Quotes about realization
page 2

“Not only were we practicing, we were nervous rehearsing, because he would sit in a chair with a belt in his hand, and if you didn't do it the right way, he would tear you up. Really get you…We were terrified of him. So terrified, I can't tell you. I don't think he realized how scared…scared…I mean SCARED. So scared that I would regurgitate. (with emphasis) Mmm-hmm. (reporter asks Michael what caused the reaction) His presence, just seeing him…And I was so fast, he wouldn't catch me half the time, but when he did, oh my God, it was bad.”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

On his father & the whippings he & his brothers would receive from him
Living with Michael Jackson (2002)

God, Way, Thinking, Tear

“I'd just like to interject for a moment. What you’re referring to as Linux, is in fact, GNU/Linux, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, GNU plus Linux. Linux is not an operating system unto itself, but rather another free component of a fully functioning GNU system made useful by the GNU corelibs, shell utilities and vital system components comprising a full OS as defined by POSIX. Many computer users run a modified version of the GNU system every day, without realizing it. Through a peculiar turn of events, the version of GNU which is widely used today is often called “Linux”, and many of its users are not aware that it is basically the GNU system, developed by the GNU Project. There really is a Linux, and these people are using it, but it is just a part of the system they use. Linux is the kernel: the program in the system that allocates the machine’s resources to the other programs that you run. The kernel is an essential part of an operating system, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete operating system. Linux is normally used in combination with the GNU operating system: the whole system is basically GNU with Linux added, or GNU/Linux. All the so-called “Linux” distributions are really distributions of GNU/Linux.”

Richard Stallman (1953) American software freedom activist, short story writer and computer programmer, founder of the GNU project

Internet meme commonly attributed to Stallman made by an unknown source.
Misattributed

People, Parting

“The principal means of realizing it will be the formation of an alliance between philosophers and the working classes, for which both are alike prepared by the negative and positive progress of the last five centuries. The direct object of their combined action will be to set in motion the force of Public Opinion.”

Auguste Comte (1798–1857) French philosopher

Source: A General View of Positivism (1848, 1856), p. 153

“The Satanist realizes that man, and the action and reaction of the universe, is responsible for everything, and doesn't mislead himself into thinking that someone cares.”

Anton LaVey book The Satanic Bible

The Satanic Bible (1969)

Thinking, Universe

“There is but One God, His name is Truth, He is the Creator, He fears none, he is without hate, He never dies, He is beyond the cycle of births and death, He is self illuminated, He is realized by the kindness of the True Guru. He was True in the beginning, He was True when the ages commenced and has ever been True, He is also True now.”

Nanak (1469–1539) Founder of Sikhism

Guru Nanak quotes

Death, God, Hate, Truth

“When I was in school, martial arts made you a dork, and I became self-conscious that I was too masculine. I was a 16-year-old girl with ringworm and cauliflower ears. People made fun of my arms and called me "Miss Man." It wasn't until I got older that I realized: These people are idiots. I'm fabulous.”

Ronda Rousey (1987) American judoka, mixed martial artist, professional wrestler and actress

"6 Feminist Quotes From Ronda Rousey That Prove She's More Than Just A Trash Talker", in Bustle.com (3 August 2015) http://www.bustle.com/articles/101566-6-feminist-quotes-from-ronda-rousey-that-prove-shes-more-than-just-a-trash-talker

People, School, Art, Girl

“The revolutionary atmosphere remained as I had first known it. General and private, peasant and militiaman, still met as equals; everyone drew the same pay, wore the same clothes, ate the same food, and called everyone else 'thou' and 'comrade'; there was no boss-class, no menial-class, no beggars, no prostitutes, no lawyers, no priests, no boot-licking, no cap-touching. I was breathing the air of equality, and I was simple enough to imagine that it existed all over Spain. I did not realize that more or less by chance I was isolated among the most revolutionary section of the Spanish working class.”

George Orwell book Homage to Catalonia

Source: Homage to Catalonia (1938)

Food, Imagination, Chance, Clothes

“I realized by using the high notes of the chords as a melodic line, and by the right harmonic progression, I could play what I heard inside me. That's when I was born.”

