Only I Know Myself Quotes & Sayings

Well, do you know what I hope for, once I allow myself to begin to hope? [ ... ] That you find in your love for people something not only to work for, but to comfort and restore you when there is a need. — Vincent Van Gogh

We only came close to dying six or seven times, which I thought was pretty good. Once, I lost my grip and found myself dangling by one hand from a ledge fifty feet above the rocky surf. But I found another handhold and kept climbing. A minute later Annabeth hit a slippery patch of moss and her foot slipped. Fortunately, she found something else to put it against. Unfortunately, that something was my face.
"Sorry," she murrmured.
"S'okay," I grunted, though I'd never really wanted to know what Annabeth's sneaker tasted like. — Rick Riordan

I didn't really know who I was, but improv had taught me that I could be anyone. I didn't have to wait to be cast - I could give myself the part. I could be an old man or a teenage babysitter or a rodeo clown. In three short years Chicago had taught me that I could decide who I was. My only job was to surround myself with people who respected and supported that choice. Being foolish was the smartest thing to do. — Amy Poehler

More than once, while staring at the wall, I'd thought of Our Lady. I wanted to talk to her, to say, Where do I go from here? But when I'd seen her earlier, when August and I had first come in, she didn't look like she could be of service to anybody, bound up with all that chain around her. You want the one you're praying to at least to look capable. I dragged myself out of bed and went to see her anyway. I decided that even Mary did not need to be one hundred percent capable all the time. The only thing I wanted was for her to understand. Somebody to let out a big sigh and say, You poor thing, I know how you feel. Given a choice, I preferred someone to understand my situation, even though she was helpless to fix it, rather than the other way around. But that's just me. Right — Sue Monk Kidd

I begin to cry as my walls of my resolve break down. I don't know how long I can hold on. The pain is horrid and I curl into myself wrestling with a wish to die and a wish to live. Both have their perks. Only one will release me from this agony. — Celia Mcmahon

I don't know if I would call it therapy, but filmmaking is really the only thing I know how to do.For me, making movies is a way to bring on change for myself, and I really enjoy that part. — Takashi Miike

In another corner Nathaniel murmured to Maura, "You must know, Miss O'Connell, I ... I loved you even before I saw you. It was your father's way of talking."
Maura shook her head. "You mustn't say that. It's not my dear da's words that should do the wooing," she said gently. "I'd rather be cared for ... for what I am myself."
Nathaniel nodded. "I'll not say more. But I will tell you what I think I'm going to do."
And what is that
I'm going to California to search for gold."
And do you think, Nathaniel Brewster, you'll find it?"
I do. But it won't be as fine as what's here," Nathaniel said with a shy smile. "Maura O'Connell ... will ... will you ... wait for me to come back?"
Maura was silent.
Will you?"
You're a fine young man, Mr. Brewster. I can only say I'll not forget you. — Avi

The whole of my life I have relied on beauty first, brains second. It was expected, even requested. But you saw right through me from the start. You are the only man I've ever known who has looked beyond my face and wanted to know me for me. And I find myself wanting you to know the whole of me. — Kristen Callihan

I love you, June, and you know how acutely, how desperately. You know that no one can say or do anything to shake my love. I have taken you into myself, whole. You need have no fear of being unmasked, only loved. — Anais Nin

I don't see myself as a moviemaker only, you know? When I can do a picture, I do. But I don't work like a business, in pictures. I am not obliged to make one picture after the other in order to live. — Alejandro Jodorowsky

After I left here on Saturday, I decided never to see you again."
He was sliding the frittata under the broiler, so she could only see his profile, but damn if he didn't appear to be smirking.
"I know that, darling. It wounds my pride you won't go out with me, but I can console myself with the knowledge that when you do see me, you can't keep your knickers on for ten minutes running."
She threw her cookie at him, feigning indignation. "You bastard! Are you calling me easy?"
"I like you easy. Besides, you're not to blame. Who'd want to wear wet knickers? — Ruthie Knox

To see things as they really are renders life almost completely intolerable. Myself because I have, I believe, at least in part, seen things as they really are, I could never act. I have always remained on the fringe of actions. So, is it desirable that people come to see things as they really are? I don't know. I believe that, in general, people are incapable of it. So therefore it is true that only a monster can see things as they really are, because the monster lies outside of humanity. — Emil Cioran

Something must always remain that eludes us ... For power to have an object on which it can be exercised, a space in which to stretch out its arms ... As long as I know there exists in the world someone who does tricks only for the love of the trick, as long as I know there is a woman who loves reading for reading's sake, I can convince myself that the world continues ... And every evening I, too, abandon myself to reading, like that distant unknown woman ... — Italo Calvino

I didn't know his age or how he liked his tea, I was wearing a terrible coat and I was drunk as a stoat - but this moment felt like it. The one I'd been waiting patiently for since I was a little girl. I'd worked so hard, for so long, at being ok with being single, but all of the things I'd told myself about independence were disappearing rapidly into the cold night. Right now, he felt like the only person who mattered in the whole world. — Lucy Robinson

You're the only person who really knows me. The only person I feel I truly know myself."
"Knowledge isn't love," I contradicted. — Kiera Cass

What if once you get to know me, you don't like what you see?"

