“We would try by any means
To reach the limits of ourselves, to reach beyond ourselves,
To let go the means, to wake.”
"Poem" — these lines are among those quoted on the The Pacifist Memorial http://www.peaceabbey.org/memorial/memorial.htm
The Speed of Darkness (1968)
Context: We would try to imagine them, try to find each other,
To construct peace, to make love, to reconcile
Waking with sleeping, ourselves with each other,
Ourselves with ourselves. We would try by any means
To reach the limits of ourselves, to reach beyond ourselves,
To let go the means, to wake.
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Muriel Rukeyser 42
poet and political activist 1913–1980Related quotes
Introduction
One Minute Wisdom (1989)
Context: This is what Wisdom means: To be changed without the slightest effort on your part, to be transformed, believe it or not, merely by waking to the reality that is not words, that lies beyond the reach of words. If you are fortunate enough to be Awakened thus, you will know why the finest language is the one that is not spoken, the finest action is the one that is not done and the finest change is the one that is not willed.
"VS Ramachandran: The Sherlock Holmes Of Neuroscience," (Swarajaya, April 4, 2017) https://swarajyamag.com/magazine/any-ape-can-reach-for-a-banana-but-only-a-human-can-reach-for-the-stars
“We will kill in ourselves a world in order to build another, a higher one reaching to the heavens.”
For My Legionaries: The Iron Guard (1936), Religion
Source: The View of Life (1918), p. 5-6 part of the first essay "Life as Transcendence"
Context: Man is something that is to be overcome.
Logically considered, this, too, presents a contradiction: he who overcomes himself is admittedly the victor, but he is also the defeated. The ego succumbs to itself, when it wins; it achieves victory, when it suffers defeat. Yet the contradiction only arises when the two aspects of this unity are hardened into opposed, mutually exclusive conceptions. It is precisely the fully unified process of the moral life which overcomes and surpasses every lower state by achieving a higher one, and again transcends this latter state through one still higher. That man overcomes himself means that he reaches out beyond the bounds that the moment sets for him. There must be something at hand to be overcome, but it is only there in order to be overcome. Thus even as an ethical agent, man is the limited being that has no limit.
What Life Should Mean to You (1937), p. 14
"Beyond Politics, Beyond Copenhagen, For Our Children" : Treatise, Travelling trilogy, Lectures and Films on Sustainable development by Manav Gupta (2009 -2010), as quoted in Hindustan Times (25 December 2009)
2000s