Quotes About Perspective

moral relativism, a position many find attractive only until they are faced with someone who is doing something really, really wrong.

To say that life is meaningless is to express an attitude, not to state a fact

If we could see our lives objectively, we could see that they are not something we should inflict on anyone.

The perspective on ourselves that we get when we take the point of view of the universe also yields as much objectivity as we need if we are to find a cause that is worthwhile in a way that is independent of our own desires. The most obvious such cause is the reduction of pain and suffering, wherever it is to be found.

The perspective on ourselves that we get when we take the point of view of the universe also yields as much objectivity as we need if we are to find a cause that is worthwhile... independent of our own desires. The most obvious such cause is the reduction of pain and suffering, wherever it is to be found.

Some of the conclusions that I draw are very different from the ethical views most people hold today. That, however, is not a ground for dismissing them. If every proposal for reform in ethics that differed from accepted moral views had been rejected for that reason alone, we would still be torturing heretics, enslaving members of conquered races, and treating women as the property of their husbands.

In thinking about ethics, we should not hesitate to question ethical views that are almost universally accepted if we have reasons for thinking that they may not be as securely grounded as they appear to be.

She thought it was too bad it didn't work the other way around, so you could get braver and smarter as you move up in years. But

All of this could have happened, and some of it did, but not in that way.

Nice days, terrible nights.

Sometimes, it seems like sighted people can hardly see anything.

In a Sufi fable, the elephant fell in love with a firefly, and imagined that it shone for no other creature but he; and when it flew long distances away, he was confident that at the center of its light was the image of an elephant.

You're dying to hear what she said. And you will. The three principles are: "One. If something is free to be taken, take it. "Two. Other people exist so that you may use them. "Three. Nothing on earth means anything, or can mean anything, but what it is.

Being seventy-six has a few advantages, one of them being that a premature demise is no longer possible.

If the owners are cashing out, there's no reason for you to be cashing in.

To ask for a map is to say, "Tell me a story.

To learn how to read any map is to be indoctrinated into that mapmaker's culture.

How we see depends, in part, on what we want to see.

Every map intends not simply to serve us but to influence us.

We compile mental maps that are wildly skewed, a mental atlas so large and complex that we can never fully convey it to anyone else. Then we live in the world those maps create.

In that version of the story, Atlas is less literal holder of the world than beholder of it; he alone among mortals can contemplate the divine and take measure of the cosmos.

Observe the things your mind is telling you, without immediately obeying its commands or spending time arguing with it. ?Recognize when your mind is viewing the world as a darker, scarier place than it really is. ?Stop confusing the memories attached to your household items with the items themselves. ?Stop envisioning catastrophe in your future. ?Celebrate your successes rather than focusing on your shortcomings.

Un zoológico es una mejor ventana desde la cual observar el mundo humano que un monasterio

I was also moved by William James's The Varieties of Religious Experience, which not only helped me put my childhood experience in perspective but also showed me how my search to find a new, more authentic spiritual identity fit within the vast landscape of American culture.