He took my hand and lifted it to his battered lips. "I already know you're the only woman in the world I'd allow myself to get my ass kicked for. I'm pretty sure it can only get better from here."

I almost smiled. "Ah, so you're an optimist."

"Not until I met you. — Lisa Kessler

It sounds like a lot when you summarize it, but I don't do all of it every day. If you want to know the truth, most days I feel like I'm miserably behind and only doing about half of what I should be doing. But when you look back you can see that you're building something. I think people who say 'Don't look back' are crazy. I wouldn't survive if I weren't looking back and patting myself on the back all the time for making it this far. — Charity Shumway

What are these deaths and revivals? It is clear that I do not live whenever I lose my faith in the existence of God, and I would have killed myself long ago if I did not have some vague hope of finding God. I truly live only whenever I am conscious of him and seek him. "What, then, do I seek?" a voice cried out within me. "He is there, the one without whom there could be no life." To know God and to liVe come to one and the same thing. God is life. — Leo Tolstoy

There is so much I could say about myself, but I wish you know only this; at times I may be bitter, at times I may be sweet; do not judge me on one character or the other. I have more facets than a jewel, I ask that you understand all of me before you judge me. No one side of my personality is bigger than another, just as no one emotion claims me all the time. — K.K. Cook

The look he gave me ... My stomach quivered in that exact same way when I watched Before Sunset, yearning for a guy to know me so deeply and truly, we were only really complete when we were together. That I could talk, go on wild tangents, make obtuse references, and he would divine my meaning before I knew what I was trying to say myself. Erik had fallen asleep next to me on the couch, complaining later that the movie was "just people talking." He had no idea that this movie could have been a love letter written for me. — Justina Chen

I would know of myself through the witnessing and naming of others. As Jesus in the Gospels is only seen and spoken of and recorded by others. I would know my existence and the value of that existence through others' eyes, which I believed I could trust as I could not trust my own. — Joyce Carol Oates

You want to know how to stop this killer? Forgive yourself, and he'll
disappear from your life forever."
"Thanks. I'll be sure to do that."
And I know:
1. This is almost the same conversation I've had with myself many times
before.
2. Gordon's only trying to help.
But it doesn't matter.
I:
1. Say, "See you later."
2. Step outside.
3. Close the door.
I don't want to, really. I want to go back inside and believe Gordon's words,
like a child believing in a fairy tale, and I want to escape this nightmare forever.
But I can't.
I realize now that it's easy to tell the difference between a real problem and
an imaginary one.
It's just the terror of facing the truth that's hard. — Jeremy C. Shipp

I thought about life, about my life, the embarrassments, the little coincidences, the shadows of alarm clocks on bedside tables. I thought about my small victories and everything I'd seen destroyed, I'd swum through mink coats on my parents' bed while they hosted downstairs, I'd lost the only person I could have spent my only life with, I'd left behind a thousand tons of marble, I could have released sculptures, I could have released myself from the marble of myself. I'd experienced joy, but not nearly enough, could there be enough? The end of suffering does not justify the suffering, and so there is no end to suffering, what a mess I am, I thought, what a fool, how foolish and narrow, how worthless, how pinched and pathetic, how helpless. None of my pets know their own names, what kind of person am I? — Jonathan Safran Foer

We are living in an artificial world - a world of fantasies and illusions. We've learned beautiful phrases but haven't learned yet how to carry out that little bit that we know. Our brains are stuffed with quotations, while at the same time nine out of ten of these dogmas are incomprehensible, murky, or lies. Which are worthwhile and which are not? Yes, I must stop being false before others and myself. How simple it all seems! But how do I do this? Let just a little time pass, and then we may understand - only the simplest, honorable acts determine the value of a man. Only I myself can and must help myself to become an adult. — Boris Gorbachevsky

I grab the nearest rock, toss it in my hand, watching as it drops and soars into the air again. I chunk it in the water, as the rock sinks to the bottom, ripples cast in each direction. Unsatisfied I do this again. And again. I only stop when I feel him approach. I stop and steady myself, I don't turn. I know it's him, my body turns rigid and my heart speeds up as if the devil himself is behind me. — Brittany Butler

I have to certainly stand for life. I know that there are some who disagree, and I respect their point of view. But I believe that life begins at conception. The only exception I have to have on abortion is in that case - of the life of the mother. I struggled with it myself for a long time, but I came to realize life is that gift from God. — Richard Mourdock

I find relief from the questions only when I concede that I am not obliged to know everything. I remind myself it is sufficient to know what I know, and that what I know, may not always be true. — Maya Angelou

It's instinct," he said then. "For centuries, it's been our job to protect our home, our women, and our children. We're emotional cowards. We don't talk about our feelings, we're not comfortable putting our soul into words. So we give of ourselves the only way we know how. We protect. We smother those we love in protection, fight for ways to keep them always safe, even from what we deem as a threat from themselves. It's in our genes, Kira. Right or wrong. Emotions are harder for a man to voice, strength is much easier for us to show. It's not an insult, it's the way men show their emotions for those they love. You can't change it."
"I can protect myself. — Lora Leigh

I want to crawl to her feet, whimper to be forgiven, for loving her, for needing her more than my own life, for belonging to her more than my own soul."

