Quotes & Sayings About Realisation

The Principle of Uncertainty fixed once for all the realisation that all knowledge is limited. It is an irony of history that at the very time when this was being worked out there should rise, under Hitler in Germany and other tyrants elsewhere, a counter-conception: a principle of monstrous certainty. When the future looks back on the 1930s it will think of them as a crucial confrontation of culture as I have been expounding it, the ascent of man, against the throwback to the despots' belief that they have absolute certainty. — Jacob Bronowski

Grandmas can shed the yoke of responsibility, relax and enjoy their grandchildren in a way that was not possible when they were raising their own children. And they can glow in the realisation that here is their seed of life that will harvest generations to come. — Erma Bombeck

I realized that no, no one would actually come to save or even stop me, I had absolutely no choice. The scale tipped: the moment not doing it became more difficult and unbearable than just doing it. — Aspen Matis

The greatest wonder of this world is the "Soul". Once It is realized (attained), everything is attained!!! — Dada Bhagwan

There's a fleeting moment that exists for every individual just before they do something truly life-altering. Its that flash of insight and sanity that stalls your heartbeat and bloo flow - a quick warning - just before you explode and make a fool of yourself. Or that incredible brief instant of clarity you have before you floor the gas pedal and run the red light. It's a split second of self admonishment in which you realise that what you're about to do is wrong, but just as quickly choose to ignore that realisation and do it anyway. It's too fast to catch, too bright to see, utterly gone even before you've blinked and therefore, it does a person absolutely no good at all. And yet, there it is. — Heather Killough-Walden

My last thought before falling asleep last night was a realisation that I was falling in love with Andrew.
Well, not me exactly. My stupid, traitorous heart. — N.R. Walker

In the humanist world following Erasmus, man is at the centre of the universe. Man becomes largely responsible for his own destiny, behaviour and future. This is the new current of thought which finds its manifestation in the writing of the 1590s and the decades which follow. The euphoria of Elizabeth's global affirmation of authority was undermined in these years by intimations of mortality: in 1590 she was 57 years old. No one could tell how much longer her golden age would last; hence, in part, Spenser's attempts to analyse and encapsulate that glory in an epic of the age. This concern about the death of a monarch who - as Gloriana, the Virgin Queen - was both symbol and totem, underscores the deeper realisation that mortality is central to life. After the Reformation, the certainties of heaven and hell were less clear, more debatable, more uncertain. — Ronald Carter

After another long silence, bit by bit, realisation dawned upon Edmund and he became even paler than Hecate herself which was, in itself, a fantastic achievement. Adele Rose, Awakening. — Adele Rose

Sergeant wheels the chair back to the door. Melanie takes this in, and reads it right. She won't be needing the chair again. She won't be going back to her cell. Tales the Muses Told is lying under her mattress back there, and she crashes head first into the realisation that she may never see it again. Those pages that smell of Miss Justineau are now, and perhaps for ever, inaccessibly distant. She — M.R. Carey

We cannot perceive what we are not vibrationally a part of.
We cannot be affected by an experience of evil, when we are focused on peace, harmony and love. — Raphael Zernoff

But the more time has been released from production, the more imperative it has become to absorb that time in consumption and consumerism, given that, as was earlier argued, capitalist 'economic rationality has no room for authentically free time which neither produces nor consumes commercial wealth'. The ever-present danger is that freely associating and self-creating individuals, liberated from the chores of production and blessed with a whole range of labour-saving and time-saving technologies to aid their consumption, might start to build an alternative non-capitalistic world. They might become inclined to reject the dominant capitalist economic rationality, for example, and start evading its overwhelming but often cruel rules of time discipline. To avoid such eventualities, capital must not only find ways to absorb more and more goods and services through realisation but also somehow occupy the free time that the new technologies release. — David Harvey

I believe that when a loved one has dementia, you experience many layers of grief.

The first wave of grief comes with the diagnosis. The realisation that the person who has supported you all your life, will no longer be able to do so, no matter how hard they try.

Grief the first time they struggle to remember your name or your relationship to each other.

Grief when you have to accept that you can no longer keep them at home.

