Quotes About Self-awareness

I did not recognize the shape of my own name.

For as we begin to recognize our deepest feelings, we begin to give up, of necessity, being satisfied with suffering and self-negation, and with the numbness which so often seems like their only alternative in our society.

The physical realities of the dingy bus slid away from me. I suddenly stood upon a hill in the center of an unknown country, hearing the sky fill with a new spelling of my own name.

For Black women as well as Black men, it is axiomatic that if we do not define ourselves for ourselves, we will be defined by others — for their use and to our detriment

those... who are unclear about the pathways of their own definition...

I am Black, Woman, and Poet—fact, and outside the realm of choice. I can choose only to be or not be, and in various combinations of myself.... all that I am is of who I am, is of what I do. —Audre Lorde, born #OTD in 1934

We have been raised to fear the yes within ourselves, our deepest cravings. But, once recognized, those which do not enhance our future lose their power and can be altered.

We can train ourselves to respect our feelings and to transpose them into a

How are we persuaded to participate in our own destruction by maintaining our silences?

For once we begin to feel deeply all the aspects of our lives, we begin to demand from ourselves and from our life-pursuits that they feel in accordance with that joy which we know ourselves to be capable of.

We know what it is to be lied to, and we know how important it is not to lie to ourselves. We are powerful because we have survived, and that is what it is all about - survival and growth.

Feelings are not wrong, but you are accountable for the behavior you use to satisfy those feelings.

The truest direction comes from inside. I give the most strength to my children by being willing to look within myself, and by being honest with them about what I find there, without expecting a response beyond their years. In this way they begin to learn to look beyond their own ears.

Je savais ce que c'était d'être hantée par le fantôme d'un moi que je voulais être, mais dont je n'étais qu'à moitié consciente.

LAURA. Yes, it's queer, but I have never looked at a man without knowing myself to be his superior. CAPTAIN.

I give you sugar for sugar And salt for salt If you can't get along with me It's your own damn fault.

He's a really nice guy, if only I weren't me.

The problem with not having anybody to tell you what to do, I understood, is that there was nobody to tell you what not to do.

Optimism sprouts from the knowledge that you are in control of your own life, not your past and not those around you. Part of being in control is taking responsibility for how you feel. This means not just admitting to uncomfortable feelings but then examining your circumstances to see what can be done to change these feelings at the source.

Even painfully shy and awkward people are not painfully shy or awkward when they are alone. The way to access this natural, comfortable alone-self when you are with others is by choosing to forbid yourself to wonder what they are thinking. Instead, force yourself to exist in the instant, then take it- and give it- as it comes.

It turned out I had always been a smoker. I just hadn't had any cigarettes.

Confidence is a reduction of your own interest in whether others are thinking about you and if so, what they're thinking.

All improvements, transformations, achievements, liberations; everything you want to change about yourself and your life; everything you want to make happen, any obstacle you want to overcome, any crisis you must survive—the prerequisite is being able to allow yourself to feel whatever it is you feel and not pretend to feel something you don't.

Freshly brainwashed from rehab, I carry the bottle into the bathroom. I hold it up to the light. See the pretty bottle? Isn't it beautiful? Yes, it's beautiful. I unscrew the cap and pour it into the toilet. I flush twice. And then I think, why did I flush twice? The answer, is of course, because I truly do know myself. I cannot be sure I won't attempt to drink from the toilet, like a dog.