"If he loved you with all the power of his soul for a whole lifetime, he couldn't love you as much as I do in a single day."

"...he's more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same."

"If you ever looked at me once with what I know is in you, I would be your slave."
"Be with me always. Take any form, drive me mad, only do not leave me in this dark alone where I cannot find you."
~ Wuthering Heights — Emily Bronte

I'm in love with you," he said quietly.
"Augustus," I said.
"I am," he said. He was staring at me, and I could see the corners of his eyes crinkling. "I'm in love with you, and I'm not in the business of denying myself the simple pleasure of saying true things. I'm in love with you, and I know that love is just a shout into the void, and that oblivion is inevitable, and that we're all doomed and that there will come a day when all our labor has been returned to dust, and I know the sun will swallow the only earth we'll ever have, and I am in love with you. — John Green

One time, when we'd been discussing martial arts, Murphy told me that eventually, no-one can teach you anything more about them. Once you reach that state of knowledge, the only way to keep learning and increasing your own skill is to teach what you know to others. That's why she teaches a children's class and a rape-defence course every spring and fall at one of her neighbourhood's community centres.
It sounded kind of flaky-Zen to me at the time, but Hell's bells, she'd been right. Once upon a time, it would have taken me an hour, if not more, to attain the proper frame of mind. In the course of teaching Molly to meditate, though, I had found myself going over the basics again for the first time in years, and understanding them with a deeper and richer perspective than I'd had when I was her age. I'd been getting almost as much insight and new understanding of my knowledge from teaching Molly as she'd been learning from me. — Jim Butcher

Not that I say,"Oh,I'm not going to associate with certain people.," but I have my world,and I only want to be around people who I feel stimulated by. I have to be honest I do have a new quest: I want to meet more vegetarians,people who are more like minded. There's something real neat about that feeling. It makes you feel so settled to know there's somebody else sitting right there,being so passionate about what I'm passionate about. I don't want to be around selfish people. I try to keep myself surrounded by deep people who will move me. — Alicia Silverstone

When you're walking at the airport, you're expected to smile at people because they know you ... I find that tough. I'm only trying to protect myself. So I don't take my eyes off the floor. People can take that as attitude. But it's actually shyness. Yes, it is a bad habit. But it's a defense mechanism. — Katrina Kaif

I am the only consistent person in my life and so I better like myself, and I better love myself. And I really better know that I'm as beautiful as anyone else. — Gabourey Sidibe

The others set up all this because they want me to know that what I did was important - important enough to burn coal.

But it doesn't feel important. Not like it should.

I'm reminded now, watching the coals burn, of why I never feel like I truly belong to Winter. I want to understand all this as deeply as Sir and Alysson and everyone else, a reminder of a time when everything was how it should be, but all this is wasted on me, someone whose only connection to Winter lies in stories told by others. I thought that if I had a hand in saving Winter, I'd feel like I deserve it, the kingdom everyone else remembers. I thought I could fill the void left by my lack of memories with purpose. That's what I've always told myself: if I matter to Winter, Winter will matter to me. And today I mattered to my kingdom.

Then why don't I feel anything more for the fire pit than the slight burn on my finger? — Sara Raasch

I have an unfortunate character; whether it is my upbringing that made me like that or God who created me so, I do not know. I know only that if I cause unhappiness to others, I myself am no less happy. I realize this is poor consolation for them - but the fact remains that it is so. In my early youth, after leaving the guardianship of my parents, I plunged into all the pleasures money could buy, and naturally these pleasures grew distasteful to me. Then I went into high society, but soon enough grew tired of it; I fell in love with beautiful society women and was loved by them, but their love only aggravated my imagination and vanity while my heart remained desolate ... I began to read and to study, but wearied of learning, too; I saw that neither fame nor happiness depended on it in the slightest, for the happiest people were the ignorant, and fame was a matter of luck, to achieve which you only had to be shrewd ... — Mikhail Lermontov

If I was late, I became so anxious that I might miss one single minute of my time with you that I would close my eyes at the red traffic lights, or look around for people who wore wrist watches to see the seconds ticking by as the traffic came to a standstill. Then I would run and run through all the people, and finally up the stairs, until I reached your room. 'I am not late' I would shout and I would hide myself in a corner by your cupboard and refuse to speak to you. 'Exaggerated behaviour' perhaps, but it is only those who have experienced it, who can know what it is. (59) — Sarah Ferguson

