Quotes about yourself
page 27

“I believe that there are varying points of contact. You have to be able to see the whole thing first. All great paintings are sculptures – there's so much of the factualness about it that a great painting forces you into a visual, physical movement of yourself. That's what determines the way you experience a painting kinetically. You move closer, you sight down it, you till your head, you step back, you feel as though you are in it. That being in it is just as important as looking from a distance.”

Kenneth Noland (1924–2010) American artist

Kenneth Noland, p. 10
Conversation with Karen Wilkin' (1986-1988)

Way, Feeling, Painting

“Each scientific institute in my opinion should have a public outreach program…all the research you are doing is funded by the government. The government gets MONEY from the people, so you owe something to the people. You are shutting yourself in an ivory tower, saying that all these people outside the scientific community do not understand it. That is not the right attitude.”

Jayant Narlikar (1938) Indian physicist

Jayant Narlikar's Cosmology

Money, People, Communication, Understanding

“The harm that you do to others is the harm that you do to yourself and you cannot think then that you can cause wars in other parts of the world and destroy people and drone them without this having a terrible impact on your own soul and your own consciousness.”

Alice Walker (1944) American author and activist

Poet, Author Alice Walker Meets the Inner Journey with Global Activism in "The Cushion in the Road" http://www.democracynow.org/2013/5/28/poet_author_alice_walker_meets_the (May 28, 2013).

War, People, World, Soul

“So long as you believe in some truth you do not believe in yourself. You are a servant. A man of faith.”

Jack McDevitt (1935) American novelist, Short story writer

Source: Academy Series - Priscilla "Hutch" Hutchins, Chindi (2002), Chapter 12 (p. 158), quoting Max Stiner

Truth, Faith

“Depression is seductive: it offends and teases, frightens you and draws you in, tempting you with its promise of sweet oblivion, then overwhelming you with a nearly sexual power, squirming past your defenses, dissolving your will, invading the tired spirit so utterly that it becomes difficult to recall that you ever lived without it… or to imagine that you might live that way again. With all the guile of Satan himself, depression persuades you that its invasion was all your own idea, that you wanted it all along. It fogs the part of the brain that reasons, that knows right and wrong. It captures you with its warm, guilty, hateful pleasures, and, worst of all, it becomes familiar. All at once, you find yourself in thrall to the very thing that most terrifies you. Your work slides, your friendships slide, your marriage slides, but you scarcely notice: to be depressed is to be half in love with disaster.”

Stephen L. Carter book The Emperor of Ocean Park

Source: The Emperor of Ocean Park (2002), Ch. 12, A Special Delivery, II

Love, Hate, Friendship, Marriage

“The Jews I knew growing up didn't do "do-it-yourself." When my father needed to hammer something he generally used his shoe, and the only real tool he owned was a pair of needle-nose pliers.”

Ayelet Waldman (1964) American- Israeli writer

Salon.com column http://www.salon.com/mwt/col/waldman/2005/06/20/labor/index.html?sid=1355604

Shoe

“It is a big mistake to think that the best way to express yourself is to do whatever you want, acting as you please. This is not expressing yourself. If you know what to do exactly, and you do it, then you can express yourself fully.”

Shunryu Suzuki (1904–1971) Japanese Buddhist missionary

Express Yourself Fully (page 8)
Not Always So, practicing the true spirit of Zen (2002)

Way, Thinking

“Giving alms is only a virtuous deed when you give money that you yourself worked to get.”

Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) Russian writer

Source: Path of Life (1909), p. 83

Money

“Can’t keep hanging on
To all that’s dead and gone
If you built yourself a myth
You'd know just what to give
Materialize
Or let the ashes fly”

Victoria Legrand (1981) singer

Myth, Bloom (May 15, 2012).

Flying, Dead

“And when you're with yourself, oh don't let it go to your head. ~ "Carlos (Don't Let It Go To Your Head)”

Pete Yorn (1974) American musician

Song lyrics

“(…) A weak mind cannot control its own projections. Be aware, therefore, of your mind and its projections. You cannot control what you do not know. On the other hand, knowledge gives power. In practice it is very simple. To control yourself – know yourself.”

Nisargadatta Maharaj (1897–1981) Indian guru

Mind
Source: I am That, P.121.

Knowledge

“Therefore, it is you, the giver of life and being, who seem to be sought in the different rites by different ways and are named with different names, because as you are you remain unknown and ineffable to all. For you who are infinite power are none of those things which you have created, nor can a creature grasp the concept of your infinity since there is no proportion between the finite and the infinite. But you, almighty God, who are invisible to every mind, are able to show yourself as visible to whom you will and in the way in which you can be grasped. Therefore, do not hide yourself any longer, O Lord; be merciful and show your face, and all peoples will be saved who are no longer able to forsake the source of life and its sweetness when they have had even a little foretaste of them. For no one withdraws from you unless he does not know you.”

Nicholas of Cusa (1401–1464) German philosopher, theologian, jurist, and astronomer

De Pace Fidei (The Peace of Faith) (1453)

Life, God, People, Way

“Remind yourself that all men assert that wisdom is the greatest good, but that there are few who strenuously seek out that greatest good.”

Pythagoras (-585–-495 BC) ancient Greek mathematician and philosopher

"Pythagorean Ethical Sentences From Stobæus" (1904)
Florilegium

Wisdom, Men

“He was referring, of course, to the gentleman employed by Henry Luce and you will note, at once, the slightly unpleasant and combative tone of the salesman but there is also so much glee contained in it, an anticipation of the joys of a difficult battle, that even a person of fine scruples, sensitive to the vulgarity of the salesman type (such as yourself, Professor) need not be offended but rather challenged by the contradiction contained herein, i. e. that this crass aggression can co-exist with an ability to draw very fine moral distinctions and to see, very objectively, the damage his father's business was doing to the fauna of the country he loved and that, further - like real estate for instance - it was one of those great Australian enterprises that generate wealth while making nothing new.”

