my brain doing the thinking? So is this brain pretending to be me thinking about it?

Before you can be anything, you have to be yourself. That's the hardest thing to find.

If we could see ourselves as others see us, we would vanish on the spot.