Grief as they lose the ability to communicate, as another piece of the jigsaw is lost.

Grief every time they are afraid, agitated or confused. So much grief you don't think you can cope with anymore.

And then the overwhelming tidal wave of grief when they pass, when you would give anything to go back to the first wave of grief. — Emma Haslegrave

Self-realisation means that we have been consciously connected with our source of being. Once we have made this connection, then nothing can go wrong ... — Swami Paramananda

Whether you like it or not, you're forced to come to the realisation that death is out there. But I don't fear death, I'm a fatalist. I believe when it's your time, that's it. It's the hand you're dealt. — Clint Eastwood

I have only danced my life. As a child I danced the spontaneous joy of growing things. As an adolescent, I danced with joy turning to apprehension of the first realisation of tragic undercurrents; apprehension of the pitiless brutality and crushing progress of life. — Isadora Duncan

When one begins to concentrate, the dropping of a pin will seem like a thunderbolt going through the brain. As the organs get finer, the perceptions get finer. These are the stages through which we have to pass, and all those who persevere will succeed. Give up all argumentation and other distractions. Is there anything in dry intellectual jargon? It only throws the mind off its balance and disturbs it. Things of subtler planes have to be realised. Will talking do that? So give up all vain talk. Read only those books which have been written by persons who have had realisation. — Swami Vivekananda

With the morbid realisation that his sexual being was a dull thing, a lifeless thing, a mass-produced marionette with chipped paint and fraying strings — Will Self

The momentary discomfort was nothing at all compared to the realisation that she was finding refuge in my flawed embrace. — Tabitha McGowan

... sometimes knowing sucked. — James Dashner

The actual writing of a song usually comes in the form of a realisation. I can't contrive a song. — Gene Clark

There is no progress (spiritual) in this world like the one that comes from being cheated knowingly. This is a very high principle. — Dada Bhagwan

My doctrine means that I must identify myself with life, with everything that lives, that I must share the majesty of life in the presence of God. The sum-total of this life is God.. Man is not at peace with himself until he has become like unto God. The endeavor to reach this state is the supreme, the only ambition worth having. And this is self-realisation. This self-realisation is the subject of the Gita, as it is of all scriptures ... to be a real devotee is to realise oneself. Self-realisation is not something apart. — Mahatma Gandhi

Just when you've squared up to the solemn realisation that life is a bitch, it turns round and does something nice, just to confuse you. - Emily Spitzer, The Better Mousetrap — Tom Holt

The 'knowledge' (gnan) that was resulting into 'the things to be known' (gneya); when that 'knowledge' results in the 'Knower' (gnata); this is known as Self-Realization [Atma Gnan]. — Dada Bhagwan

Realisation danced across his face; she saw the hurt in his eyes. And a twisted, darker piece of her almost enjoyed it. The air in the room, stale with blood and sweat, and pure horror, hummed in the aftermath of her words. And finally, Ella knew what had to be done. — Shona Moyce

Wherever there has been expansion in love or progress in well-being, of individuals or numbers, it has been through the perception, realisation, and the practicalisation of the Eternal Truth-the oneness of all beings — Swami Vivekananda

Crossing the Fens by boat there comes the realisation that water not earth or sky is the natural element in this landscape. — Stephanie Green

Ideas are easy to come by, they spring effortlessly out of the vacuity of the mind and cost nothing. When they are held and projected onto one's self or others they become a project. When the project is enacted it becomes the work, and when the work is completed it appears to be self-existent. Creation is the process of form manifesting from emptiness, where that which arises from the mind comes into existence. Yet the distance between conception and realisation may be enormous, as vast as the distance between the stars. — Robert Beer

To gain significance, you must first realise that you are insignificant. — Manoj Vaz

If careful attention is paid to the reality, we will see clearly, the real shortage is of the right skills, rather than of jobs. If the right skills are developed, the right start-ups and other enterprises will emerge and provide the jobs needed. It's always the horse before the cart, not the other way round. At a personal level, it will require the realisation of the need for the acquisition of required skills, the discipline to pursue it and the commitment to push through. These will require a great deal of personal courage and effort. But then, the benefit will be immeasurable. — Emi Iyalla

