Quotes About Reflection

When men are most sure and arrogant they are commonly most mistaken, giving views to passion without that proper deliberation which alone can secure them from the grossest absurdities.

How can we satisfy ourselves without going on in infinitum? And, after all, what satisfaction is there in that infinite progression? Let us remember the story of the Indian philosopher and his elephant. It was never more applicable than to the present subject. If the material world rests upon a similar ideal world, this ideal world must rest upon some other; and so on, without end. It were better, therefore, never to look beyond the present material world.

The first thing to do is carry a notebook and during quiet times or as the thought occurs to you, compile a list of anything that really interests you. In other words, write a list of subjects which fascinate you without regard to photography.

That's the problem with memories; You can visit them, but you can't live in them.

talking about what people ought to do, instead of giving some kind of lead in condemning what they are actually doing.

When you look in the mirror what do you see? Do you see the real you, or what you have been conditioned to believe is you?

Violent people are those who hate themselves and instead of looking inside to find the cause of that self dislike, they thrash out at someone else.

When anyone tells you they have all the answers it is time to race for the exits.

The extraterrestrials who are dubbed "aliens" are actually other aspects of ourselves. They are not "alien" at all. They are part of us.

It is never too late to apply good sense as a corrective to stupidity.

Retrospective analysis is not a useful guide to current problems.

He liked to collect rocks. That day, he had gathered one from near the path down Longevity Hill toward the water. It was a fine-grained piece of granite that he found under a mulberry tree. He took it from his pocket now and, as was his practice, he inscribed the time and place he had found it, in tiny characters, on the rock. He would add it to his collection, hundreds of stones neatly aligned on his shelves at home, so that he could remember

Keep looking. I'd love to be able to start over again fresh. I'd love to look in that other person's face and see nothing but a clear reflection. Maybe this time I'd be more careful not to damage it.

I should be content to look at a mountain for what it is and not as a comment on my life.

As the population of software developers ages, they care more about the rest of their lives. Many lament wasting their twenties locked up in an office slaving over a piece of code that failed to reach market expectations and became obsolete soon after release. Work/life

Technophilosophy is a combination of (1) asking philosophical questions about technology and (2) using technology to help answer traditional philosophical questions.

I think I received a new understanding of the meaning of suffering," he wrote Harold DeWolf, "and I came away more convinced than ever before that unearned suffering is redemptive." The imprisonment had not been pleasant, but he did feel that his faith had benefited from the experience.20

The act of writing, especially of putting pen to paper, has always had a sacred quality. The process by which one creates a paragraph-of conceptualizing, framing, and sequencing a moment in time-is the same process that governs some of the most sophisticated psychotherapies.

Increasingly, I learned that the great spirits of religious traditions do not solve all questions but live in the questions, and return to them again and again, not as a circle returns, but as an ascending spiral comes to the same place, each time at a higher level.

If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it is sufficient. Meister Eckhart

Teach your tongue to say 'I don't know.

How much of our lives take place in the elusive spaces of this world—how much is conveyed, like the artistry of the master musician, in the silence between the notes?

Then in October, Indian Summer, the air turned so soft, the sunlight so fragile, and each day's loveliness so poignantly doomed that even self-ignorance and restlessness felt like profound states of being, and he just wandered the empty beaches and misty headlands in a state of serene confusion and awe.

I'll just quote myself for now; actually, I'll quote what a good friend of mine, David Jenkins responded to a post I made when I was feeling 'pissy.' "Deep thoughts (come) from a deep well. Society is useful because when we see ourselves reflected through others we can gain a deeper understanding of ourselves." ~ David Jenkins, 2013