Charlie Parker (1920–1955) American jazz saxophonist and composer

c. 1939 quoted in Masters of Jazz

“I realized that it was not by wisdom that poets write their poetry, but by a kind of nature or inspiration, such as you find in seers and prophets; for these also say many beautiful things, but do not know anything of what they say.”

Socrates (-470–-399 BC) classical Greek Athenian philosopher

22c
Plato, Apology

Wisdom, Beauty, Nature

“Divine incarnations do not come to bring a new or exclusive religion, but to restore the One Religion of God-realization.
Many are the churches and temples founded in his name, often prosperous and powerful, but where is the communion that he stressed — actual contact with God? Jesus wants temples to be established in human souls, first and foremost; then established outwardly in physical places of worship. Instead, there are countless huge edifices with vast congregations being indoctrinated in churchianity, but few souls who are really in touch with Christ through deep prayer and meditation.”

Paramahansa Yogananda (1893–1952) Yogi, a guru of Kriya Yoga and founder of Self-Realization Fellowship

The Second Coming of Christ: The Resurrection of the Christ Within You, (2004) by Yogananda

God, Religion, Soul, Christ

“The cycle of violence will continue far into the new millennium. Hopes for peace will probably not be realized, because the great that shape the international system fear each other and compete for power as a result. Indeed, their ultimate aim is to gain a position of dominant power over others, because having dominant power is the best means to ensure one's own survival.”

John Mearsheimer book The Tragedy of Great Power Politics

Preface, p. xi
The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (2001)

Fear, Peace, Hope

“Only a numskull is pleased at being a so-called 'success' with women, only a dunderhead is puffed up by it. A real man is much more likely to be dismayed at realizing that a woman has lost her heart to him when he can't reciprocate her feelings.”

Stefan Zweig book Beware of Pity

Beware of Pity (1939)

Women, Feeling, Success, Heart

“Do you realize sufficiently what it means to rule—to rule in a secret society? Not only over the lesser or more important of the populace, but over the best of men, over men of all ranks, nations, and religions, to rule without external force, to unite them indissolubly, to breathe one spirit and soul into them, men distributed over all parts of the world?”

Adam Weishaupt (1748–1830) German philosopher and founder of the Order of Illuminati

"Greeting to the newly integrated illuminatos dirigentes", in Nachtrag von weitern Originalschriften vol. 2 (1787) p. 45.

Men, Secret, World, Religion

“If you are not capable of cruelty, then you are absolutely a victim of anyone who is. For those who are exceedingly agreeable, there is a part of them crying out for the incorporation of the monster within them, which is what gives them strength of character and self-respect, because it is impossible to respect yourself until you grow teeth. And if you grow teeth, you realize that you're somewhat dangerous, or seriously dangerous. Then you might be more willing to demand that you treat yourself with respect and that other people do the same thing. That doesn't mean that being cruel is better than not being cruel. What it means is that being able to be cruel, and then not being cruel, is better than not being able to be cruel, because in the first case you're nothing but weak and naive, and in the second case you're dangerous but you have it under control. If you're competent at fighting, it actually decreases the probability that you're going to have to fight, because when someone pushes you you'll be able to respond with confidence, and with any luck a reasonable show of confidence, which is a show of dominance, will be enough to make the bully back off.”

Jordan Peterson (1962) Canadian clinical psychologist, cultural critic, and professor of psychology

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLc_MC7NQek&t=0s "2017 Personality 04/05: Heroic and Shamanic Initiations"

People, Confidence, Fight, Parting

“I mean, the realization that crime does not begin when you murder people. Crime begins with propaganda, even if such propaganda is for a good cause. The moment propaganda turns against another nation or against any human being, evil starts”

Hans Fritzsche (1900–1953) German Nazi official

To Leon Goldensohn, April 6, 1946, from "The Nuremberg Interviews" by Leon Goldensohn, Robert Gellately - History - 2004
Context: What I would like to emanate from the darkness of this tragedy is one spark of life. I mean, the realization that crime does not begin when you murder people. Crime begins with propaganda, even if such propaganda is for a good cause. The moment propaganda turns against another nation or against any human being, evil starts. Whereas the Germans started propaganda toward the end of this tragedy, you Allies stand at the beginning of the tragedy.

