Who We Are Quotes - Page 17

• We may know who we are or we may not. We may be Muslims, Jews or Christians but until our hearts become the mould for every heart we will see only our differences.

  Rumi

  Christian, Spiritual, Heart

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• We're so quick to cut away pieces of ourselves to suit a particular relationship, a job, a circle of friends, incessantly editing who we are until we fit in.

  Charles de Lint

  Jobs, Cutting, Editing

  Charles De Lint (2000). “Triskell Tales: Twenty-two Years of Chapbooks”, Subterranean

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• We love our superheroes because they refuse to give up on us. We can analyze them out of existence, kill them, ban them, mock them, and still they return, patiently reminding us of who we are and what we wish we could be.

  Grant Morrison

  Giving Up, Superhero, Wish

  Grant Morrison (2011). “Supergods: Our World in the Age of the Superhero”, p.416, Random House

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• So here is why I write what I do: We all have futures. We all have pasts. We all have stories. And we all, every single one of us, no matter who we are and no matter what’s been taken from us or what poison we’ve internalized or how hard we’ve had to work to expel it – – we all get to dream.

  N.K. Jemisin

  Dream, Taken, Writing

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• In times of adversity and change, we really discover who we are and what we're made of.

  Howard Schultz

  Adversity, Made, Times Of Adversity

  Howard Schultz (2011). “Onward: How Starbucks Fought for Its Life Without Losing Its Soul”, p.200, Rodale

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• How can we truly understand who we are unless we know who we were and what we have the power to become?

  Neal A. Maxwell

  Knows

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• At the end of our lives it is our loves we remember most, because they are what shaped us. We have grown to be who we are around them, as around a stake.

  Anna Funder

  Our Love, Remember, Ends

  Anna Funder (2012). “All That I Am: A Novel”, p.13, Harper Collins

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• We all have different desires and needs, but if we don't discover what we want from ourselves and what we stand for, we will live passively and unfulfilled. Sooner or later, we are all asked to compromise ourselves and the things we care about. We define ourselves by our actions. With each decision, we tell ourselves and the world who we are. Think about what you want out of this life, and recognize that there are many kinds of success.

  Bill Watterson

  Motivational, Thinking, Decision

  "Some thoughts on the real world by one who glimpsed it and fled". Bill Watterson's commencement speech at the Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, www.graduationwisdom.com. May 20, 1990.

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• Love without truth is sentimentality; it supports and affirms us but keeps us in denial about our flaws. Truth without love is harshness; it gives us information but in such a way that we cannot really hear it. God's saving love in Christ, however, is marked by both radical truthfulness about who we are and yet also radical, unconditional commitment to us. The merciful commitment strengthens us to see the truth about ourselves and repent. The conviction and repentance moves us to cling to and rest in God's mercy and grace.

  Timothy Keller

  Moving, Commitment, Love Is

  Timothy Keller (2013). “The Obedient Master”, p.34, Penguin

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• But we all make mistakes. It’s how we fix them that makes us who we are.

  Jessica Sorensen

  Mistake, Making Mistakes, We All Make Mistakes

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• No. Take the heart first. Then you don't feel the cold so much. The pain so much. With the heart gone, there's no reason to stay your hand. Your eyes can look on death and not tremble. It's the heart that betrays us, makes us weep, makes us bury our friends when we should be marching ahead. It's the heart that sickens us at night and makes us hate who we are. It's the heart that sings old songs and brings memories of warm days.

  Jeanette Winterson

  Life, Song, Pain

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• Don’t discount that part of who he was just because you didn’t know it. None of us are all of who we are to any one person.

  John Scalzi

  Persons, Discounts, Knows

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• Life's too short to care about what other people think. Besides, they should accept us for who we are

  Jeannette Walls

  Thinking, People, Care

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• [Happiness] comes when we choose to be who we are, to be ourselves, at this present moment in our lives.