Awaken the spirit of divinity in you. — Lailah Gifty Akita

We grow up with such an idealistic view on how our life should be; love, friendships, a career or even the place we will live ~ only to age and realise none of it is what you expected & reality is a little disheartening, when you've reached that realisation; you have learnt the gift of all, any new beginning can start now and if you want anything bad enough you'll find the courage to pursue it with all you have. The past doesn't have to be the future, stop making it so. — Nikki Rowe

Enlightenment is when a laptop comes to know that it is a laptop. — Girish Kohli

In the moment of quietness, my strength re-energized — Lailah Gifty Akita

The murder of my husband by the railways has altered the way I think about everything. I had always thought that the majority of people were decent and honourable. In the wake of the crash, what made me angry more than anything else was the realisation that this was not true. I still find it very hard to come to terms with. — Nina Bawden

As we drove I remembered how I had told myself I would make Simon happy. I didn't feel the same person. For I now knew that I had been stuffing myself up with a silly fairy tale, that I could never mean to him what Rose had meant. I think I knew it first as I watched his face while he listened to her singing, and then more and more, as he talked about the whole wretched business - not angrily or bitterly, but quietly and without ever saying a word against Rose. But most of all I knew it because a change in myself. Perhaps watching someone you love suffer can teach you more than suffering yourself can.
Long before we got back to the castle, with all my heart and for my own heart's ease as well as his, I would have given her back to him if I could. — Dodie Smith

His father cultivated art and self-realisation; his mother went in for simplicity and hygiene. Hence the child, during his tenderer years, was wholly unacquainted with any drink between the extremes of absinth and cocoa, of both of which he had a healthy dislike. — G.K. Chesterton

All the objects which he contemplated with as much curiosity and admiration as gratitude, for if, in absorbing his dreams, they had delivered him from an obsession, they themselves were, in turn, enriched by the absorption; they shewed him the palpable realisation of his fancies, and they interested his mind; they took shape and grew solid before his eyes, and at the same time they soothed his troubled heart. — Marcel Proust

We ought to test for the living water. — Lailah Gifty Akita

The unknown scares man, but those who confront it, will cease to fear it" (Rodolfo Rios Medina) — Rodolfo Rios Medina

A crowd is not merely impulsive and mobile. Like a savage, it is not prepared to admit that anything can come between its desire and the realisation of its desire. — Gustave Le Bon

A Sannyasin cannot belong to any religion, for his is a life of independent thought, which draws from all religions; his is a life of realisation, not merely of theory or belief, much less of dogma. — Swami Vivekananda

The success sometimes may come immediately, but we must be ready to wait patiently even for what may look like an infinite length of time. The student who sets out with such a spirit of perseverance will surely find success and realisation at last. — Swami Vivekananda

The blood and sweat shed by United States and United Nations troops proved to be the prime mover behind the realisation of freedom throughout the post-war period. — Kim Young-sam

When you imagine the reality of the fulfilled desire and feel the thrill of accomplishment, your subconscious brings about the realisation of desire. — Joseph Murphy

One ounce of the practice of righteousness and of spiritual Self-realisation outweighs tons and tons of frothy talk and nonsensical sentiments. — Swami Vivekananda

But he knew, too, that there is more than one story in this world at a time; and that her story was not his.
Their stories had entwined, but they had different trajectories, different conclusions. He could only hope the two stories would not separate. It was a strange sort of realisation: that he loved her. — Lavie Tidhar

The meaning of this is, that whomsoever we love, in him we find our own soul in the highest sense. The final truth of our existence lies in this. God, the Supreme Soul, is in me, as well as in my son, and my joy in my son is the realisation of this truth. — Rabindranath Tagore

I sucked that smoke in and made it part of me, joined mystically with the universe right at that point, said Yes to drugs forever just by the unique hit I got from that one packet of fags Andy liberated from his dad. It was a revelation, an epiphany; a sudden realisation that it was possible for matter - something there in front of you, in your hand, in your lungs, in your pocket - to take your brain apart and reassemble it in ways you hadn't thought of previously. This was better than religion, or this was what people meant by religion! The whole point was that this worked! People said Believe In God or Do Well At School or Buy This or Vote For Me or whatever, but nothing ever worked the way substances worked, nothing ever fucking delivered the way they did. They were truth. Everything else was falsehood. — Iain Banks