People, Evil

“I've almost asked that question, then realized it's good for my soul not to know. For a while! Just to let the evening wear on and see what I think of this person without knowing what he does and how successful he is, or what a failure. We're ranking everybody every minute of the day.”

Arthur Miller (1915–2005) playwright from the United States

Paris Review (Summer 1966)
Context: Success, instead of giving freedom of choice, becomes a way of life. There's no country I've been to where people, when you come into a room and sit down with them, so often ask you, "What do you do?" And, being American, many's the time I've almost asked that question, then realized it's good for my soul not to know. For a while! Just to let the evening wear on and see what I think of this person without knowing what he does and how successful he is, or what a failure. We're ranking everybody every minute of the day.

Soul, Failure, Question, Thinking

“He held her hand because he wanted her heart; then gazed into her empty eyes and realized nothing was there. Often, the emotions of someone we love are dismissed in a continual effort to remain.”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

1984

Love, Making love, Effort, Heart

“Self-realization determines the immortality of a person.”

Zafar Mirzo (1972)

Personality

“Personality implies a self-realizing human.”

Zafar Mirzo (1972)

Personality

“It really hurts hard
when you realize
you are not as important
to someone
as you thought you were.”

Stephie Pahlavi Zan

Hurt

“Extremist groups rarely consider the endgame. They’re so emotionally entrenched in the crusade; they fail to realize their extreme conceptions precludes normalcy in their lives.”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

2018

“Only when the last tree has been cut down and the last river has dried up will man realize that reciting red Indian proverbs makes you sound like a fucking Muppet.”

Banksy pseudonymous England-based graffiti artist, political activist, and painter

Source: Banging Your Head Against a Brick Wall (2001)

Tree

“When it is understood that one loses joy and happiness in the attempt to possess them, the essence of natural farming will be realized. The ultimate goal of farming is not the growing of crops, but the cultivation and perfection of human beings.”

Masanobu Fukuoka book The One-Straw Revolution

Source: The One-Straw Revolution

Happiness, Nature, Joy, Perfection

“Luck? I don’t know anything about luck. I’ve never banked on it and I’m afraid of people who do. Luck to me is something else: hard work - and realizing what opportunity is and what isn’t.”

Lucille Ball (1911–1989) American actress and businesswoman

People

“If you realize that you're the problem, then you can change yourself, learn something and grow wiser. Don't blame other people for your problems.”

Robert T. Kiyosaki book Rich Dad Poor Dad

Source: Rich Dad, Poor Dad

People, Problem, Learning, Change

“… you realize that you don't understand yourself any better than you understand anyone else.”

Jonathan Tropper (1970) American writer

Source: This is Where I Leave You

Understanding

“None of us can help the things life has done to us. They’re done before you realize it, and once they’re done they make you do other things until at last everything comes between you and what you’d like to be, and you’ve lost your true self forever.”

Eugene O'Neill Long Day's Journey into Night

Page 63 (Act 2, Scene 1)
Long Day's Journey into Night (1955)
Source: Long Day's Journey Into Night
Context: But I suppose life has made him like that, and he can't help it. None of us can help the things life has done to us. They're done before you realize it, and once they're done they make you do other things until at last everything comes between you and what you'd like to be, and you've lost your true self forever.

Life, Help

“You can't force love, I realized. It's there or it isn't. If it's not there, you've got to be able to admit it. If it is there, you've got to do whatever it takes to protect the ones you love.”

Richelle Mead book Frostbite

Source: Frostbite

Love, Romantic

“People who pride themselves on their "complexity" and deride others for being "simplistic" should realize that the truth is often not very complicated. What gets complex is evading the truth.”

Thomas Sowell (1930) American economist, social theorist, political philosopher and author

Source: 1980s–1990s, Barbarians inside the Gates and Other Controversial Essays (1999)

People, Truth

“Suddenly Ka realized he was in love with İpek. And realizing that this love would determine the rest of his life, he was filled with dread.”

