Internal Reflection Quotes

Imagination is strong in a man when that particular function of the brain which enables him to observe is roused to activity without any necessary excitement of the sense. Accordingly, we find that imagination is active just in proportion as our sense are not excited by external objects. A long period of solitude, whether in prison or in a sick room; quiet, twilight, darkness-these are the things that promote its activity; and under their influence it comes into play of itself.

What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality.

Man knows himself only insofar as he knows the world, becoming aware of it if only within himself, and of himself self only within it. Each new subject, well observed, opens up within us a new organ of thought.

All thought of something is at the same time self-consciousness [...] At the root of all our experiences and all our reflections, we find [...] a being which immediately recognises itself, [...] and which knows its own existence, not by observation and as a given fact, nor by inference from any idea of itself, but through direct contact with that existence. Self-consciousness is the very being of mind in action.

If my film fails, I never think it was because the script was weak.

It has shown me that everything is illuminated in the light of the past. It is always along the side of us...on the inside, looking out.

We listen for guidance everywhere except from within.

Creative activity could be described as a type of learning process where teacher and pupil are located in the same individual.

I paint to rest from the phenomena of the external world-to pronounce and to make notations of its essences with which to verify the inner eye.

Most people prefer to think that their resentment is entirely the fault of the person they resent, and that twisted logic seems to make sense in their minds. But it makes no sense to me at all... But it's a popular point of view. Probably because it's so much easier. It relieves you of the burden of any and all self-examination. (Nathan to Nat)

Never forget that you are not in the world; the world is in you. When anything happens to you, take the experience inward. Creation is set up to bring you constant hints and clues about your role as co-creator. Your soul is metabolizing experience as surely as your body is metabolizing food

I see what you mean. It must be a huge relief, and an easy way out, to think the devil is always outside of us. (…) we would stop looking for Sheitan outside and instead focus on ourselves. What we need is sincere self-examination. Not being on the watch for the faults of others.” (p. 257).

It's not always easy to tell the difference between thinking and looking out of the window.

When a man fails to understand something he is conscious of a discord, and seeks for the cause of it not in himself, as he should, but outside himself - hence the war with what he does not understand.

Novels for me are how I find out what's going on in my own head. And so that's a really useful and indeed critical thing to do when you do as many of these other things as I do.

Live contemplating the body. Contemplate internally and externally. Contemplate the origination of things in the body. Contemplate the dissolution of things in the body.

When your mind is simply trapped by the image out there so that you never make the reference to yourself, you have misread the image.

Each reader reads only what is already within himself. The book is only a sort of optical instrument which the writer offers to the reader to enable the latter to discover in himself what he would not have found but for the aid of the book.

When you don't have those types of things, fashion and all that stuff, it helps you find yourself because you don't have those things to rely on.

We don't spend so much time on the opponent that we forget it's really about us.

You are not going to find yourself anywhere except right where you are.

It’s not in the book or in the writer that readers discern the truth of what they read; they see it in themselves, if the light of truth has penetrated their minds.

Is it possible to have negative self-awareness?

There's lots of prejudice, but if you examine yourself, you can make It. Of course, this doesn't make me too popular with some quarters in the women s movement.

The only knowledge which satisfies us is one which is subject to no external standards but springs from the inner life of the personality.