  Jean Vanier

  Moments, Our Lives, Present Moment

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• Clearly recognizing what is happening inside us, and regarding what we see with an open, kind and loving heart, is what I call Radical Acceptance. If we are holding back from any part of our experience, if our heart shuts out any part of who we are and what we feel, we are fueling the fears and feelings of separation that sustain the trance of unworthiness. Radical Acceptance directly dismantles the very foundations of this trance.

  Tara Brach

  Heart, Acceptance, Feelings

  "Accepting Absolutely Everything" by Tara Brach, www.huffingtonpost.com. September 10, 2012.

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• Throughout human history, as our species has faced the frightening, terrorizing fact that we do not know who we are, or where we are going in this ocean of chaos, it has been the authorities - the political, the religious, the educational authorities - who attempted to comfort us by giving us order, rules, regulations, informing - forming in our minds - their view of reality. To think for yourself you must question authority and learn how to put yourself in a state of vulnerable open-mindedness, chaotic, confused vulnerability to inform yourself.

  Timothy Leary

  Religious, Confused, Educational

  "How to Operate Your Brain". Documentary, a guided meditation spoken by Timothy Leary and set to music, 1994.

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• Other people teach us who we are. Their attitudes to us are the mirror in which we learn to see ourselves, but the mirror is distorted. We are, perhaps, rather dimly aware of the immense power of our social enviornment.

  Alan Watts

  Attitude, Mirrors, People

  Alan Watts (2011). “The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are”, p.50, Souvenir Press

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• Relationships unlock certain parts of who we are supposed to be.

  Donald Miller

  Certain, Supposed To Be

  Donald Miller (2010). “Father Fiction: Chapters for a Fatherless Generation”, p.42, Simon and Schuster

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• The late British-born philosopher Alan Watts, in one of his wonderful lectures on eastern philosophy, used this analogy: "If I draw a circle, most people, when asked what I have drawn, will say I have drawn a circle or a disc, or a ball. Very few people will say I've drawn a hole in the wall, because most people think of the inside first, rather than thinking of the outside. But actually these two sides go together--you cannot have what is 'in here' unless you have what is out there.' " In other words, where we are is vital to who we are.

  Eric Weiner

  Wall, Philosophy, Thinking

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  Our flaws are what makes us human. If we can accept them as part of who we are, they really don't even have to be an issue.

  Ellen DeGeneres

  Issues, Flaws, Accepting

  Ellen DeGeneres (2011). “Seriously ... I'm Kidding”, p.8, HarperCollins Australia

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• Because it's our choices that makes us who we are.

  Jeff Kinney

  Choices, Our Choices

  Jeff Kinney (2012). “Diary of a Wimpy Kid”, p.189, Abrams

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• Schwartz's research suggests something important: we can stretch our personalities, but only up to a point. Our inborn temperaments influence us, regardless of the lives we lead. A sizeable part of who we are is ordained by our genes, by our brains, by our nervous systems. And yet the elasticity that Schwartz found in some of the high-reactive teens also suggests the converse: we have free will and can use it to shape our personalities.

  Susan Cain

  Personality, Brain, Important

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• There's a dream world that we visit sometimes and that's how we found out who we are.

  Anthony Horowitz

  Dream, World, Sometimes

  Anthony Horowitz (2012). “The Gatekeepers #3: Nightrise”, p.174, Scholastic Inc.

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• Feelings and stories of unworthiness and shame are perhaps the most binding element in the trance of fear. When we believe something is wrong with us, we are convinced we are in danger. Our shame fuels ongoing fear, and our fear fuels more shame. The very fact that we feel fear seems to prove that we are broken or incapable. When we are trapped in trance, being fearful and bad seem to define who we are. The anxiety in our body, the stories, the ways we make excuses, withdraw or lash out—these become to us the self that is most real.

  Tara Brach

  Real, Believe, Self

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• The personality is defined by its inconsistencies, not its consistencies. It's what makes us unique and who we are.

  Sherrilyn Kenyon

  Unique, Personality, Consistency

  Sherrilyn Kenyon (2011). “The Guardian”, p.11, Macmillan

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