Peter Carey book Illywhacker

Page 561.
Illywhacker (1985)

Love, Business, Joy, Drawing

“You have in yourself some thing similar to God, and therefore use yourself as the temple of God, on account of that which in you resembles God.”

Quintus Sextius Roman philosopher

Sentences of Sextus

God

“People say, I am afraid of changes. But who is asking you to change? Knowledge is not a change. When you see yourself in the mirror, the first thing you will realize is that beauty that you have always looked for is right there. That's the first thing you will realize. That, to me, is the magic of this Knowledge.”

Prem Rawat (1957) controversial spiritual leader

Escobar, Argentina, January 23, 1991
1990s

People, Beauty, Knowledge, Change

“If you built yourself a myth
You'd know just what to give
What comes after this
Momentary bliss
Consequence of what you do to me”

Victoria Legrand (1981) singer

Myth, Bloom (May 15, 2012).

“On the bus going home I heard a most fascinating conversation between an old man and woman. "What a thing, though," the old woman said. "You'd hardly credit it." "She's always made a fuss of the whole family, but never me," the old man said. "Does she have a fire when the young people go to see her?" "Fire?" "She won't get people seeing her without warmth." "I know why she's doing it. Don't think I don't," the old man said. "My sister she said to me, 'I wish I had your easy life.' Now that upset me. I was upset by the way she phrased herself. 'Don't talk to me like that,' I said. 'I've only got to get on the phone and ring a certain number,' I said, 'to have you stopped.'" "Yes," the old woman said, "And you can, can't you?" "Were they always the same?" she said. "When you was a child? Can you throw yourself back? How was they years ago?" "The same," the old man said. "Wicked, isn't it?"”

Joe Orton (1933–1967) English playwright and author

the old woman said. "Take care, now" she said, as the old man left her. He didn't say a word but got off the bus looking disgruntled.
Wednesday 18 January 1967 (p. 66)
The Orton Diaries (1986)

Life, People, Family, Way

“Here’s the thing about constant surveillance—the question you must ask yourself is not “Am I being overheard?” but “Is anybody paying attention to me?””

Sarah Zettel (1966) American writer

Source: Bitter Angels (2009), Chapter 2 (p. 18)

Question

“Life without literature is a life reduced to penury. It expands you in every way. It illuminates what you’re doing. It shows you possibilities you haven’t thought of. It enables you to live the lives of other people than yourself. It broadens you, it makes you more human. It makes life enjoyable.”

M. H. Abrams (1912–2015) American literary theorist

The New York Times dialogue with S. Greenblatt (2012)

Life, People, Way, Literature

“Are you or aren't you convinced that weakness is a man's condition? How can you raise yourself if you haven't fallen first?”

Cesare Pavese (1908–1950) Italian poet, novelist, literary critic, and translator

Source: The devil in the hills (1949), Chapter 5, p. 306

“Part of the rationalist ethos is binding yourself emotionally to an absolutely lawful reductionistic universe — a universe containing no ontologically basic mental things such as souls or magic — and pouring all your hope and all your care into that merely real universe and its possibilities, without disappointment.”

Eliezer Yudkowsky (1979) American blogger, writer, and artificial intelligence researcher

Mundane Magic http://lesswrong.com/lw/ve/mundane_magic/(October 2008)

Law, Hope, Disappointment, Soul

“Interviewer: Is that why you draw yourself as a cow?”

Hiromu Arakawa (1973) award winning Japanese manga artist

Interview with mobuta.com (2004)

Drawing

“There are three ways to understand things. If somebody tells you something, who you respect, you'll say, Okay, since you are saying it, I'll believe it. Second way is that, This is what my concept is, so I'll believe it. But the third way is a very independent way, which is called, seeing is believing. That you see, that you feel, you realize practically, without anybody's concept, but actually be able to realize it completely, completely independently. And then feel it. And this is what I beg of every premie to do. Instead of to follow a bunch of concepts down the line, see this Knowledge, believe this Knowledge -— by yourself, independent of any concepts, any thoughts, any ideas.”

Prem Rawat (1957) controversial spiritual leader

Denver, Colorado, May 12, 1974
1970s

Way, Feeling, Idea, Understanding

“Ever since childhood I have suspected you get along better if you respect people’s ways and wishes regardless of your apparent relative strengths.
That doesn’t mean you let people walk on you. It doesn’t mean you eat their pain for them. You need to demand respect for yourself, too.”

Glen Cook book Bleak Seasons

Source: Bleak Seasons (1996), Chapter 25 (p. 67)

Pain, People, Way, Childhood

“There are relatively few ideas that you can do just by yourself.”

Paul Allen (1953–2018) American inventor, investor and philanthropist

Success: "Paul Allen is No Second Act" https://www.success.com/article/paul-allen-is-no-second-act (27 January 2009)

Idea

“I find it necessary on the first page of this book, quite ready for publication, to give the following advice:
:Read each of my written expositions thrice:
:Firstly: at least as you have already become mechanized to read all your contemporary books and newspapers.
:Secondly: as if you were reading aloud to another person.
:And only thirdly: try and fathom the gist of my writings. Only then will you be able to count upon forming your own impartial judgment, proper to yourself alone, on my writings. And only then can my hope be actualized that according to your understanding you will obtain the specific benefit for yourself which I anticipate, and which I wish for you with all my being.”

G. I. Gurdjieff (1866–1949) influential spiritual teacher, Armenian philosopher, composer and writer

"Friendly Advice [Written impromptu by the author on delivering this book, already prepared for publication, to the printer" (1949)
All and Everything: Beelzebub's Tales to His Grandson (1950)

Books, Hope, Understanding, Reading

“There are moments or periods when it would be wonderful to plan something and do it and have the thing only do what you planned to do, and then, there are other times when the destruction of those planned things becomes interesting to you. So then, it becomes a question of destroying – of destroying the planned forms; it's like an escape, it's something to do, something to begin the situation. You yourself, you don't decide, but if you want to paint, you have to find out some way to start this thing off, whether it is painting it out or putting it in..”

