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10 Inspiring Quotes on Discovering the Self

by Liz B | May 22, 2018 | Identity, Spirituality

1. “I might only truly become my fullest self if I explored and stayed open to moving through daunting terrain.”
― Sarah Lewis

2. “War within ourselves is always a prelude to war outside ourselves. All war starts within our own hearts. When our egos are inflated or our desires insatiable, we go to war with the other for the sad joy of maintaining our one-dimensional worlds.”
― Joan D. Chittister

3. “The closer you come to knowing that you alone create the world of your experience, the more vital it becomes for you to discover just who is doing the creating.”
― Eric Micha’el Leventhal

4. “It is better for you to take responsibility for your life as it is, instead of blaming others, or circumstances, for your predicament. As your eyes open, you’ll see that your state of health, happiness, and every circumstance of your life has been, in large part, arranged by you — consciously or unconsciously.”
― Dan Millman

5. You will never have a greater or lesser dominion than that over yourself…the height of a man’s success is gauged by his self-mastery; the depth of his failure by his self-abandonment. …And this law is the expression of eternal justice. He who cannot establish dominion over himself will have no dominion over others.”
― Leonardo da Vinci

Alan Watts

6. “You’re under no obligation to be the same person you were 5
minutes ago.”
― Alan W. Watts

7. “The ego-self constantly pushes reality away. It constructs a future out of empty expectations and a past out of regretful memories.”
― Alan W. Watts, The Wisdom of Insecurity

8. “The more you know yourself, the more clarity there is. Self-knowledge has no end – you don’t come to an achievement, you don’t come to a conclusion. It is an endless river.”
― Jiddu Krishnamurti

9. “I am grateful for what I am and have. My thanksgiving is perpetual. It is surprising how contented one can be with nothing definite – only a sense of existence. Well, anything for variety. I am ready to try this for the next ten thousand years, and exhaust it. How sweet to think of! my extremities well charred, and my intellectual part too, so that there is no danger of worm or rot for a long while. My breath is sweet to me. O how I laugh when I think of my vague indefinite riches. No run on my bank can drain it, for my wealth is not possession but enjoyment.”
― Henry David Thoreau

10. “The tragedy in a man’s life is what dies inside of him while he lives.”
― Albert Schweitzer

The Chandogya Upanishad: A Lesson On Our True Natures

by Liz B | Jun 9, 2017 | Identity, Spirituality

The Chandogya Upanishad tells as story about Svetaketu, a young man of ancient India who, on returning to his home after twelve years of studying the Vedas, appeared to his father to be as somewhat set up about his vast learning. The father therefore set out to teach him some homely but profound wisdom not necessarily learned from books.

“Bring me,” he said to his son, “a fruit from a banyan tree.”
“Here is one, sir.”
“Break it.”
“It is broken, sir.”
“What do you see there?”
“Some seeds, sir, exceedingly small.”
“Break one of these.”
“It is broken, sir.”
“What do you see there?”
“Nothing at all.”
The father said, “My son, that subtle essence which you do not perceive there – in that very essence stands the being of the great banyan tree. In that which is the subtle essence all that exists has its self. That is the true, that is the Self, and you, Svetakeu, are that.”
“Pray, sir,” said the son. “Tell me more.”
For the second lesson the father gave his son a bag of salt, saying, “Place this salt in a vessel of water and come to me tomorrow morning with the vessel.”
When the son appeared the next day the father commanded, “Bring me the salt which you put in the water.”
But the salt of course had disappeared.
“Taste the water from the surface of the vessel and tell me how it is.”
“Salty,” said the son.
“And from the middle?”
“Salty.”
“And from the bottom?”
“Salty also.”
Then the father said, “Here likewise in this body of yours, my son, you do not perceive the true, but there in fact it is. In that which is the subtle essence, all that exists has its self. That is the true, that is the Self; and you, Svetaketu, are that.”

-Changdogya Upanishad