Jonathan Lethem Quotes

Judgment comes from you comparing yourself to other people, and expectations of what you think life should be.

If we judge ourselves only by our aspirations and everyone else only their conduct we shall soon reach a very false conclusion.

She said, 'Believe it or not, I used to be idealistic.' I asked her what 'idealistic' meant. 'It means you live by what you think is right.' 'You don't do that anymore?' 'There are questions I don't ask anymore.

The way I judge myself is not on how many World Cups I can win in a row.

We justify ourselves when we should judge ourselves. If we learned humility, it might spare us the humiliation.

At forty-two, I had never done anything that took my own breath away, and I suppose now that was part of the problem--my chronic inability to astonish myself. I promise you, no one judges me more harshly than I do myself; I caused a brilliant wreckage. Some say I fell from grace; they're being kind. I didn't fall. I dove.

The child is in me still and sometimes not so still.

There are no souls in the world that are so fearful to judge others as those that do most judge themselves, nor so careful to make a righteous judgment of men or things as those that are most careful to judge themselves.

What is it about childhood that never lets you go, even when you're so wrecked it's hard to believe you ever were a child?

I believe, when in my behavior or in relationships or in the way I react to something, that I'm still dealing with some leftover stuff from my childhood, but the good thing is now, because I have learned so much from the Bible, I can tell when I'm behaving wrong and when I'm not, and it doesn't take me very long to realize that's out of fear, or that's because I was controlled as a child, and I can make a conscious decision to behave the way I know I should behave.

The more I accuse myself, the more right I have to judge you. Even better, I make you judge yourself, which comforts me the more.

I look in the mirror through the eyes of the child that was me.

I hate mankind, for I think myself one of the best of them, and I know how bad I am.

The Human is the only animal on earth that pays a thousand times for the same mistake. We make a mistake, we judge ourselves, we find ourselves guilty, and we punish ourselves. Every time we remember, we judge ourselves again, we are guilty again, and we punish ourselves again and again and again.

If you always do your best there is no way you can judge yourself.

I think you judge yourself too severely, a quality that always distinguishes people of true worth.

Confession basically means saying the same thing about your sin as God says. So if you say you want to develop integrity, but you're not willing to face the rough parts and confess them, you won't get there.

Where we tended to be judgmental, we became more judgmental of ourselves in our spiritual practice.

I believe that in judging our actions we are more severe than professional judges. We judge not only our actions, but our thoughts, our intentions, our secret curses, our hidden hate.

If you ask any of the other actors, they'd probably say nice things because they're nice people, but I was always like, "Oh gosh, I hope I'm doing this right." I was very hard on myself, and I continue to be. That's why it's sometimes hard for me to digest watching myself on television. There is some pressure.

'Fault' means failure to meet a standard. Whose? Mine.

There are only three things you need to let go of judging, controlling, and being right. Release these three and you will have the whole mind and twinkly heart of a child.

As far as looking at myself on screen, I tend to pick out every single flaw that I could have or should have done better. I'm more of a cringer at first and when it is years down the road and out of my way, I can actually appreciate it somehow.

Judge yourself and beware of passing judgement on others. In judging others we expend our energy to no purpose; we are often mistaken and easily sin. But if we judge ourselves our labour is always to our profit.

Doing what we do [filming], you have to be your own critic and judge and adjudicate as to what you do and how it turned out.