Quotes About Perspective

You could say that I worked every minute of my life, or you could say with equal justice that I never worked a day.

Creative people are constantly surprised. They don't assume that they understand what is happening around them, and they don't assume that anybody else does either. They question the obvious—not out of contrariness but because they see the shortcomings of accepted explanations before the rest of us do. They sense problems before they are generally perceived and are able to define what they are.

a constant alternation between a highly concentrated critical assessment and a relaxed, receptive, nonjudgmental openness to experience. His attention coils and uncoils, its focus sharpens and softens, like the systolic and diastolic beat of the heart. It is out of this dynamic change of perspective that a good new work arises.

Of course my own self exists solely in my own consciousness; in that of others who know me there will be versions of it, most of them probably unrecognizable likenesses of the "original"—myself as I see me.

Si te sientes dolido por las cosas externas, no son éstas las que te molestan, sino tu propio juicio acerca de ellas.

We have come to accept that our morality simply no longer has currency outside our own culture.

ningún cambio social puede suceder mientras no cambie primero la conciencia de los individuos. Cuando

In the past few centuries economic rationality has een so successful that we have come to take for granted that the "bottom line" of any human effort is to be measured in dollars and cents. But an exclusively economic approach to life is profoundly irrational; the true bottom line consists in the quality and complexity of experience

And the great emperor Marcus Aurelius wrote: "If you are pained by external things, it is not they that disturb you, but your own judgment of them. And it is in your power to wipe out that judgment now.

accepting limitations is liberating.

And the reality is that the quality of life does not depend directly on what others think of us or on what we own. The bottom line is, rather, how we feel about ourselves and about what happens to us. To improve life one must improve the quality of experience.

Poets make much of the majestic eagle soaring freely among the snowy peaks. But the eyes of the eagle are generally focused on the ground, searching for rodents lurking in the shadows. The lives of much of humanity could be summed up in similar terms. Let

The foremost reason that happiness is so hard to achieve is that the universe was not designed with the comfort of human beings in mind. It is almost immeasurably huge

An open stance makes it possible for a person to be objective, to be aware of alternative possibilities, to feel a part of the surrounding world.

O el malestar penetrante que a menudo nos amarga hasta los instantes más preciosos es el resultado de buscar la felicidad en el lugar equivocado?

Even the most highly respected physicist, artist, or politician becomes a hollow bore and ceases to enjoy life if all he can interest himself in is his limited role in the universe.

A person can make himself happy, or miserable, regardless of what is actually happening "outside," just by changing the contents of consciousness. We

Those who always worry about what can go wrong might be well prepared against dangers but will never know how enjoyable life can be.

Men are not afraid of things, but of how they view them," said Epictetus

Yet we cannot reach happiness by consciously searching for it. "Ask yourself whether you are happy," said J. S. Mill, "and you cease to be so." It is by being fully involved with every detail of our lives, whether good or bad, that we find happiness, not by trying to look for it directly.

Marcus Aurelius wrote: "If you are pained by external things, it is not they that disturb you, but your own judgment of them. And it is in your power to wipe out that judgment now.

Pero si una persona se toma unos momentos para reflexionar, el desencanto vuelve: tras cada éxito se ve con mayor claridad que el dinero, el poder, la posición social y las posesiones, por sí mismas, no añaden ni un ápice a la calidad de vida.

Our perceptions about our lives are the outcome of many forces that shape experience, each having an impact on whether we feel good or bad.

Having a record of the past can make a great contribution to the quality of life. It frees us from the tyranny of the present, and makes it possible for consciousness to revisit former times.