I pretended that it wasn't such a big deal, that I knew we weren't suited, that I agreed with what-ever bullshit rationale you used - 'we don't make each other the best possible versions of ourselves' or what-ever. But you did make me the best 'me'. — Lottie Moggach

We must believe, but we can't believe. Perhaps this is the tragedy that some of us see in Obama: a change we can believe in and the crushing realisation that nothing will change. — Simon Critchley

I was quite small as a kid and maybe a little afraid physically. When I grew into myself, the realisation changed. That when you hurt yourself, it's transient; it doesn't stay forever. — Brian O'Driscoll

At some point on the morning of the second day she came to a terrifying realisation. She had no idea how it had happened or how she was supposed to cope with it. She was in love for the first time in her life. — Stieg Larsson

As the eye of narrative drew back from the coffin on its stand, two things happened. One happened comparatively slowly, and this was Vargo's realisation that he never recalled the coffin having a pillow before.
The other was Greebo deciding that he was as mad as hell and wasn't going to take it any more. — Terry Pratchett

Spiritual awakening is the difficult process whereby the increasing realisation that everything is as wrong as it can be flips suddenly into the realisation that everything is as right is it can be. Or better, everything is as It as it can be. — Alan Watts

And what the white students had not expected to let themselves in for, when boarding the Freedom Train, was the realisation that the black situation in America was but one aspect of the fraudulent nature of American life. They had not expected to be forced to judge their parents, their elders, and their antecedents, so harshly, and they had not realised how cheaply, after all, the rulers of the republic held their white lives to be. Coming to the defence of the rejected and the destitute, they were confronted with the extent of their own alienation, and the unimaginable dimensions of their own poverty. They were privileged and secure only so long as they did, in effect, what they were told: but they had been raised to believe that they were free. — James Baldwin

A night of crying has silenced me. This morning it seems the whole world is against me. I've never before felt so barren, so empty. I've never before thought the daylight to be ... my enemy. My enemy. — Shaun Hick

The Unknown is not the Unknowable; it need not remain the unknown for us, unless we choose ignorance or persist in our first limitations. For to all things that are not unknowable, all things in the universe, there correspond in that universe faculties which can take cognisance of them, and in man, the microcosm, these faculties are always existant and at a certain stage capable of development. We may choose not to develop them; where they are partially developed, we may discourage and impose on them a kind of atrophy. But, fundamentally all possible knowledge is knowledge within the power of humanity. And since in man there is the inalienable impulse of Nature towards self-realisation, no struggle of the intellect to limit the action of our capacities within a determined area can for ever prevail. — Sri Aurobindo

Divine desperateness is the beginning of spiritual awakening because it gives rise to the aspiration for God-realisation. — Meher Baba

I try to push a single idea to its absolute limit. So for all of those ideas that existed in the story, you attempt to find a physical realisation in the space. — Simon McBurney

People who have made comparative studies of many different societies, know that when status is ascribed, rather than achieved, individual efforts towards excellence are not directed through any form of innovation; rather, the enhancement of status occurs only through the realisation of a previously well defined role position. It is only with social change, or when some form of continual dynamic disequilibium occurs in a society, that we begin to observe the development of achievement motivation in its modern form. — Dor Bahadur Bista

Along with Islam and Christianity, Judaism does insist that some turgid and contradictory and sometimes evil and mad texts, obviously written by fairly unexceptional humans, are in fact the word of god. I think that the indispensable condition of any intellectual liberty is the realisation that there is no such thing. — Christopher Hitchens

I think that it is a part of growing up, learning to control our suffering. I think that when we grow up, and learn that happiness is rare, and passes quickly, we become disillusioned and hurt. And how much we suffer is a mark of how much we have been hurt by this realisation. Suffering, you see, is a kind of anger. We rage against the unfairness, the injustice of our sad and sorry lot. — Gregory David Roberts