Orhan Pamuk book Snow

Source: Snow

Love, Life

“Adolescence is such a fun time in your life, because you think you know it all, and you haven’t gotten to the point where you realize that you know almost nothing.”

Anthony Kiedis book Scar Tissue

Source: Scar Tissue

Life, Thinking, Time

“Focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a certain poverty of ambition. It asks too little of yourself. … Because it’s only when you hitch your wagon to something larger than yourself that you realize your true potential.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

Knox College Commencement Address (4 June 2005)
2005

Life

“The significant relationships of early adulthood are thus construed as the means to an end of individual achievement, and these "transitional figures" must be cast off or reconstructed following the realization of success. If in the process, however, they become, like Dido, an impediment to the fulfillment of the Dream, then the relationship must be renounced, "to allow the developmental process" to continue. This process is defined by Levinson explicitly as one of individuation: "throughout the life cycle, but especially in the key transition periods… the developmental process of individuation is going on." The process refers "to the changes in a person's relationships to himself and to the external world," the relationships that constitute his "Life Structure" (p. 195).

If in the course of "Becoming One's Own Man," this structure is discovered to be flawed and threatens the great expectations of the Dream, then in order to avert "serious Failure or Decline," the man must "break out" to salvage his Dream. This act of breaking out is consummated by a "marker event" of separation, such as "leaving his wife, quitting his job, or moving to another region" (p. 206). Thus the road to mid-life salvation runs through either achievement or separation.”

Carol Gilligan (1936) American feminist, ethicist, and psychologist

Source: In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women's Development

Life, World, Dreams, Failure

“A little love and attention can go a long way… too bad more people don't realize that.”

Frank E. Peretti book Hangman's Curse

Source: Hangman's Curse

Love, People, Way

“I realize that I was all error and deviation, that I never lived, that I existed only in so far as I filled time with consciousness and thought.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Source: The Book of Disquiet

Error, Time

“Life is a series of experiences, each of which makes us bigger, even though it is hard to realize this. For the world was built to develop character, and we must learn that the setbacks and griefs which we endure help us in our marching onward.”

Henry Ford (1863–1947) American industrialist

Life, World, Learning, Help

“To be mature you have to realize what you value most… Not to arrive at a clear understanding of one's own values is a tragic waste. You have missed the whole point of what life is for.”

Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American politician, diplomat, and activist, and First Lady of the United States

Source: You Learn by Living: Eleven Keys for a More Fulfilling Life

Life, Understanding

“You may not like what's happening, but just accept it, and let's try to live together. Even if you feel angry, let's be patient and endure, let's try to live together. I've realized that this is the only way forward.”

Hayao Miyazaki (1941) Japanese animator, film director, and mangaka

Way, Feeling

“He lives the poetry that he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they dare not realize”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

“I realized that searching was my symbol, the emblem of those who go out at night with nothing in mind, the motives of a destroyer of compasses.”

Julio Cortázar (1914–1984) Argentinian writer

Search, Motivation, Night

“Life sometimes separates people so that they can realize how much they mean to each other.”

Paulo Coelho book The Winner Stands Alone

Source: The Winner Stands Alone

Life, People

“God, Who is everywhere, never leaves us. Yet He seems sometimes to be present, sometimes to be absent. If we do not know Him well, we do not realize that He may be more present to us when He is absent than when He is present.”

Thomas Merton book No Man Is an Island

Source: No Man Is an Island

God

“Realize deeply that the present moment is all you have. Make the NOW the primary focus of your life.”

Eckhart Tolle (1948) German writer

Variant: Realize deeply that the present moment is all you ever have. Make the Now the primary focus of your life
Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment

Life

“There is poetry as soon as we realize that we possess nothing.”

John Cage (1912–1992) American avant-garde composer

“I began to realize how important it was to be an enthusiast in life. If you are interested in something, no matter what it is, go at it full speed ahead. Embrace it with both arms, hug it, love it and above all become passionate about it. Lukewarm is no good. Hot is no good, either. White hot and passionate is the only thing to be.”

