“To free us from the expectations of others, to give us back to ourselves--there lies the great, singular power of self-respect.”

Last update June 12, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "To free us from the expectations of others, to give us back to ourselves--there lies the great, singular power of self-…" by Joan Didion?

Joan Didion48

American writer 1934

Related quotes

“There is a powerful craving in most of us to see ourselves as instruments in the hands of others and thus free ourselves from the responsibility for acts which are prompted by our own questionable inclinations and impulses.”

Eric Hoffer (1898–1983) American philosopher

The Passionate State Of Mind, and Other Aphorisms (1955)

“The feeling of having free will is deep in us and we are reluctant to give it up for ourselves—but we are often willing to deny it to others!”

Richard Hamming (1915–1998) American mathematician and information theorist

The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn (1991)

“We are, the great spiritual writers insist, most fully ourselves when we give ourselves away, and it is egotism that holds us back from that transcendent experience that has been called God, Nirvana, Brahman, or the Tao.”

Karen Armstrong (1944) author and comparative religion scholar from Great Britain

The Spiral Staircase: My Climb Out of Darkness (2004)
Context: We are, the great spiritual writers insist, most fully ourselves when we give ourselves away, and it is egotism that holds us back from that transcendent experience that has been called God, Nirvana, Brahman, or the Tao.
What I now realize, from my study of the different religious traditions, is that a disciplined attempt to go beyond the ego brings about a state of ecstasy. Indeed, it is in itself ekstasis. Theologians in all the great faiths have devised all kinds of myths to show that this type of kenosis, or self-emptying, is found in the life of God itself. They do not do this because it sounds edifying, but because this is the way that human nature seems to work. We are most creative and sense other possibilities that transcend our ordinary experience when we leave ourselves behind.

“Nothing is more important than self-respect in our life. It hurts a lot if someone hurts our self-respect. It seems as if we have no value in their eyes, we are torn apart completely and we separate ourselves from the world, but still our self-respect does not allow us to live peacefully throughout life.”

Shabdon Ka Jahan

“Space, like time, engenders forgetfulness; but it does so by setting us bodily free from our surroundings and giving us back our primitive, unattached state.”

Thomas Mann book The Magic Mountain

Source: The Magic Mountain (1924), Ch. 1
Context: Space, like time, engenders forgetfulness; but it does so by setting us bodily free from our surroundings and giving us back our primitive, unattached state. Yes, it can even, in the twinkling of an eye, make something like a vagabond of the pedant and Philistine. Time, we say, is Lethe; but change of air is a similar draught, and, if it works less thoroughly, does so more quickly.

“The Creator only gives, but does not expect anything from us. He invests in us without expecting any interest in return.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

“Oh would some power the giftie gie us, To see ourselves as others see us.”

Robert Burns To a Louse

To a Louse, st. 8 (1786) http://www.poetry-online.org/burns_to_a_louse.htm Variant: O, wad some Power the giftie gie us To see oursels as others see us! It wad frae monie a blunder free us Source: The Complete Poetical Works of Robert Burns Context: O, wad some Power the giftie gie us To see oursels as others see us! It wad frae monie a blunder free us, An' foolish notion. What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us An' ev'n Devotion

“The way to happiness: Keep your heart free from hate, your mind from worry. Live simply, expect little, give much. Scatter sunshine, forget self, think of others. Try this for a week and you will be surprised.”

Norman Vincent Peale book The Power of Positive Thinking

Source: The Power of Positive Thinking

“There is something else which has the power to awaken us to the truth. It is the works of writers of genius. They give us, in the guise of fiction, something equivalent to the actual density of the real, that density which life offers us every day but which we are unable to grasp because we are amusing ourselves with lies.”

Simone Weil (1909–1943) French philosopher, Christian mystic, and social activist

“If you want to be respected by others the great thing is to respect yourself. Only by that, only by self-respect will you compel others to respect you.”

Fyodor Dostoyevsky book Humiliated and Insulted

General, The Insulted and the Injured (1861)

“To free us from the expectations of others, to give us back to ourselves--there lies the great, singular power of self-respect.”

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Joan Didion48

Related quotes

Related topics