Our challenges will probably always be with us but, as we go on our journey of development, we become more aware of them, we come to accept them more, and they have less power over us. — Rebecca O'Dwyer Centred Woman

Swamiji: That is but a state of stupefaction, as under liquor. What will be the use of merely remaining like that? Through the urge of Advaitic realisation, you should sometimes dance wildly and sometimes remain lost to outward sense. Does one feel happy to taste of a good thing all by oneself? One should share it with others. Granted that you attain personal liberation by means of the realisation of the Advaita, but what matters it to the world? You must liberate the whole universe before you leave this body. Then only you will be established in the eternal Truth. Has that bliss any match, my boy? (VII. 162-63) — Swami Vivekananda

Realisation is nothing new to be acquired. It is already there, but obstructed by a screen of thoughts. All our attempts are directed to lifting this screen and then realisation is revealed. — Ramana Maharshi

And even now I wonder if creation is both too beautiful and too horrible for a handful of perceptive souls, and if the realisation of this opposing duality can offer them few options but to take leave of their own accord. — Mitch Cullin

Neither numbers nor powers nor wealth nor learning nor eloquence nor anything else will prevail, but purity, living the life, in one word, anubhuti, realisation. Let there be a dozen such lion-souls in each country, lions who have broken their own bonds, who have touched the Infinite, whose whole soul is gone to Brahman, who care neither for wealth nor power nor fame, and these will be enough to shake the world. — Swami Vivekananda

I think it's linked to the realisation that we're not going to live forever and that the way of saying and the language become more important than the story. — John McGahern

The reality of en-masse inner transformation of human beings by self-realisation is the most revolutionary discovery of the present age. — Nirmala Srivastava

Then there was the realisation that I didn't actually feel that much better when I was thin(ner). In fact the 'thin' version felt worse because I lived with hunger clawing at my stomach all the time, and in fear that I was going to get fat again. After years of neuroticism I'd finally understood those who loved me would continue to put up with me fat or thin, and those who didn't ignored me. As a middle-aged woman I was pretty much invisible anyway. To pass unnoticed through an image-obsessed society is surprisingly liberating. — Helen Brown

Whenever he reads articles in newspapers or magazines written by politicians using global warming or the destruction of the environment for their electoral campaigns, he thinks:
How can we be so arrogant? The planet is, was and always will be stronger than us. We can't destroy it; if we overstep the mark, the planet will simply erase us from its surface and carry on existing.
Why don't they start talking about not letting the planet destroy us? Because "Saving the planet" gives a sense of power, action and nobility. Whereas "not letting the planet destroy us" might lead us to feelings of despair and impotence, and to a realisation of just how very limited our capabilities are. — Paulo Coelho

While I was travelling and I kind of had the classic realisation - that I guess most teenagers have at some point - that time's gonna run out and that's not in my power to change that. — George Ezra

It will be my birthday on Tuesday. Last year, I reached the painful conclusion that there wasn't enough time left to read every book ever written. This year, my gloomy realisation is even more painful - I will not be able to correct everyone's mistakes before I depart. — Daniel Finkelstein

Do you know the reason why poetry and philosophy are nothing but dead-letter nowadays? It is because they have severed themselves from life. In Greece, ideas went hand-in-hand with life; so that the artist's life was already a poetic realisation, the philosopher's life a putting into action of his philosophy; in this way, as both philosophy and poetry took part in life, instead of remaining unacquainted with each other, philosophy provided food for poetry, and poetry gave expression to philosophy - and the result was admirably persuasive. Nowadays beauty no longer acts; action no longer desires to be beautiful; and wisdom works in a sphere apart. — Andre Gide

To help someone, or make them feel special; all it needs is to offer the tools which are thrust, and guidance, and show that you believe in the persons potential. The product is musical notes floating everywhere.
Katia M. S. — Katia M. S.

