Quotes About Purpose

If a man makes two-thirds of his existence subservient to one-third, for which admittedly he has no absolutely feverish zest, how can he hope to live fully and completely? He cannot.

Is dat niet de kern van de psychiatrie, dat de patiënt verleid moet worden tot leven, al was het maar omdat psychiaters anders overbodig zouden worden? Elke beroepsgroep creëert zijn eigen perpetuum mobile.

Sommige mensen lijden omdat ze niet hoeven te leven. Ze hebben alles. Hun natje, hun droogje, een dak boven het hoofd. Maar ze hoeven niet te leven, want ze hebben alles. Als ze een boek waren geweest, zou een recensent vast schrijven: 'Aardig, maar de noodzaak ontbreekt'.

It's me. I chose this. I chose all of this — this rock has been waiting for me my entire life. I've been moving towards it my whole life.

Everything happens for a reason, and part of that beauty of life is that we're not allowed to know those reasons for certain.

Indeed, it has affirmed my belief that our purpose as spiritual beings is to follow our bliss, seek our passions, and live our lives as inspirations to each other.

I did get myself into this. Somehow, in some convoluted way, it's what I've been looking for in my life. How else did I come to be here? We create our lives. I don't fully understand why, but little by little I get that somehow I've wanted something like this to happen. I've been looking for adventure, and I've found it.

I have no idea where I'm going but here's the real question: What am I doing here in the first place?

A wise man once said that all human activity is a form of play. And the highest form of play is the search for Truth, Beauty and Love. What more is needed? Should there be a 'meaning' as well, that will be a bonus? If we waste time looking for life's meaning, we may have no time to live — or to play.

Death focuses the mind on the things that really matter: why are we here, and what should we do?

Faith in one's own destiny was among the most valuable of the gifts which the gods could bestow upon a man

They had forgotten much, but they did not know it. They were as perfectly fitted to their environment as it was to them—for both had been designed together. What was beyond the walls of the city was no concern of theirs; it was something that had been shut out of their minds. Diaspar was all that existed, all that they needed, all that they could imagine. It mattered nothing to them that Man had once possessed the stars.

They will say that the Universe has no purpose and no plan, that since a hundred suns explode every year in our Galaxy, at this very moment some race is dying in the depths of space. Whether that race has done good or evil during its lifetime will make no difference in the end: there is no divine justice, for there is no God.

This had not endeared him to exobiologists such as Dr Perera, who took exactly the opposite view. To them, the only purpose of the Universe was the production of intelligence, and they were apt to talk sneeringly about purely astronomical phenomena, 'Mere dead matter' was one of their favourite phrases.

Soon after her beloved young brother was killed, she asked me, "What is the purpose of grief? Does it serve any biological function?

I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do.

Yet among all the distractions and diversions of a planet which now seemed well on the way to becoming one vast playground, there were some who still found time to repeat an ancient and never-answered question: "Where do we go from here?

Futilitarianism.

I have always had the greatest enthusiasm for the mission.

Las líneas borrosas y confusas, los colores inciertos y opacos demostraban que, si el artista no conocía su meta, las herramientas más milagrosas no eran capaces de lograrla.

En ese momento, mientras su corazón anhelaba lo inalcanzable, tomó una decisión. Supo entonces qué haría con su vida.

In my life I have found two things of priceless worth—learning and loving. Nothing else—not fame, not power, not achievement for its own sake—can possibly have the same lasting value. For when your life is over, if you can say 'I have learned' and 'I have loved,' you will also be able to say 'I have been happy.

en este mundo moderno lo importante es tener un ideal.

No man burdens his mind with small matters unless he has some very good reason for doing so.