Roald Dahl book My Uncle Oswald

Source: My Uncle Oswald (1979)

Love, Life, Passion, Speed

“All my life I used to wonder what I would become when I grew up. Then, about seven years ago, I realized that I was never going to grow up--that growing is an ever ongoing process.”

M. Scott Peck (1936–2005) American psychiatrist

Life

“Nothing is going to startle us more when we pass through the veil to the other side than to realize how well we know our Father and how familiar His face is to us.”

Ezra Taft Benson (1899–1994) President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Variant: Nothing will surprise us more than when we get to heaven and see the Father and realize how well we know Him and how familiar His face is to us.

“Everything is vague to a degree you do not realize till you have tried to make it precise.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

“It marks a big step in your development when you come to realize that other people can help you do a better job than you could do alone.”

Andrew Carnegie (1835–1919) American businessman and philanthropist

People, Help

“I realized that the world did not exist for my benefit. It followed that the ratio of pleasant and unpleasant things around me would not change. It wasn't up to me. It was clear that the best thing to do was to adopt a sort of muddled cheerfulness.”

Banana Yoshimoto book Kitchen

Source: Kitchen

World, Change

“People don't realize how much they are in the grip of ideas. We live among ideas much more than we live in nature.”

Saul Bellow (1915–2005) Canadian-born American writer

Source: Conversations with Saul Bellow

People, Idea, Nature

“Scarlett O'Hara was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when caught by her charm as the Tarleton twins were.”

Margaret Mitchell (1900–1949) American author and journalist

Men, Beauty

“Don't you ever get the feeling that all your life is going by and you're not taking advantage of it? Do you realize you've lived nearly half the time you have to live already?”

Ernest Hemingway book The Sun Also Rises

Source: The Sun Also Rises

Life, Feeling, Time

“Most things will be okay eventually, but not everything will be. Sometimes you'll put up a good fight and lose. Sometimes you'll hold on really hard and realize there is no choice but to let go. Acceptance is a small, quiet room.”

Cheryl Strayed book Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar

Source: Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar

Fight

“You wouldn't worry so much about what others think of you if you realized how seldom they do.”

Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American politician, diplomat, and activist, and First Lady of the United States

Thinking

“She was perhaps too young to realize that what she assumed was her love for [him] was actually a tentative, timorous, acceptance of herself.”

Arundhati Roy book The God of Small Things

Source: The God of Small Things

Love

“I look back now and realize that the gift of a true friend is that she sees you not the way you see yourself or the way others see you. A true friend sees you for who you are and who you can become.”

Robin Jones Gunn (1955) American writer

Source: Sisterchicks Say Ooh La La!

Way

“If cats looked like frogs we'd realize what nasty, cruel little bastards they are. Style. That's what people remember.”

Terry Pratchett book Lords and Ladies

Source: Lords and Ladies

People, Cats

“Politics is supposed to be the second oldest profession. I have come to realize that it bears a very close resemblance to the first.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Remarks at a business conference in Los Angeles (2 March 1977)
1970s

“Life, for people, begins to crumble on the edges; they don't realize it.”

Dorothea Lange (1895–1965) American photojournalist

Life, People

“Mort was already aware that love made you feel hot and cold and cruel and weak, but he hadn't realized that it could make you stupid.”

Terry Pratchett book Mort

Source: Mort

Love, Stupidity, Feeling

“I realize something. That wasn't a finish line for me… This is my new starting line.”

Wendelin Van Draanen (1965) American writer

Source: The Running Dream

“It is through your body that you realize you are a spark of divinity.”

B.K.S. Iyengar (1918–2014) Indian yoga teacher and scholar

“Reading is my passion and my escape since I was 5 years old. Overall, children don't realize the magic that can live inside their own heads. Better even then any movie.”

Eckhart Tolle (1948) German writer

Source: The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment

Children, Passion, Reading

“As you go through life's rich tapestry, you realize that most people you meet aren't fit to shine your shoes. It's a sad fact, but it's true. A good friend is someone who'd hide you if you were on the run for murder. How many of them do you know?”