Franz Kline (1910–1962) American painter

n.p.
1960's, Living Art, 1963

Way, Question, Time, Painting

“I have never had great expectations of my performance or of a film. I try not to think about the outcome. If you look that far ahead, it sort of taints your choices as an actor. I try as hard as I can to believe that no one is ever going to see it and that it's not even a movie. Then you can allow yourself to bare more. Then, once a project is done, I tend to forget about it until it comes out.”

Heath Ledger (1979–2008) Australian actor

Interview remarks quoted by Honie Stevens, "Squaring the Ledger" https://archive.is/20121206021747/www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,22763328-5006011,00.html, The Daily Telegraph, November 18, 2007.

Thinking, Forgetting

“Remind yourself of your vision, keep your hopes close yo your heart, be passionate about them and always, always always be true to them”

Michael Elmore-Meegan (1959) British humanitarian

All Will be Well (2004)

Hope, Passion, Heart

“It’s great to be outlandish… to acknowledge that side of yourself. But it’s when you harness that true power that the true success is unleashed. I’m glad I came out of hiding to liberate this persona.”

Erika Jayne (1969) American singer, actress and television personality

TedxPasadena speech (2018)

Success

“My first book “The Naked Manager”, a big success in 1971, had been followed by many others, and I wanted to write still more. Writing books is very interesting as each new project takes you in a different direction. You learn a lot – especially about what you yourself really think.”

Robert Heller (1932–2012) British magician

Interview: Robert Heller (2006)

Books, Thinking, Learning, Success

“It takes a profound hypocrisy to try to reconcile for others things that you can’t reconcile for yourself.”

Jerry Coyne (1949) American biologist

" The disingenuous Professor Ruse http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2012/07/29/the-disingenuous-professor-ruse/" July 29, 2012

“One of my favorite quotes is from Hemingway, who said, "Never persuade yourself that war, no matter how necessary, is not a crime." … It is. Sometimes it's necessary, but it's always awful, and that's my point.”

Paul Fussell (1924–2012) Recipient of the Purple Heart medal

Fussell here slightly paraphrases Hemingway's statement from his Foreword to Treasury for the Free World (1946): Never think that war, no matter how necessary nor how justified, is not a crime. Ask the infantry and ask the dead.
Humanities interview (1996)

War, Quotes

“Be Impeccable with Your Word. Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean. Avoid using the word to speak against yourself or to gossip about others. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love.”

Miguel Ángel Ruiz book The Four Agreements

The Four Agreements (1997)

Love, Truth

“Do you ever consciously try to sense your gut feeling by asking yourself, ‘What do I feel about this person, situation or decision?’ Trusting your gut can help you in the workplace and beyond. The danger is when you let external noise drown out what it’s telling you, letting other people’s views and opinions take priority over your own.”

Nigel Cumberland (1967) British author and leadership coach

Your Job-Hunt Ltd – Advice from an Award-Winning Asian Headhunter (2003), Successful Recruitment in a Week (2012) https://books.google.ae/books?idp24GkAsgjGEC&printsecfrontcover&dqnigel+cumberland&hlen&saX&ved0ahUKEwjF75Xw0IHNAhULLcAKHazACBMQ6AEIGjAA#vonepage&qnigel%20cumberland&ffalse, 100 Things Successful People Do: Little Exercises for Successful Living (2016) https://books.google.ae/books?idnu0lCwAAQBAJ&dqnigel+cumberland&hlen&saX&ved0ahUKEwjF75Xw0IHNAhULLcAKHazACBMQ6AEIMjAE

People, Feeling, Decision, Sense

“It's a life's work to see yourself for what you really are and even then you might be wrong.”

Cormac McCarthy book No Country for Old Men

No Country for Old Men (2005)

Life

“Modern military planners often talk in terms of “threat spirals” when a given threat escalates and inspires a defensive countermeasure. Ideally you should anticipate your opponent’s next escalation and take countermeasures, insulating yourself from the future threat.”

James Wesley Rawles (1960) Survivalist-fiction author and blogger

Source: How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It, Plume, New York (2009), p. 202

Future

“Exploring Israel's meaning to you, as an American and as a Jew, is to firmly lock yourself onto the chain of thousands of years of Jewish history, and also claim your legacy as an American who is blessed to live in a land of freedom.”

Edgar Bronfman, Sr. (1929–2013) Canadian-American businessman

http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/opinion/supporting-israel-means-questioning-its-policies-1.356546.

History, Freedom

“"Oh, Richard!" exclaimed she, on one occasion, "if you would but dismiss such gloomy subjects from your mind, you would live as long as any of us; at least you would live to see the girls married, and yourself a happy grandfather, with a canty old dame for your companion."”

Anne Brontë book Agnes Grey

Source: Agnes Grey (1847), Ch. VI : The Parsonage Again

Happiness, Girl

“No matter how busy you may think you are, you must find time for reading, or surrender yourself to self-chosen ignorance.”

Confucius (-551–-479 BC) Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher

Atwood H. Townsend, editor of Good Reading, various editions from at least 1960
Misattributed, Not Chinese

Business, Thinking, Time, Reading

“We need to participate in the very process of electing into office people we believe are deserving. And this long process – sometimes viewed as tedious – starts with having yourself registered properly.”

Francis Escudero (1969) Filipino politician

Philippine Star http://www.philstar.com/cebu-news/2015/07/20/1478960/comelec-cebu-requests-six-more-registration-machines 2015

People

“I love writing, but I feel like you need time to really get in touch with yourself to do that. On [Metamorphosis], I would have liked to have had more time to work with the writers [and] write some more of my own stuff. Hopefully I can do that on my second album.”

Hilary Duff (1987) American actress and singer

Rosen, Craig. "Hilary Duff: A Performer's Metamorphosis" http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=2076149. Billboard. January 26 2004. Retrieved October 25 2006. On Metamorphosis (2003), her second album and first non-holiday album.

