Quotes About Introspection

Think about what you're thinking. When you consciously analyze the ideas you've formed about a person and weigh these perceptions against reality, you can rewire your brain and build new, more accurate perceptions. Then you'll be communicating with the person who's really in front of you—not the fictitious character conjured up by your false perceptions.

you probably know a lot less than you think you do about the people you want to reach, whether they're new in your life or people you've known forever. That what you think you know may be very wrong. And that reaching these people doesn't just mean opening their minds to you. It also means rewiring yourself so you can see these people as they really are.

Self-involvement is usually at the root of self-defeating behavior in relationships.

But other times, you'll discover that you're sticking with an irrational person simply because you don't want to feel like a bad person yourself.

The trick to this approach is to ask the question ("Do you really believe that?") not in a hostile or degrading manner, but very calmly and in a straightforward way. Your intent is not to antagonize the other person, but rather to make the person stop and realize, "I really am making a mountain out of a molehill. I must sound like a jackass.

identify the negative qualities that you find most bothersome in the people around you and start acting toward these people as though they're exhibiting the opposing positive qualities. For

What people say and do in the most innocent situations can speak volumes about their real selves.

believe you can learn almost everything you need to know—and more than other people would like you to know—simply by watching and listening, keeping your eyes peeled, your ears open. And your mouth closed.

Science and literature give me answers. And they ask me questions I will never be able to answer.

And it occurred to him that there were two parts to being a better person. One part was thinking about other people. The other part was not giving a toss what other people thought.

and I went into the garden and lay down and looked at the stars in the sky and made myself negligible.

To show them who you are.

The story of an alienated young man cosseted by privilege, smothered by the comforts that surround him, and determined to listen to himself had come to feel personal in a way he had never imagined.

At a certain age [...] you start thinking you might have learned something when you were young if you hadn't already been so smart.

Time in prison—not just in solitary—becomes "a thick dull mallet that pounds consciousness into a coma.

I stink, therefore I think.

The romantic wants to create a world where he or she will possess a fully integrated, unconflicted identity—where the answers to the questions Who am I? and What are we? are exactly the same.

Solitude is different from loneliness. Solitude is rich, inspiring, and restful; replete with space and possibility. Loneliness is empty, pathetic, and enervating; bereft of power and potential. Lonely people expect others to fill their inner void, whereas lovers of solitude—which is what I invite you to become on this journey—recognize that time alone is precious, a refuge where you can practice meeting yourself in the mirror of the blank page.

To see your-self you must first be yourself, to be your-self you must first know yourself, and to know your-self you must first love your-self more than anything in the world."-Mark Miller

Ultimately, intellectual work of this sort is its own reward, because it is focused on the only One whose recognition is important, the One before whom all hearts are open.

Mark Oppenheimer

If you shouldn't blame yourself for minor things you did or didn't do when someone dies, how can you start giving yourself credit for tiny things you did when something really good happens?

A person should realize that conflict situations between oneself and others are nothing but the effects of conflict situations in one's own soul. MARTIN BUBER Let

Great souls suffer in silence. JOHANN CHRISTOPH FRIEDRICH VON SCHILLER During