I could see the road ahead of me. I was poor and I was going to stay poor. But I didn't particularly want money. I didn't know what I wanted. Yes, I did. I wanted someplace to hide out, someplace where one didn't have to do anything. The thought of being something didn't only appall me, it sickened me. The thought of being a lawyer or a councilman or an engineer, anything like that, seemed impossible to me. To get married, to have children, to get trapped in the family structure. To go someplace to work every day and to return. It was impossible. To do things, simple things, to be part of family picnics, Christmas, the 4th of July, Labor Day, Mother's Day ... was a man born just to endure those things and then die? I would rather be a dishwasher, return alone to a tiny room and drink myself to sleep. — Charles Bukowski

I have to be honest in asking myself: Do I really want to know and do God's will? Or is it rather that I want God to do my will? Do I go to God with the assurance that I want only to know and do his will? Or do I rather first make my own plans and then insist that God make my dreams come true? — John Powell

Already we know almost literally nothing about the Revolution and the
years before the Revolution. Every record has been destroyed or falsified, every book has been rewritten, every picture has been repainted, every statue and street and building has been
renamed, every date has been altered. And that process is continuing day by day and minute by minute. History has stopped. Nothing exists except an endless present in which the Party is always right. I know, of course, that the past is falsified, but it would never be possible for me to prove it,
even when I did the falsification myself. After the thing is done, no evidence ever remains. The only
evidence is inside my own mind, and I don't know with any certainty that any other human being shares my memories. — George Orwell

But I'm your son, which was my only appeal and the last thing I would say. He made a dismissive sound, almost a laugh, and then he spoke again, with a snarling voice I had never heard before, he said The hell you are. He went on, he spoke without stopping, A faggot, he said, if I had known you would never have been born. You disgust me, he said, do you know that, you disgust me, how could you be my son? As I listened to him say these things it was as though even as I laid claim to myself I found there was nothing to claim, nothing or next to nothing, as though I were dissolving and my tears were the outward sign of that dissolution. — Garth Greenwell

Because just before I arrived, he showed up on the bus. He, meaning Damien.
He reminded me of the pain I'd felt when he died. He reminded me of what it's like to feel your heart explode in your chest cavity at the realization of living your life without the only person you've ever loved. And he reminded me of the promise I'd made to him months ago. I told him that I'd love him forever.
That I'd never let go.
But part of me wants to let go.
Deep down inside I know that I can't go on loving a ghost forever. I tell myself this every day. Then I see him and I forget about having those thoughts. Because when I do see him, he looks like the Damien I met on that humid summer day, who was smirking at me, and driving his candy apple red Cadillac in reverse. When I see him he looks so vivid.
So full of life.
Not so ... so ...
So dead. — Lauren Hammond

I am less to you than your ivory Hermes or your silver Faun. You will like them always. How long will you like me? Till I have my first wrinkle, I suppose. I know, now, that when one loses one's good looks, whatever they may be, one loses everything. Your picture has taught me that. Lord Henry Wotton is perfectly right. Youth is the only thing worth having. When I find that I am growing old, I shall kill myself. — Oscar Wilde

You don't know for sure if I'm pregnant."
"Do not play games, Raven. Sometimes your rebellious ways grow tedious. I know you are with child. You cannot hide such a thing from me. Mikhail knows it to be true, and he knows he cannot allow your dangerous involvement in this mission to continue with you in such a condition."
Raven flung out her ebony hair. "No one allows me to do anything. I decide. I was born and raised human, Gregori," she pointed out. "I can only be myself. Byron is my friend, and he is in desperate trouble. I intend to help him."
"If your lifemate is so enthralled with you that he would allow you such foolishness," Gregori replied softly, menacingly, "then I can do no other than protect you myself."
"Don't you talk about Mikhail like that!" Raven was furious.
You really know how to stir up the hornets' nest with the women, do you not? Mikhail demanded, even though he understood Gregori completely and felt him justified. — Christine Feehan

I know when to say no and when to say yes. I take responsibility for my choices. The victim? She went somewhere else. The only one who can truly victimize me is myself, and 99 percent of the time I choose to do that no more. But I need to continue to remember the key principles: boundaries, letting go, forgiveness after feeling my feelings - not before, self-expression, loving others but loving myself, too. — Melody Beattie

But I kept it to myself
maybe because I didn't think it mattered, but probably because, in a place where everyone knew my story, it was nice to know there was a chapter that only I had read. — Ally Carter

As sorry as I feel for myself, I feel even sorrier for her. I know she's afraid of staying and equally as frightened of going. Just as this land is a part of me, this house is a part of her. Selling off these things piece by piece is like cutting away chunks of her heart. I promised to make it better, but only God knows whether or not that's a promise I'll be able to keep. — Bette Lee Crosby

Am I a good person? Deep down, do I even really want to be a good person, or do I only want to seem like a good person so that people (including myself) will approve of me? Is there a difference? How do I ever actually know whether I'm bullshitting myself, morally speaking? — David Foster Wallace