Love, Feeling, Time

“When a person is born, he can embark on only one of three roads of life: if you go right, the wolves will eat you; if you go left, you’ll eat the wolves; if you go straight, you’ll eat yourself.”

Anton Chekhov (1860–1904) Russian dramatist, author and physician

Fatherlessness or Platonov, Act I, sc. xiv (1878)

Life, Personality

“The day you start telling yourself you can, is the day you start knowing you will.”

Steve Maraboli (1975)

Source: Life, the Truth, and Being Free (2010), p. 135

“Know, my son, that the enemy will always be with you. He will be in the shadow of your dreams and in your living flesh, for he is the other part of yourself.”

Jane Yolen book The Devil's Arithmetic

Source: The Devil's Arithmetic (1988), p. 143

Dreams, Parting

“The mind of the man who dreams is fully satisfied by what happens to him. The agonizing question of possibility is no longer pertinent. Kill, fly faster, love to your heart's content. And if you should die, are you not certain of re-awaking among the dead? Let yourself be carried along, events will not tolerate your interference. You are nameless. The ease of everything is priceless.”

André Breton (1896–1966) French writer

Le Manifeste du Surréalisme, Andre Breton (Manifesto of Surrealism; 1924)

Love, Dreams, Question, Heart

“Erika Jayne is six words: fantasy, love, escape, glitz, glamour, and fun. I think women should live out loud. I think that we should be fearless. I think we should express ourselves. I think we should have fun. And I don’t think anyone should dictate to you when your best days are, or that you are too old to express yourself. You are of worth and value in your 40s, 50s, and 60s. You don’t have to stop doing what you love simply because you’re not 25. I just think that those are old ideas that need to be broken and discarded quite honestly.”

Erika Jayne (1969) American singer, actress and television personality

Erika Jayne interview to Refinery29 https://www.refinery29.com/erika-jayne-girardi-real-housewives-of-beverly-hills-interview (2017)

Love, Women, Idea, Thinking

“It's when you feel like this that, out of resentment, you begin to bump people back. And, let me confess, you feel that way most of the time. You ache with the need to convince yourself that you do exist in the real world, that you're a part of all the sound and anguish, and you strike out with your fists, you curse and you swear to make them recognize you. And, alas, it's seldom successful.”

Ralph Ellison book Invisible Man

Prologue.
Invisible Man (1952)

People, World, Way, Feeling

“I don't know much about the score for GODZILLA 1985. However, my impression of GODZILLA VS. BIOLLANTE is a negative one, both in terms of the direction and the music. For example, the music that is heard while the scenes that take place in Saradia are shown is just ridiculous. The composer used European music instead of some modern Arabic music. By the way, during the production of GODZILLA VS. BIOLLANTE, Toho asked for permission to use some of my music in the film. I said that I would allow its use as long as it was not turned into popular music. Toho agreed to that, but just before GODZILLA VS. BIOLLANTE was completed, a Toho representative came to me and said, "Well, your music was turned into popular music." By that time, it was too late to do anything about the situation. After GODZILLA VS. BIOLLANTE was released, my daughter came to me and said, "No matter how much you try to escape from Godzilla movies, Toho always uses your name and your melodies, so why don't you just score the next Godzilla film yourself?"”

Akira Ifukube (1914–2006) Japanese composer

That is why I agreed to work on GODZILLA VS. GHIDRAH. As quoted by David Milner, "Akira Ifukube Interview I" http://www.davmil.org/www.kaijuconversations.com/ifukub.htm, Kaiju Conversations (December 1992)

Music, Way, Time, Daughters

“In self-examination, take no account of yourself by your thoughts and resolutions in the days of religion and solemnity; examine how it is with you in the days of ordinary conversation and in the circumstances of secular employment.”

Jeremy Taylor (1613–1667) English clergyman

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 117.

Religion

“In life to handle yourself, use your head, but to handle others, use your heart.”

Chinmayananda Saraswati (1916–1993) Indian spiritual teacher

Quotations from Gurudev’s teachings, Chinmya Mission Chicago

Life, Heart, Leadership

““Can you really kill the Goddess?” Jane asked.
“You stupid gobbet of flesh! Don’t you understand yet? There is no Goddess.”
“No,” Jane cried. “You said yourself—”
“I lied,” the dragon said with a fearful complacency. “Everyone you have ever met has lied to you. Life exists, and all who live are born to suffer. The best moments are fleeting and bought with the coin of exquisite torment. All attachments end. All loved ones die. All that you value passes away. In such a vexatious existence laughter is madness and joy is folly. Shall we accept that it all happens for no reason, with no cause? That there is nobody to blame but ourselves but that accepting the responsibility is pointless for doing so cannot ease, defer, or deaden the pain? Not likely! It is so much more comforting to erect a straw figure on which to blame it all.
“Some bow down before the Goddess and others curse her every name. There is not a fart’s difference between the two approaches. They cling to the fiction of the Goddess because admitting the alternative is unbearable.””

Michael Swanwick book The Iron Dragon's Daughter

Source: The Iron Dragon's Daughter (1993), Chapter 19 (pp. 339-340)

Love, Life, Pain, Stupidity

“Quite deliberately you use your conscious mind playfully, creating a game as children do, in which for a time you completely ignore what seems to be in physical terms and 'pretend' that what you really want is real. If you are poor, you purposely pretend that you have all you need financially. Imagine how you will spend your money. If you are ill, imagine playfully that you are cured. See yourself doing what you would do. If you cannot communicate with others, imagine yourself doing so easily. If you feel your days dark and pointless, then imagine them filled and joyful. Now this may sound impractical, yet in your daily life you use your imagination and your emotions often at the service of far less worthy beliefs; and the results are quite clear - and let me add, unfortunately practical.”

Jane Roberts (1929–1984) American Writer

Session 622, Page 63
The Nature of Personal Reality (1974)

Life, Money, Children, Feeling

“You ought to try to make significant contributions to humanity rather than just get along through life comfortably… the life of trying to achieve excellence in some area is in itself a worthy goal… A life without a struggle on your part to make yourself excellent is hardly a life worth living. …a life without such a goal… is merely existing…”

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

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

Life, Parting

“Truth does not need argument, agreement, theories or beliefs. There is only one test for it and that is to ask yourself 'Is the statement true or false in my experience?”