Lemmy Kilmister (1945–2015) British singer-songwriter

Life, People, Sadness, Shoe

“Tomas did not realize at the time that metaphors are dangerous. Metaphors are not to be trifled with. A single metaphor can give birth to love.”

Milan Kundera book The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Source: The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Love, Birth, Time

“There is an innocence in admiration: it occurs in one who has not yet realized that they might one day be admired.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

“Disarmed, I realized how easily you can lose all animosity toward someone you've deemed your enemy as soon as that person stops behaving as such.”

Carlos Ruiz Zafón book The Shadow of the Wind

Source: The Shadow of the Wind

Personality

“I realized what a ridiculous lie my whole life has been.”

Arthur Miller book Death of a Salesman

Source: Death of a Salesman

Life, Lie

“Until you've lost your reputation, you never realize what a burden it was or what freedom really is.”

Margaret Mitchell book Vom Winde verweht (1937 German edition)

Variant: Until you 've lost your reputation, you never realize what a burden it was or what freedom really is.
Source: Gone with the Wind

Freedom

“Realize that everything connects to everything else.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

Variant: Learn how to see. Realize that everything connects to everything else.

“Where is God? Where can I find him?" we ask. We don't realize that's like a fish swimming frantically through the ocean in search OF the ocean”

Ted Dekker (1962) American writer

God, Search, Fish

“Were all instructors to realize that the quality of mental process, not the production of correct answers, is the measure of educative growth something hardly less than a revolution in teaching would be worked.”

John Dewey book Democracy and Education

Source: Democracy and Education

Education

“Most people believe the mind to be a mirror, more or less accurately reflecting the world outside them, not realizing on the contrary that the mind is itself the principal element of creation.”

Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) Bengali polymath

People, World

“Just when I thought I was learning how to live, 'twas then I realized I was learning how to die.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Learning

“When my husband died, people kept telling me not to cry. People kept trying to help me to forget. But I didn't want to forget… So I realize, that if it's hard for me, how much harder it must be for you.”

Katherine Paterson book Bridge to Terabithia

Source: Bridge to Terabithia

People, Help, Cry, Forgetting

“Scar tissue is stronger than regular tissue. Realize the strength, move on.”

Henry Rollins (1961) American singer-songwriter

“The day the child realizes that all adults are imperfect, he becomes an adolescent; the day he forgives them, he becomes an adult; the day he forgives himself, he becomes wise.”

Alden Nowlan (1933–1983) Canadian writer

Forgiveness, Wise

“I'd come to realize that all our troubles spring from our failure to use plain, clear-cut language.”

Jean Paul Sartre (1905–1980) French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and …

Spring, Failure

“Today I suddenly experienced an absurd but quite valid sensation. I realized, in an intimate lightning flash, that I am no one. No one, absolutely no one.”

Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) Portuguese poet, writer, literary critic, translator, publisher and philosopher

“But I must finally realize that I am subject to these sudden transformations. The thing is that I rarely think; a crowd of small metamorphoses accumulate in me without my noticing it, and then, one fine day, a veritable revolution takes place.”

Jean Paul Sartre book Nausea

Source: Nausea

Thinking

“The aim of life is self-development. To realize one's nature perfectly - that is what each of us is here for.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

Life, Nature

“A certain type of perfection can only be realized through a limitless accumulation of the imperfect.”

Haruki Murakami book Kafka on the Shore

Source: Kafka on the Shore

Perfection

“They forget that the vampaneze were once our brothers, that by destroying them, we destroy a part of ourselves. Most vampire never realize how pointless and savage war truly is. You were smart enough to see through the truth. Don't ever forget it.”

Darren Shan book The Vampire Prince

Source: The Vampire Prince

War, Truth, Parting, Forgetting

“Really! Between you and Eragon, I seem to spend most of my time among the Varden healing people to silly to realize they need to avoid getting chopped into tiny little pieces”

Christopher Paolini book Brisingr

Source: Brisingr

People, Time

“You have come to a stage where you almost have to work on yourself. You know, on finding some tranquility with which to respond to these things, because I realize that the biggest risk that many of us run is beginning to get inured to the horrors.”

