Quotes About Identity

But then, even in the most insignificant details of our daily life, none of us can be said to constitute a material whole, which is identical for everyone, and need only be turned up like a page in an account-book or the record of a will; our social personality is created by the thoughts of other people. Even the simple act which we describe as "seeing some one we know" is, to some extent, an intellectual process.

What think'st thou then of mee, and this my State, Seem I to thee sufficiently possest Of happiness, or not? who am alone From all Eternitie, for none I know Second to mee or like, equal much less.

Qué importa el sitio donde yo resida, si soy siempre el mismo y el que debo ser [...] vale más reinar en el infierno que servir en el cielo.

One who brings a mind not to be changed by place or time. The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven. What matter where, if I be still the same, and what I should be...

Only decades later would it dawn on me that normal people who never deal with depression have a sense of self-worth automatically. Just by being a person on the earth, they feel themselves worthy of respect and love and all that other cool stuff.

Only by being useful or talented, and receiving external recognition, would I achieve personhood. I couldn't imagine a world where I was a worthwhile person by dint of mere existence; I felt like I needed to earn it and prove it every day. Don't worry, this feeling went away after only several decades.

there is nothing more intoxicating for a depressed person with an alcoholic parent in his past than being told you are loved and wanted.

What you do may not be unique, but you are. This is why putting your personality into your brand is so important. You're not in a niche or industry that is without competition. The only difference between you and your competition is your brand.

Everybody has an idea of himself which augments, aggravates, or modifies the actuality.

Each of us carries a unique world within our hearts.

Most of us are moving through such an undergrowth of excess that we cannot sense the shape of ourselves any more.

Our hunger to belong is the longing to find a bridge across the distance from isolation to intimacy. Every one longs for intimacy and dreams of a nest of belonging in which one is embraced, seen, and loved. Something within each of us cries out for belonging. We can have all the world has to offer in terms of status, achievement, and possessions. Yet without a sense of belonging it all seems empty and pointless.

Our grounding in the soul means that regardless of how badly we think of ourselves, there is a wholesomeness in us that no one has ever been able to damage.

You travel certainly, in every sense of the word. But you take with you everything that you have been, just as the landscape stores up its own past. Because you were once at home somewhere, you are never an alien anywhere.

To be holy is to be home, to be able to rest in the house of belonging that we call the soul.

Because you were once at home somewhere, you are never an alien anywhere.

The most subversive invitation you could ever accept is the invitation to awaken to who you are and where you have landed.

Each of us is a secret envoi of the earth. We

There is a desperate hunger for belonging. People feel isolated and cut off. Perhaps this is why a whole nation can assemble around the images of celebrities. They have no acquaintance with these celebrities personally. They look at them from a distance and project all their longings onto them. When something happens to a celebrity, they feel as if it is happening to themselves. There is an acute need for the reawakening of the sense of community.

We have fallen out of belonging.

One of the hardest things in the world is to stop being the prodigal son without turning into the elder brother.

Somebody once said that the biggest difference between you and God is that God doesn't think he's you. In pain, we get very clear about not being God.

Author Evelyn Waugh was a Catholic who fell pretty woefully short of his faith's standards. Somebody asked Waugh one time, "How can you call yourself a Catholic and be so badly behaved, so mean, such a jerk, so spiteful?" Waugh responded, "Just imagine me if I were not a Catholic." And

God's purpose in guidance is not to get us to perform the right actions. His purpose is to help us become the right kind of people.