Barry Long (1926–2003) Australian spiritual teacher and writer

Knowing Yourself: The True in the False (1996)

Truth, Falseness

“Withdraw into yourself, as far as you can. Associate with those who will make a better man of you. Welcome those whom you yourself can improve. The process is mutual; for men learn while they teach.”
Recede in te ipse quantum potes; cum his versare qui te meliorem facturi sunt, illos admitte quos tu potes facere meliores. Mutuo ista fiunt, et homines dum docent discunt.

Seneca the Younger (-4–65 BC) Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, and dramatist

Source: Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium (Moral Letters to Lucilius), Letter VII: On crowds, Line 8.

Men, Learning

“[Her birth] was the best moment of my life, by far, and it didn't do it justice watching it on Skype…When I saw my child for the first time it just switched the switch, you know. That's when you realise you love something more than you love yourself.”

Sonny Bill Williams (1985) New Zealand rugby player and heavyweight boxer

Williams on birth of his first child. Noble name for SBW's baby http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=11369071, by Rachel Glucina, NZ Herald, dated 5 December 2014.

Love, Life, Justice, Birth

“Medicine, guarded too by preliminary impediments, and frightful medusa-heads of quackery, which deter many generous souls from entering, is of the half-articulate professions, and does not much invite the ardent kinds of ambition. The intellect required for medicine might be wholly human, and indeed should by all rules be,—the profession of the Human Healer being radically a sacred one and connected with the highest priesthoods, or rather being itself the outcome and acme of all priesthoods, and divinest conquests of intellect here below. As will appear one day, when men take off their old monastic and ecclesiastic spectacles, and look with eyes again! In essence the Physician's task is always heroic, eminently human: but in practice most unluckily at present we find it too become in good part beaverish,—yielding a money-result alone. And what of it is not beaverish,—does not that too go mainly to ingenious talking, publishing of yourself, ingratiating of yourself; a partly human exercise or waste of intellect, and, alas, a partly vulpine ditto;—making the once sacred… Human Healer, more impossible for us than ever!”

Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish philosopher, satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher

1850s, Latter-Day Pamphlets (1850), Stump Orator (May 1, 1850)

Men, Money, Exercises, Soul

“Advice to aspiring models: Believe in yourself. Listen to the photographers you work with, and try to be professional at all time.”

Alessandra Ambrosio (1981) Brazilian model

http://alessandraambrosio.com/
Attributed

Time

“Everyone is a mirror image of yourself—your own thinking coming back at you.”

Byron Katie (1942) American spiritual writer

Loving What Is: Four Questions That Can Change Your Life (2002)

Thinking

“I’ve come to believe that you cannot change any society unless you take responsibility for it, unless you see yourself as belonging to it and responsible for changing it.”

Grace Lee Boggs (1915–2015) social activist and feminist

"'Revolution as a New Beginning': An Interview with Grace Lee Boggs" http://web.archive.org/web/20070415072944/http://oat.tao.ca/~tom/journal/uta1_sequential.pdf. Upping the Anti No. 1. p. 28. March 31, 2005. Interview conducted at Boggs's home in Detroit, Michigan, July 22, 2003. (Web archives http://uppingtheanti.org/journal/article/01-revolution-as-a-new-beginning/ http://web.archive.org/web/20081030014009/http://uppingtheanti.org/node/1280)

Change

“Tolstoy's War and Peace is overblown – do yourself a favour and read his Death of Ivan Ilych.”

Philip Ó Ceallaigh (1968) Irish writer

Interview by Tom Vowler (2010-13)

Death, War, Peace, Reading

“Knowing Yourself - The true in the false, gradually strips away all self-delusion until all that remains is pure being.”

Barry Long (1926–2003) Australian spiritual teacher and writer

Knowing Yourself: The True in the False (1996)

Falseness

“Who is the loving person? The loving person is the person who loves him or herself. I say this so often, and people say, "Oh yes, you're so right," but they don't do it! You will never be able to love anyone else until you love yourself. Even With your Fat Thighs!”

Leo Buscaglia (1924–1998) Motivational speaker, writer

Speaking Of Love (1980)

Love, People, Personality

“Last week, i… i extended a hand to the WWE Universe in a much needed intervention. You know, i don't know if you people know this or not, but i'm not the only one who knows that pills and cigarettes and alcohol are harmful. Medical science has proven this, so there's a surgeon general put in place to put warning labels on all of these products. I guess he's just there to warn the smart people that already know, huh? This is my crusade, and i will continue my crusade for as long as there are people who need help, as long as there are people out there who need change in their lives. One person in particular i've been helping for quite some time now, i'd like to introduce him to the world. Ladies and gentlemen, i give you… Luke Gallows. (Gallows raises his fist) That's right, some of you may recognize him as "Festus", but that was a lifetime ago. And it's a lifetime that he'd just as soon regret. It's a lifetime of torturous drug abuse and neglect, you see, it started just like it started for all of you people, one, one little pill. Just one little pill to take the edge off, one painkiller. And then one turns to two, two turns to four, four turns to eight, so on and so forth. And sure, his friends, his family were there, but they enabled him. They didn't help him, they thought they were but they were slowly rotting him from the inside out. But then i helped him, just like i could help all of you. Trust me, this is just the start, this doesn't end here, it begins here and now. I will continue to reach out and help those who can't help themselves. Holds up brown paper bag On December 1st, this is scary, people, pay attention. On December 1st, a very dangerous addictive new drug hits the streets. Now this scares me because it's a socially accepted over-the-counter drug and it's gonna be widely available all over the world. And it's scary because it's more dangerous than any prescribed medication, it's more harmful than chain smoking an entire carton of unfiltered cigarettes, it is more dangerous than corroding your liver with a fifth of gin or vodka and then chasing it with your Daddy's favorite beer. (Punk pulls a Jeff Hardy DVD out of the bag) "Jeff Hardy, My Life, My Rules" And what an appropriate title, for a loser who destroyed his life and his career living by his rules. And what makes me sick to my stomach is Jeff didn't just ruin his life, he didn't just end his career. (Crowd chants Hardy) He ruined the lives of all his fans because he's planted seeds of destruction in all of the people, all of the drug addicts like yourself who actually looked up to the Charismatic Enabler like he was some sort of a prophet. Well, if you people have any brain-cells left, if there's anything left of your memory that's not burnt out, all you need to know is that the last chapter of this DVD is the most important one you need to watch because it tells the whole story. It's a cage match between myself and Jeff Hardy, where i ended Jeff's career in the WWE… FOREVER! I'm the reason he's not here! And I know how hard it is to deprogram your weak little brains from all the lies you've been fed all over the years, but you owe it to yourselves. Look yourself in the mirror, search inside yourself for that shred of self-respect that might be left, and when it comes to this, when it comes to this garbage, (Holds up DVD) just say no.”