Arundhati Roy (1961) Indian novelist, essayist

“I realize full well how hard it must be to go on living alone in a place from which someone has left you, but there is nothing so cruel in this world as the desolation of having nothing to hope for.”

Haruki Murakami book The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

Source: The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

World, Hope

“Above all, we must realize that no arsenal or no weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

1980s, First term of office (1981–1985), First Inaugural address (1981)
Context: Above all, we must realize that no arsenal or no weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women. It is a weapon our adversaries in today's world do not have. It is a weapon that we as Americans do have. Let that be understood by those who practice terrorism and prey upon their neighbors.

Women, Men, World, Courage

“You might want to lie down. I find that helps when the crushing sense of horrible realization sets in.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Ashes

Magnus to Maia, pg. 274
Source: The Mortal Instruments, City of Ashes (2008)

Lie, Sense, Help

“Confusion is a good state to be in. It means you are looking, constantly looking. People ask me, "Why do you confuse us like this?" I want you to understand, if you can be confused by anybody, it means you do not know. If you are fanatical, you cannot be confused. Or if you are realized, you cannot be confused. Between ignorance and enlightenment is a very thin line. But they are worlds apart.”

Sadhguru (1957) Yogi, mystic, visionary and humanitarian

Source: Of Mystics & Mistakes

People, World, Understanding

“Only the truth of who you are, if realized, will set you free.”

Eckhart Tolle (1948) German writer

Truth

“They realize at last that change does not mean reform, that change does not mean improvement.”

Frantz Fanon book The Wretched of the Earth

Source: The Wretched of the Earth

Change

“It is through art, and through art only, that we can realize our perfection; through art and art only that we can shield ourselves from the sordid perils of actual existence.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

The Critic as Artist (1891), Part II

Art, Perfection

“to love means to realize there is a time to let the beloved one go”

Tony Parsons book Man and Boy

Source: Man and Boy

Love, Time

“To THINK BIG and to use our talents doesn't mean we won't have difficulties along the way. We will—we all do. How we view those problems determines how we end up. If we choose to see the obstacles in our path as barriers, we stop trying. “We can't win,” we moan. “They won't let us win.”However, if we choose to see the obstacles as hurdles, we can leap over them. Successful people don't have fewer problems. They have determined that nothing will stop them from going forward.Whatever direction we choose, if we can realize that every hurdle we jump strengthens and prepares us for the next one, we're already on the way to success.”

Ben Carson book Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

Source: Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story
Source: Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story (1990), p. 232

People, Way, Problem, Thinking

“I realized that the longing for art, like the longing for love, is a malady that blinds us, and makes us forget the things we already know, obscuring reality.”

Orhan Pamuk book The Museum of Innocence

Source: The Museum of Innocence

Love, Art, Reality, Forgetting

“To say she was my girlfriend was absurd: no one the wrong side of thirty has a girlfriend… I suppose I ought to have realize it’s ominous that forty thousand years of human language had failed to produce a word for our relationship.”

Robert Harris (1957) novelist

“The deeper we look into nature, the more we recognize that it is full of life, and the more profoundly we know that all life is a secret and that we are united with all life that is in nature. Man can no longer live for himself alone. We realize that all life is valuable, and that we are united to all this life. From this knowledge comes our spiritual relationship to the universe.”

Albert Schweitzer (1875–1965) French-German physician, theologian, musician and philosopher

Source: The Spiritual Life (1947), p. 248

Life, Secret, Nature

“The secret to being wrong isn't to avoid being wrong! The secret is being willing to be wrong. The secret is realizing that wrong isn't fatal.”

Seth Godin (1960) American entrepreneur, author and public speaker

Source: Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?

Secret

“Communism is Soviet government plus the electrification of the whole country. Otherwise the country will remain a country of small peasant economy, and it is up to us to realize this quite clearly.”

Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian politician, led the October Revolution

New External and Internal Position and the Problems of the Party (1920); as quoted in The Soviet Power : The Socialist Sixth Of The World (1940) by Hewlett Johnson.
1920s

Communication, Country

Quotes about realization page 2

Quotes about realization
page 2