I know not how to defeat others, I only know how to win over myself. The real and most dangerous opponents we face in life are fear, anger, confusion, doubt and despair. If we overcome those enemies who attack from within , we can attain a sure victory over any attack from without. — Chris Bradford

I only know that when I study mathematics, I transport myself to another world, a world of exquisite beauty and truth. And in that world I am the person I like to be. — Dora Musielak

Murder me with bombs you poor lonely sod I will only build myself again and stronger. I am too stupid to know better I am a woman built on the wreckage of myself. — Chris Cleave

The child I was is the only child I really know.' That's it. I can still feel what it was like to be that child of the 1940s from inside; I am still the same mixture of insecurity and determination, shyness and arrogance, curiosity and fear. I have the same talent she had; the same imagination. I write for her, for that child, and so it is true when I say I write for myself. — Susan Cooper

A stranger to myself and to the world, armed solely with a thought that negates itself as soon as it asserts, what is this condition in which I can have peace only by refusing to know and to live, in which the appetite for conquest bumps into walls that defy its assaults? — Albert Camus

I love, I can only love the one I've left behind, stained with my blood when, ungrateful wretch that I am, I extinguished myself and shot myself through the heart. But never, never have I ceased to love that one, and even on the night I parted from him I loved him perhaps more poignantly than ever. We can truly love only with suffering and through suffering! We know not how to love otherwise. We know no other love. I want suffering in order to love. I want and thirst this very minute to kiss , with tears streaming down my cheeks, this one and only I have left behind. I don't want and won't accept any other.
— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

I am naturally addicted to venery, I have little ambition and am not at all avaricious. Education has further limited my scope. Having been brought up in society, I am impregnated with its laws; not only should I be afraid of taking a holiday from them, I should also feel it painful to try to do so. In a word, I have conscience as well as fear of gaol. Yes, I know it by experience. How often have I tried to take holidays, to get away from myself, my own boring nature, my insufferable mental surroundings! But always without success. — Aldous Huxley

Making you believe what he wanted you to believe was his very reason for being. Maybe his only reason. I was intrigued by the way he turned events, or hints I had given him about people, into reality
that is, his kind of reality. This obsessive reinvention of the real never stopped, what-could-be having always to top what is.
...
I began to wonder which was real, the woman in the book or the one I was pretending to be upstairs. Neither of them was particularly "me." I was acting just as much upstairs; I was not myself just as much Maria in the book was not myself. Perhaps she was. I began not to know which was true and which was not, like a writer who comes to believe that he's imagined what he hasn't.
...
The book began living in me all the time, more than my everyday life. — Philip Roth

It wasn't until I began to work on my inner life and know myself that my life changed. Success really does begin within. The size and quality of your outer life is only limited by the size and quality of your inner life. — Robin Sharma

The secret to success: Don't stop to admire yourself too often. I only stopped to admire my work after I wrote eight books, before that, I never once admired myself for accomplishing anything in my profession. Don't stop to admire yourself too much, instead, admire people who have achieved more than you have, because that gives you something to keep on looking forward to. But when the time comes that you should take a look at the greatness you have done, make sure you take a really long and hard good look at it! Make sure you know your own greatness. — C. JoyBell C.

I have come to accept the feeling of not knowing where I am going. And I have trained myself to love it. Because it is only when we are suspended in mid-air with no landing in sight, that we force our wings to unravel and alas begin our flight. And as we fly, we still may not know where we are going to. But the miracle is in the unfolding of the wings. You may not know where you're going, but you know that so long as you spread your wings, the winds will carry you. — C. JoyBell C.

But perhaps there is another, more personal reason for my disagreement with Ramin: I cannot imagine myself feeling at home in a place that is indifferent to what has become my true home, a land with no borders and few restrictions, which I have taken to calling "the Republic of Imagination." I think of it as Nabokov's "somehow, somewhere" or Alice's backyard, a world that runs parallel to the real one, whose occupants need no passport or documentation. The only requirements for entry are an open mind, a restless desire to know and an indefinable urge to escape the mundane. — Azar Nafisi

Do you know my best quality?" she asks.
"Of your many, I could not say, my darling."
"I see the best in people. I fall in love with people when I see a window into their beings, their shining moments. I've fallen in love with so many people but the trouble is I fall out of love so quickly too. I see the worst in them just as easily.
"Do you know I fell in love with you right away? That day at the Trotters' I had noted you because you were new, of course, and then you sat down at the piano, and you played a few notes, but you played them so well, with no self consciousness, and no idea that anyone might be listening. It was in that room off the garden and you were the only one there. I was passing through on the way to the ladies' room and saw you there. I fell in love with you right then, and so I slipped my drink all over myself so I could meet you." — Janice Y.K. Lee

As it happens I am comfortable with the Michael Laskis of this world, with those who live outside rather than in, those in whom the sense of dread is so acute that they turn to extreme and doomed commitments; I know something about dread myself, and appreciate the elaborate systems with which some people manage to fill the void, appreciate all the opiates of the people, whether they are as accessible as alcohol and heroin and promiscuity or as hard to come by as faith in God or History.