Phil Brooks (1978) American professional wrestler and mixed martial artist

November 27, 2009
Friday Night SmackDown

Life, People, Alcohol, World

“Life is unpredictable and uncertain. You can never be right all the time. Sometimes the best thing to do is to chill, step back, admit you could do with some help and stop taking yourself so seriously.”

Nigel Cumberland (1967) British author and leadership coach

Life, Time, Help

“Upper middle-class upbringing has rooted out any element of what might appear to be self-assertion or egoism; good manners is to be like everyone else. So the male of the species becomes accustomed to suppress any stirring of impatience or originality. Shaw once said you can't learn to skate without making a fool of yourself; the British middle-class attitude seems to be that, in that case, you hadn't better skate at all. The result seems to be considerably more oppressive than being brought up in a Jewish ghetto or a west side slum.”

Colin Wilson (1931–2013) author

Source: The Bicameral Critic (1985), p. 112, An integrity born of hope: Notes on Christopher Isherwood (1976)

Fools, Learning, Appearance

“Draw from others the lesson that may profit yourself.”
Periclum ex aliis facito tibi quod ex usu siet.

Terence Heauton Timorumenos

Act I, scene 2, line 37 (211).
Heauton Timorumenos (The Self-Tormentor)

Drawing

“If you wish me to weep, you yourself
Must first feel grief.”
Si vis me flere, dolendum est primum ipsi tibi.

Horace Ars Poetica

Source: Ars Poetica, or The Epistle to the Pisones (c. 18 BC), Line 102

Feeling

“If you give yourself that short little moment of thinking, then you cannot miss it.”

Michel Thomas (1914–2005) American linguist and language teacher

Speak German with Michel Thomas, Disc 3

Thinking

“He wrote Helen that "a part of adolescence is feeling that there's no one else around you who's enough like yourself to understand you."”

John Irving book The World According to Garp

The World According to Garp (1978), ch. 5

Feeling, Understanding, Parting

“I don't pay any attention. The stunt people take care of all that. All I do is get in and out of the Coyote [the car Skid drove, which required anyone riding in it to enter and exit through the window], which is no mean trick. You can't get into the S. O. B. without bending yourself into a pretzel. Me, I'd rather drive a pickup.”

Brian Keith (1921–1997) actor

TVGuide.com)
Brian Keith who became very antsy about the car that was needed in every script

People, Cars

“All the energy that you spend, trying to hurt somebody else, that energy will turn around and slap you in the face. The same thing is true, Love, what I know is that the energy that put out everyday with the best of intentions that it would reach you where you really live in heart of yourself has come back to me from all of you in full force. So that what we've learnt on this show; You are responsible for your life and when you get that, everything changes, my friends. So don't wait for somebody else to fix you, to save you or complete you…”

Oprah Winfrey (1954) American businesswoman, talk show host, actress, producer, and philanthropist

"Oprah Winfrey Show Finale" in CBS (25 May 2011)

Love, Life, Change, Waiting

“Today, people’s mood is very much like that: if the coffee is bitter they’re going to have a bad mood all day long. You could be having a perfect day and all of a sudden you get fired. And that’s it. there goes your beautiful day. Maybe they’ve had a beautiful life all life long, and then something will happen that will completely devastate them. But, you can go beyond all that to have something that’s permanent, to have something that is a true experience, to have an experience of yourself, to have an experience of what makes you alive.”

Prem Rawat (1957) controversial spiritual leader

Sao Paulo, Brazil, January 30, 1980
1980s

Life, People, Beauty, Coffee

“It has been reported from Sulaiman b. Buraid through his father that when the Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) appointed anyone as leader of an army or detachment he would especially exhort him to fear Allah and to be good to the Muslims who were with him. He would say: Fight in the name of Allah and in the way of Allah. Fight against those who disbelieve in Allah. Make a holy war, do not embezzle the spoils; do not break your pledge; and do not mutilate (the dead) bodies; do not kill the children. When you meet your enemies who are polytheists, invite them to three courses of action. If they respond to any one of these, you also accept it and withold yourself from doing them any harm. Invite them to (accept) Islam; if they respond to you, accept it from them and desist from fighting against them. Then invite them to migrate from their lands to the land of Muhajirs and inform them that, if they do so, they shall have all the privileges and obligations of the Muhajirs. If they refuse to migrate, tell them that they will have the status of Bedouin Muslims and will be subjected to the Commands of Allah like other Muslims, but they will not get any share from the spoils of war or Fai' except when they actually fight with the Muslims (against the disbelievers). If they refuse to accept Islam, demand from them the Jizya. If they agree to pay, accept it from them and hold off your hands. If they refuse to pay the tax, seek Allah's help and fight them. When you lay siege to a fort and the besieged appeal to you for protection in the name of Allah and His Prophet, do not accord to them the guarantee of Allah and His Prophet, but accord to them your own guarantee and the guarantee of your companions for it is a lesser sin that the security given by you or your companions be disregarded than that the security granted in the name of Allah and His Prophet be violated When you besiege a fort and the besieged want you to let them out in accordance with Allah's Command, do not let them come out in accordance with His Command, but do so at your (own) command, for you do not know whether or not you will be able to carry out Allah's behest with regard to them.”