This is one place an opinion has to be made: that this body is a betrayal. — Dada Bhagwan

Every single human being should be the fulfilment of a prophecy: for every human being should be the realisation of some ideal, either in the mind of God or in the mind of man. — Oscar Wilde

When you allow yourself to remember that you truly are a multidimensional being, you will begin experiencing yourself in a much more expanded way. What previously was believed to be supernatural becomes natural. Then you come to a realisation that now you can see what has always been there yet it remained hidden to you who chose to see something else. — Raphael Zernoff

As our mother earth is a mere speck in the sunbeam in the illimitable universe, so man himself is but a tiny grain of protoplasm in the perishable framework of organic nature. [This] clearly indicates the true place of man in nature, but it dissipates the prevalent illusion of man's supreme importance and the arrogance with which he sets himself apart from the illimitable universe and exalts himself to the position of its most valuable element. — Ernst Haeckel

The last verse [In My Secret Life] completely got to me, about how we all have great ideals but in reality we end up conforming, following everyone else. We want to be stronger so we lead that life inside, thinking of ourselves as these great brave souls. I literally thought when I was 15 that I was a musical genius and I could change the world, but in fact you're not and you can't and you don't, and that realisation is almost heartbreaking. — Katie Melua

There's a reason humans peg-out around eighty: prose fatigue. It looks like organ failure or cancer or stroke but it's really just the inability to carry on clambering through the assault course of mundane cause and effect. If we ask Sheila then we can't ask Ron. If I have the kippers now then it's quiche for tea. Four score years is about all the ifs and thens you can take. Dementia's the sane realisation you just can't be doing with all that anymore. — Glen Duncan

This' path is not to be followed through force. It is to be followed through understanding. — Dada Bhagwan

There's a way,
a way way too long but reachable,
not for everyone a way but possible ...
Go and don't lose your way! — Rossana Condoleo

[This world] exists nonnecessarily, improbably, and causelessly. It exists for absolutely no reason at all. It is inexplicably and stunningly actual ... The impact of this captivated realisation upon me is overwhelming. I am completely stunned. I take a few dazed steps in the dark meadow, and fall among the flowers. I lie stupefied, whirling without comprehension in this world through numberless worlds other than this one. — Quentin Smith

Go forward and fulfil your dream. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Renunciation, and renunciation alone, is the real secret, the Mulamantra, of all Realisation. — Swami Vivekananda

All bad qualities centre round the ego. When the ego is gone, Realisation results by itself. There are neither good nor bad qualities in the Self. The Self is free from all qualities. Qualities pertain to the mind only. — Ramana Maharshi

Good generalship is the realisation that you've got to figure out how to accomplish your mission with the minimum loss of human life. — Norman Schwarzkopf

Nothing invests life with more meaning than the realisation that every moment of sentience is a precious gift — Steven Pinker

But it's not easy, realising how we fucked it all up. And that turns out to be the hardest thing to live with, not the regret or the fear, but the realisation that the edge is so close to where we live. — Jess Walter

Atheism isn't a growth model any more than "I don't like rollerblading" is a workout strategy. — Tim Urban

I remember, around age three, peas growing in the back garden. Pinching them from their pods and popping them in the mouth was my first realisation that food came from somewhere other than a shelf. — Caitlin Moran

If democracy is ever to be threatened, it will not be by revolutionary groups burning government offices and occupying the broadcasting and newspaper offices of the world. It will come from disenchantment, cynicism and despair caused by the realisation that the New World Order means we are all to be managed and not represented. — Tony Benn

The realisation that our small planet is only one of many worlds gives mankind the perspective it needs to realise sooner that our own world belongs to all its creatures. — Arthur C. Clarke

He who can see his own mistake can become absolute supreme Self (Parmatma)! — Dada Bhagwan

When is one considered a vitarag (free of attachment)? It is when he has no fear of anything in this world. — Dada Bhagwan

The individual comes face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists. The American mind has not come to a realisation of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent. — J. Edgar Hoover

When someone's success makes you as happy as if it were your own, you know you've found someone worth holding on to. — Charlotte Eriksson

The journey to the realisation of your dreams is difficult; you will have to climb the mountains of despair, brave the storms of self doubt, be resolute in the winds of ridicule but the in the very end you will get a kind of self satisfaction that no one can take away from you — Rassool Jibraeerl Snyman