But of course I did not mention dread to Michael Laski, whose particular opiate is History. I did suggest "depression," did venture that it might have been "depressing" for him to see only a dozen or so faces at his last May Day demonstration, but he told me that depression was an impediment to the revolutionary process, a disease afflicting only those who do not have ideology to sustain them. — Joan Didion

There had been a time when I owned my life and now I felt like I was coming around to myself again. It's like I've finally discovered bones in myself I never knew I had. I discovered that it takes bravery to be one's self. I now know that the only thing I needed to be afraid of was of not finding my true self and having the courage to be me. — Benilde Little

Yes, it's true that I fell in love with someone and that he died, along with the two other people I loved best in this world. That has been the main thing to know about me, the only thing about me for a very long time, although I didn't know it myself. But there must be more to know. There will be more. — E. Lockhart

The older I grow and the more I abandon myself to God's will, the less
I value intelligence that wants to know and will that wants to do; and
as the only element of salvation I recognize faith, which can wait patiently,
without asking too many questions. — Umberto Eco

I kept thinking about how you might never know that I missed you with only an ocean between us. But if it was death separating us ... I would find you. I don't care how many rules it would break. Even if I had to get all three keys myself and open a gate, I would find you again. Always. — Sarah J. Maas

God is true. The universe is a dream. Blessed am I that I know this moment that I have been and shall be free all eternity; ... that I know that I am worshiping only myself; that no nature, no delusion, had any hold on me. Vanish nature from me, vanish these gods; vanish worship; ... vanish superstitions, for I know myself. I am the Infinite. All these - Mrs. So-and-so, Mr. So-and-so, responsibility, happiness, misery - have vanished. I am the Infinite. How can there be death for me, or birth? Whom shall I fear? I am the One. Shall I be afraid of myself? Who is to be afraid of whom? ... — Swami Vivekananda

I am astonished, disappointed, pleased with myself. I am distressed, depressed, rapturous. I am all these things at once, and cannot add up the sum. I am incapable of determining ultimate worth or worthlessness; I have no judgment about myself and my life. There is nothing I am quite sure about. I have no definite convictions - not about anything, really. I know only that I was born and exist, and it seems to me that I have been carried along. I exist on the foundation or something I do not know. — C. G. Jung

Once upon a time, I, Chuang Tzu, dreamt I was a butterfly, fluttering hither and thither, to all intents and purposes a butterfly. I was conscious only of following my fancies as a butterfly, and was unconscious of my individuality as a man. Suddenly, I awoke, and there I lay, myself again. Now I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly dreaming that I am a man." The — David Eagleman

I always feel that I am a traveler, going somewhere and to some destination.
If I tell myself that the somewhere and the destination do not exist, that seems to me very likely and reasonable enough.
The brothel keeper, when he kicks anyone out, has similar logic, argues it well, and is always right, I know. So at the end of the course I shall find my mistake. Be it so. I shall find then that not only the Arts, but everything else as well, were only dreams, that one's self was nothing at all. — Vincent Van Gogh

Before he dies, all his experiences in these long years gather themselves in his head to one point, a ques-tion he has not yet asked the doorkeeper. He waves him nearer, since he can no longer raise his stiffening body. The doorkeeper has to bend low towards him, for the difference in height between them has altered much to the man's disadvantage. "What do you want to know now?" asks the doorkeeper; "you are insati-able." "Everyone strives to reach the Law," says the man, "so how does it happen that for all these many years no one but myself has ever begged for admit-tance?" The doorkeeper recognizes that the man has reached his end, and to let his failing senses catch the words roars in his ear: "No one else could ever be admitted here, since this gate was made only for you. I am now going to shut it. — Franz Kafka

This is the first time I have heard 'ethics' in the mouth of a man. You and I are the only men on this ship that know its meaning. At one time in my life, I dreamed that I might someday talk with men who used such language, that I might lift myself out of the place in life in which I had been born, and hold conversation and mingle with men who talked about just such things as ethics. — Jack London

I have always hesitated to give advice, for how can one advise another how to act unless one knows that other as well as one knows himself? Heaven knows. I know little enough of myself: I know nothing of others. We can only guess at the thoughts and emotions of our neighbours. Each one of us is a prisoner in a solitary tower and he communicates with the other prisoners, who form mankind, by conventional signs that have not quite the same meaning for them as for himself. — W. Somerset Maugham

That's what it felt like. Passed through is the only way I can express it. Like my body had passed clean through a stone wall. At what exact point I felt like I'd made it through, I can't recall, but suddenly I noticed I was already on the other side. I was convinced I'd made it through. I don't know about the logic or the process or the method involved - I was simply convinced of the reality that I'd passed through.
After that, I didn't have to think anymore. Or, more precisely, there wasn't the need to try to consciously think about not thinking. All I had to do was go with the flow and I'd get there automatically. If I gave myself up to it, some sort of power would naturally push me forward. — Haruki Murakami