Muhammad (570–632) Arabian religious leader and the founder of Islam

Sahih Muslim, Book 019, Number 4294
Sunni Hadith

War, Children, Fear, Peace

“I had not yet learned the lesson that when you are forever telling yourself that such and such is worth the price, then the price is too high and has been paid too often.”

Tanith Lee book Vazkor, Son of Vazkor

Book Two, Part I “Yellow City”, Chapter 5 (p. 152)
Vazkor, Son of Vazkor (1978)

Learning

“Let me assure you, nothing in this life feels better than having the confidence that you can take care of yourself and your family and know that you can continue to grow and excel in your profession and as a person.”

Richie Sambora (1959) musician, songwriter

Doctorate Award Speech, Kean University (2004)

Life, Family, Feeling, Confidence

“If I'm in, you know, especially in a poor area, and I see guys walking like they're thugs down the street, I don't care what color they are, I go "That guy looks like they're a thug, and looks like they're tough, okay… If they try to shake me down I'm gonna ignore them and keep walking, and if they come up to me and try to put a hand on me, I'm gonna punch 'em right in the throat. 'Cause I don't wanna jump on top on of 'em and hurt my knees and stuff, when I slam their head in the ground. Plus, I don't wanna kill 'em. 'Cause then I'd have to go to jail and stuff, and they'd have to find that it was done in self defense. Been down that road." So, I'm sitting there and I'm thinking, "Alright. I'm gonna punch this guy in the throat." I'm thinking how hard am I gonna punch him. And I'm not thinking he's a black guy. I'm thinking the guy's walking like a thug, thinks they're tough, and I'm thinking about how I'm going to defend myself. Just like when I've been at the Coast, a few years ago, and walk out of a restaurant in South Padre and they're having a biker rally—and it wasn't like a nice biker rally, most rallies are nice people—it was like thug wannabes, rode up with a motorcycle…and were looking at me, and I was thinking "Okay. Alright. That guy is taking his helmet off. I'm gonna punch him in the throat the minute he tries to get up and do something, and then I'm gonna assault those next three guys. Then they'll probably pull a weapon. I need to take that." I mean, that's what I'm thinking whenever something like that is going on. I can't help it. I'm thinking, "Alright, I'm ready to kill." That's just how I am. And I'm thinking, "Alright. Okay. Instantly assess these guys. These are probably ex-con, real criminals. I've got my three kids here. That gives me, you know, just turbo dinosaur power. And I'm thinking, "Control yourself. Don't have a fight, unless you absolutely got to."”

Alex Jones (1974) American radio host, author, conspiracy theorist and filmmaker

You know, the man in me is ready to take all on! and... you know what I'm talking about, don't you? ARGH, you scum! I hate gang members and filth! And it has nothing to do with black people. But I will stump your head in if you start a fight with me, you thug scum! Anyways, excuse me ladies and gentlemen. "Alex Jones Self-Defense Rant" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HIMJ_pxy2eU, July 2013. 2013

Hate, People, Color, Guy

“To be open, receptive and exposed to the dangers of making improvised music, means exposing yourself to unwanted situations that could break the foundations of your own security. … You must engage in questioning your security, see it as a constriction. You are aware and scared, as if you were in a dark corridor. Now you are starting to realise that what you thought of as walls existed only in your imagination.”

Mattin (1977) Spanish musician

Pages 20–21.
"Going Fragile" (July 2005)

Music, Imagination, Question

“!-- What you have to do first is separate yourself from the world, most new-born babies don’t see any difference between them, their playpen and their Dad. It’s all them. Only after a little while do they start to realise that it’s not all me, just this bit is me. So by the invention of something similar to the word or concept ‘I’ we separate ourselves from the universe. Then we start to separate up the universe. We will divide sky from ground, the organic from inorganic. Looked at like this, doesn’t it provide a literal interpretation of the Biblical Creation story. -->If you take the idea of God in the Bible as a metaphor for any nascent, formative just-created intelligence, is that not how we all create the universe. We divide the firmament up from the waters of the abyss, and the key to how to do this is in the first line: in the beginning, there was the word. By giving sky one word, the ground into another, we break the universe down into manageable things that we can interact with through language.”

Alan Moore (1953) English writer primarily known for his work in comic books

De Abaitua interview (1998)

God, World, Intelligence, Idea

“[Her message to women and girls of the world] You are more powerful than you can possibly imagine. You are more powerful than you can possibly imagine. And it is incumbent upon you to use that power--not only for yourself, but for everyone else around you.”

Jennifer Beals (1963) American actress and a former teen model

Global Health TV Interview at Women Deliver Conference (16 June 2010) http://www.globalhealthtv.com/news/v/jennifer_beals_attends_women_deliver_as_guest_of_united_nations_fund/to/latest_news/.

Women, World, Imagination, Girl

“Above all, avoid falsehood, every kind of falsehood, especially falseness to yourself. Watch over your own deceitfulness and look into it every hour, every minute.”

Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1821–1881) Russian author

Book II, ch. 4 (trans. Constance Garnett)
The Elder Zossima, speaking to Mrs. Khoklakov
The Brothers Karamazov (1879–1880)

Falseness

“Ask yourself, if you or a loved one is to undergo brain or heart surgery, does it matter whether the surgeons who will operate had been selected for medical school for any other reason than their aptitude for medicine and surgery? Even if there were no quotas, should race have been "taken into consideration" in their selection? Consider the hairline life and death decisions that surgeons make all the time. Does not every consideration, however slight, apart from aptitude, dilute the qualifications of surgeons for surgery? The next time you are crossing a great bridge, do you not rely upon the qualifications of the engineers and builders to ensure your safety? What does the skin color of the classmates of doctors or engineers have to do with their medicine or their engineering? Is it not their professional qualification that matters, and not either the sameness or the differences from which they came? Is not the same true if we are seeking mathematicians, physicists, economists, or generals? In each case, what is apt for the end in view may be regarded as good, what is inapt may be regarded as bad.”

