4,826 Quotes About Self

Because who you are is just the stories you tell yourself about yourself, and the intersection of all the hurts you've ever had and how you survived them.

But those stories aren't important to my story, and that's what I'm trying to muddle through right now—what I'm going to do, and where I'm going to go. And, most difficult of all, who I'm going to be—because who you are is just the stories you tell yourself about yourself, and the intersection of all the hurts you've ever had and how you survived them.

[T]he thing about someone who is escaping is this: he's more concerned about what he's leaving than what he's going to.

May I have the courage to be who I say I am.

That was with me for years—feeling I wasn’t myself. And I do think I wasn’t my real self then. Of course, I’m not sure there is such a thing as a real self. You could ransack your innards looking for the real you and never find it—slice yourself open and all you’ll find is blood and muscle and bone. . . .

I don't know if I believe this but that's what it felt like: As if we were to people mining one body, and in doing so, merged, until no corner was left saying I.

Paradise is not some kind of enchanted land filled with flowers and music. It is not some kind of spiritual Disneyland. Paradise is our primordial pure consciousness, which is free of all limitations but embodies the infinity of the divine.

Humans grow a tree within their minds. A tree known as the self. It's a tree that is nourished through wisdom and experience, emotion and love. Each person has their own variety and type of tree. What kind of flowers will it grow? What kind of fruit will it bear? Who will it fascinate, what will it yield, how will it keep the pests away? What kind of poison will it possess? How tall will it grow?

Think of brief insanities that are in you, not just the ones that blossomed as you grew into taller, more sinful versions of yourself, but the ones you were born with, tucked behind your liver.