With a strength I can be proud of, I live only for myself, and only die for myself. I'll never die for someone, cause I know the pain of who remains alive, this is my pride. — Kazuya Minekura

I once used the word OBSOLETE in a headline, only to discover that 43 per cent of housewives had no idea what it meant. In another headline, I used the word INEFFABLE, only to discover that I didn't know what it meant myself. — David Ogilvy

When he had ended, the holy hermit was a moment silent, then said: My son, I have attended to thy story and I know the maiden. I have myself seen her, as have many. Know, then, that she is capricious for she imposeth conditions that man cannot fulfill, and delinquency is punished by desertion. She cometh only when unsought, and will not be questioned. One manifestation of curiosity, one sign of doubt, one expression of misgiving, and she is away! — Ambrose Bierce

The only way to get better at stand-up is to do loads of gigs, and I don't know. I spread myself pretty thin to get the stage time. I'd love to do more, really. — Peter Serafinowicz

You know how I get angry sometimes? That's because it's the only way I can still feel. And I need to test myself, to make sure I'm really here. — Jodi Picoult

No one knows what he himself is made of, except his own spirit within him, yet there is still some part of him which remains hidden even from his own spirit; but you, Lord, know everything about a human being because you have made him ... Let me, then, confess what I know about myself, and confess too what I do not know, because what I know of myself I know only because you shed light on me, and what I do not know I shall remain ignorant about until my darkness becomes like bright noon before your face. — Augustine Of Hippo

I don't know, man." He reached into his inside pocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes.
"Ew!" I recoiled. "You smoke?"
"Only when I drink," he said, reaching for a lighter, "or when I'm seriously depressed."
I snatched the pack away. "These will kill you, and you don't want that."
"Yeah?" he said sarcastically. "How should I get myself killed then?"
"You could hang out with me some more," I suggested. "I attract homicidal maniacs like mosquitoes, baby. — Kyra Davis

It's all right."
"It's not. Nothing's right. I've never done a right thing in my life, it seems."
"That makes a pair of us then." Her lips pressed against the spot under his ear. "But I believe we are right together, don't you? People like us ... we have no talent for following rules. We can only follow our hearts. I've wronged people as well, but is it horribly wicked that I can't bring myself to regret it? It brought me to you."
He took one of her hands and kissed it. "You're so young, you can't know the meaning of true regret. It's never what you've done, love, it's what you've left undone. — Tessa Dare

Talking of appearances, I would like my future readers to know that the picture of Jim and me that Thomas Hart Benton painted on the wall of the Missouri state capitol bears not the slightest resemblance to either one of us. ... I've never been satisfied with any representation of myself and have seen only one picture of Jim that did him justice. I don't know why this should be, unless it is evidence of a nearly universal prejudice against us, instigated by Sunday school superintendents, Republicans, and bigots. — Norman Lock

How much of my body is really me? My face is me, for sure. Anyone who looked at my face would know it was me. ( ... ) But after that? If I showed myself a picture of myself from the shoulders down, would I be sure it was me? ( ... ) I close my eyes and ask myself what my feet look like. I only kind of know. ( ... )
I let it define me, but I can't even define it. — David Levithan

All I know: I could only encounter you, my oasis, coming out of a desert. Deserted myself. This is all right. My futureless and solitary self. When suddenly I hear the voice of the springs--Right away you made me want to sing. To cry. Then to drink. But after the desert, the merest trickle of water sounds like a storm. And ever since, Promethea's every murmur shakes my life like an earthquake. I was asleep. I was not thirsty. It would have been possible for me not to hear the first three tears. Ever since I never sleep. I listen. — Helene Cixous

Who was the real me? I can only repeat: I was a man of many faces.

At meetings I was earnest, enthusiastic, and committed; among friends, unconstrained and given to teasing; with Marketa, cynical and fitfully witty; and alone (and thinking of Marketa), unsure of myself and as agitated as a schoolboy.

Was the last face the real one?

No. They were all real: I was not a hypocrite, with one real face and several false ones. I had several faces because I was young and didn't know who I was or wanted to be. (I was frightened by the differences between one face and the next; none of them seemed to fit me properly, and I groped my way clumsily among them.) — Milan Kundera

I think spirituality, even if there's no God, even if there's nothing - I consider myself relatively spiritual. I believe in a God. I don't know what it's like, but I do believe in it. It's the only thing that makes any sense. Maybe I'm just looking for order in the chaos. Though, I do believe in Evolution and I do believe in science. — Gerard Way

For myself, the only way I know how to make a book is to construct it like a collage: a bit of dialogue here, a scrap of narrative, an isolated description of a common object, an elaborate running metaphor which threads between the sequences and holds different narrative lines together. — Hilary Mantel

I am caught in this contradiction: on the one hand, I believe I know the other better than anyone and triumphantly assert my knowledge to the other ("I know you - I'm the only one who really knows you!"); and on the other hand, I am often struck by the obvious fact that the other is impenetrable, intractable, not to be found; I cannot open up the other, trace back the other's origins, solve the riddle. Where does the other come from? Who is the other? I wear myself out, I shall never know. — Roland Barthes

I know that I am going away on my own account. I must make the usual effort. I must have something to show for myself. To take what you would give me, I should have to be either a very large man or a very small one, and I am only in the middle class. — Willa Cather

Holly asks, "Do you know what he'll say? You're so calm."