Harry V. Jaffa (1918–2015) American historian and collegiate professor

2000s, Is Diversity Good? (2003)

Love, Life, Death, School

“Anything that affects your senses … is your business. If you want to kill yourself through nicotine or cyanide, it's your business.”

Timothy Leary (1920–1996) American psychologist

Harvard Law School Forum (1966)

Business, Sense

“My father once told me that the art of receiving a compliment is, of all things, the sign of a civilized man. He died soon afterwards, leaving my education in this important matter sadly incomplete; I'm only glad that, on this, the occasion of the rarest compliment he ever could have dreamed of, that he isn't here to see his son so publicly at a loss. In receiving a compliment, or in trying to, the words are all worn out by now. They're polluted by ham and corn. And, when you try to scratch around for some new ones, it's just an exercise in empty cleverness. What I feel this evening, is not very clever. it's the very opposite of emptiness. The corny old phrase is the only one I know to say it: my heart is full; with a full heart, with all of it, I thank you. This is Samuel Johnson, on the subject of what he calls contrarieties: "there are goods, so opposed that we cannot seize both, and, in trying, fail to seize either. Flatter not yourself, he says, with contrarieties. Of the blessings set before you, make your choice. No man can, at the same time, fill his cup from the source, and from the mouth of the nile." For this business of contrarieties has to do with us. With you, who are paying me this compliment, and for me, who has strayed so far from this hometown of ours. Not that I am alone in this, or unique, I am never that; but there are a few of us left in this conglomerated world of us who still trudge stubbornly along this lonely rocky road; and this is in fact our contrariety. We don't move nearly as fast as our cousins on the freeway; we don't even get as much accomplished just as the family sized farm can't possibly raise as many crops or get as much profit as the agricultural factory of today. What we do come up with has no special right to call itself better it's just.. different. No if there's any excuse for us it all, it's that we're simply following the old American tradition of the maverick, and we are a vanishing breed. This honor I can only accept in the name of all the mavericks. And also, as a tribute to the generosity of all the rest of you; to the givers, to the ones with fixed addresses. A maverick may go his own way but he doesn't think that it's the only way, or ever claim that it's the best one, except maybe for himself. And don't imagine that this raggle-taggle gypsy-o is claiming to be free. It's just that some of the necessities to which I am a slave are different from yours. As a director, for instance, I pay myself out of my acting jobs. I use my own work to subsidize my work (in other words I'm crazy). But not crazy enough to pretend to be free. But it's a fact that many of the films you've seen tonight could never have been made otherwise. Or, if otherwise, well, they might have been better, but certainly they wouldn't have been mine. The truth is I don't believe that this great evening would ever have brightened my life if it wasn't for this: my own, particular, contrariety. Let us raise our cups, then, standing as some of us do on opposite ends of the river, to what really matters to us all: to our crazy, beloved profession, to the movies — to good movies, to every possible kind.”

Orson Welles (1915–1985) American actor, director, writer and producer

Speech given upon his acceptance of the AFI Lifetime Achievement award. Viewable http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXJnxClGamA&list=HL1349840607&feature=mh_lolz

Life, Truth, World, Education

“First of all, directing is an idea that you have of a total flow of images that are going on, which are incidentally actors, words, and objects in space. It's an idea you have of yourself, like the idea you have of your own personality which finds its best representation in the world in terms of specific flows of imaginary images. That's what directing is.”

Abraham Polonsky (1910–1999) American politician

as quoted in Directing the Film, Ed Sherman, 1976.

World, Idea, Personality

“Never follow a dog act. You know you're on the skids when you play yourself in the movie version of your life.”

Erica Jong (1942) Novelist, poet, memoirist, critic

Erica Jong's father (a musician, songwriter and later business man), his two pieces of advice for her. Given in the Times Literary Supplement, 7 October 1994, page 44.
Other

Life, Dogs

“You have got to stop seeing yourself as a victim, take control and take responsibility.”

Trinny Woodall (1964) English fashion advisor and designer, television presenter and author

Retail therapists (2007)

“Even if you are alone you wage war with yourself.”

Dejan Stojanovic (1959) poet, writer, and businessman

“War,” p. 86
The Sun Watches the Sun (1999), Sequence: “A Game”

War

“I tell young people who ask me about their careers, "Wake up on Saturday and ask yourself, Which job would I go to right now? Then choose that one." Because what it tells you is that you're going to your passion; your passion is your work. And I feel that way about my work.”

Regina E. Dugan (1963) American businesswoman, inventor, and technology developer

Fast Company interview (2011)

People, Way, Feeling, Passion

“Compromise is necessary,” Max agreed, “so long as you never give up who you are. That isn’t compromise; that’s spiritual death. You have to remain true to yourself.”

Charles de Lint (1951) author

“Where Desert Spirits Crowd the Night”, p. 291
The Ivory and the Horn (1996)

Death

“By and large, the critics and readers gave me an affirmed sense of my identity as a writer. You might know this within yourself, but to have it affirmed by others is of utmost importance. Writing is, after all, a form of communication.”

Ralph Ellison (1914–1994) American novelist, literary critic, scholar and writer

"The Art of Fiction: An Interview" (The Paris Review, Spring 1955), in The Collected Essays, ed. John F. Callahan (New York: Modern Library, 1995), p. 218.

Communication, Sense

“Therefore my tax-payer, resign yourself to this: that we may fight bravely, fight hard, fight long, fight cunningly, fight recklessly, fight in a hundred and fifty ways, but we cannot fight cheaply.”

George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright

The Daily Chronicle on the 7 March 1917 https://www.rte.ie/centuryireland/index.php/articles/george-bernard-shaw-joyriding-on-the-front. 1910s, The Technique of War (1917)

Way, Fight