I say, "I'm sick over it."

"You don't look it."

Corr can hold a thousand things in his heart and reveal only one of them on his face, like he did earlier today. He is so very like me.

I let myself, for one brief moment, consider what Malvern may want to meet about. The thought stings inside me, a cold needle.

"Now you do," says Holly. — Maggie Stiefvater

It's good you have something to keep you occupied." I smile stiffly and turn away from her. Because I'm this far from asking what the fuck she thinks I do all day. But even through the surge of anger that's rising, I remind myself of what I know is true: she means well. They all do. These women want me to receive all of God's blessings, many of which can be bestowed only after my temple marriage, which should be my first objective. Everything I've done so far (my two graduate degrees, my international travels, my teaching career, my friendships, my creative pursuits), is "preparing." Treading water, keeping time, staying busy until real life begins. — Nicole Hardy

I think, you know, it was something that I really wanted. I wanted so much to have a son or daughter. We adopted a son. And it was just the most wonderful thing. I think the only thing that was difficult for both Maury and myself were the sleepless nights. — Connie Chung

Culturally, though not theologically, I'm a Christian. I was born a Protestant of the white Anglo-Saxon persuasion. And while I do love that great teacher of peace who was called Jesus, and while I do reserve the right to ask myself in certain trying situations what indeed He would do, I can't swallow that one fixed rule of Christianity insisting that Christ is the only path to God. Strictly speaking, then, I cannot call myself a Christian. Most of the Christians I know accept my feelings on this with grace and open-mindedness. Then again, most of the Christians I know don't speak very strictly. To those who do speak (and think) strictly, all I can do here is offer my regrets for any hurt feelings and now excuse myself from their business. — Elizabeth Gilbert

I figure you know, I think you're an asshole. I don't only not like you, I hate you. I hate how you played me. I hate that I was so fucking stupid, I let myself get played. I hate that you know about this because I hate that you know anything about me. And I hate that I have to accept help from you. — Kristen Ashley

I will be forever grateful for your presence in my life. I am a much better human being because of you. The experience of loving you, living with you, was the greatest journey of my life thus far. You showed me an alternative to the man I was becoming.
I know I still have much to learn, much to accomplish, and I know my future is bright. I owe you the confidence I now have in myself. This is the confidence that could only come from the knowledge that a woman of your caliber loved me for who I am; for what you saw in me.
You are a great woman and I mean that in the strongest sense of the phrase. You feel deeply, think deeply, and live deeply. I admire so much about you. Regardless of whether our paths cross again, know that I am actively wishing you success and happiness. I pray that you will once again be part of my life. But if left with just the experience we've shared, I know my life was better because of it. — Emma Forrest

You are stronger than I. I have no armour for the struggle between us, I have only the Word, avenging weapon of the weak. Today I have availed myself of this weapon. This letter is nothing but an act of revenge - you see how honourable I am - and if any word of mine is sharp and bright and beautiful enough to strike home, to make you feel the presence of a power you do not know, to shake even a minute your robust equilibrium, I shall rejoice indeed. - Tristan — Thomas Mann

This only I know, that woe is me except in Thee: not only without but within myself also; and all abundance, which is not my God, is emptiness to me. — Augustine Of Hippo

I didn't sleep that night. I cried. I wasn't frightened for myself; I was indignant; it was the wickedness of it that broke me. The war came to an end and I went home. I'd always been keen on mechanics, and if there was nothing doing in aviation, I'd intended to get into an automobile factory. I'd been wounded and had to take it easy for a while. Then they wanted me to go to work. I couldn't do the sort of work they wanted me to do. It seemed futile. I'd had a lot of time to think. I kept on asking myself what life was for. After all it was only by luck that I was alive; I wanted to make something of my life, but I didn't know what. I'd never thought much about God. I began to think about Him now. I couldn't understand why there was evil in the world. I knew I was very ignorant; I didn't know anyone I could turn to and I wanted to learn, so I began to read at haphazard. — W. Somerset Maugham

Perhaps, as we say in America, I wanted to find myself. This is an interesting phrase, not current as far as I know in the language of any other people, which certainly does not mean what it says but betrays a nagging suspicion that something has been misplaced. I think now that if I had any intimation that the self I was going to find would turn out to be only the same self from which I had spent so much time in flight, I would have stayed at home. — James Baldwin