Openness Quotes

In brokenness comes beauty, divine fragility.

The truth is like sunlight: It causes cancer.

Her life is lived through the masterpiece of art, that she cannot draw.

Bonhoeffer did not expect his life to be a tidy edifice of perfection.

And then Jonah heard God’s voice.t“Jonah, do you know what the difference is between you and the trees?”ttHe was confident it was God because God usually asked questions but gave no answers. Jonah didn’t need a divine answer to this question, he knew it.t“Yes,” he said. “The difference between me and the trees is that the trees let go of their leaves. I keep holding onto mine. The trees make room for new life. I don’t.

Culture is nested in context, not genes.

We always get help we ask for. "Knock and the door will open" Make sure it's the right door.

I read things that male relationship experts write about women and I read things that female relationship experts write about men, then I feel a true sadness in my heart. Why can’t there be a simple, pure, direct openness? Why can’t there be a simple, real, open trust? The truth is that male or female, gay or straight— we are all people— we have all been broken and put back together in so many different ways... it’s really just about learning how to recognize the sound of the other one's cracks. And that’s what it’s really about, just that.

He was driven to use the prerogatives of his profession, to act the parson.

Jefferson was the rare student who came to college already knowing that there could be joy in studying.

See the openness of the ocean. Now feel that your mind is more open and welcoming than that.

He learned rapidly because his first training was in how to learn. And the first lesson of all was the basic trust that he could learn. It is shocking to find how many people do not believe they can learn, and how many more believe learning to be difficult.

The author says one of the sources of resilience is the ability to measure and perceive early warning signs so as to adapt.

More depended on the student than on the school.

How long will this last, this delicious feeling of being alive, of having penetrated the veil which hides beauty and the wonders of celestial vistas? It doesn't matter, as there can be nothing but gratitude for even a glimpse of what exists for those who can become open to it.

Shifting perspective(s) and being proactive are essential to your our life paths, progress and possibilities: "Just because a door appears closed it does not mean that it is locked - nor that it will not open with the right heart, call or touch

There is no excuse good enough to ever be out of alignment with love. You’re going to get hurt, and you will feel pain. Yet your purpose is to keep loving, anyway. Keep moving forward with an open heart. Love is a Divine gift given to humanity. Wasting it is no longer an option. Love is what brings light to a dark place. Love is what transforms a dying world into a thriving planet.

College is about exposing students to many things and creating an aphrodisiac atmosphere so that they might fall in lifelong love with a few.

In Russia everything is a secret, but there is no secrecy.

When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?

A majority of young people seem to develop mental arteriosclerosis forty years before they get the physical kind. Another question: why do some people remain open and elastic into extreme old age, whereas others become rigid and unproductive before they're fifty?

Happiness lies even in little tiny butterflies. You just have to cpen up your eyes and see where beauty flies to beautify your world lenghtwise.

[P]eople think of compassion as, like, kindness. The image comes to mind of some nice New Age guy bending to something with a look on his face like he’s about to cry. And I don’t think that’s it. I think of it more as a quality of openness that comes with being in a state of unusual attentiveness.

It's amazing how willingly one can tell to a new face, and how restrained one may be from telling a familiar one.

The soul is healed by being with children.

When you don't have a job (requiring reading) and you are doing your own reading you've got deep psychological questions. As deep as those of a little boy.

Always be open to inspiration. You never know where it may come from. Begin with an open mind, end with an inspired heart.

Even though Paul knew farewells were inevitable, he still formed deep relationships.

I used to have six theories and no kids. Now I have six kids and no theories.

As with all travel, replacing familiar surroundings with the unknown fires an electric charge that awakens a sense of adventure.

his was a profession in which a good leader constantly had to adapt to new weapons, whether he liked them or not,

Quite often we are led to aporia, an impasse, unable to proceed a step further. Socrates is almost always there, but even he is only a supporting character. The starring role is given to the philosophical question. It is the philosophical question that is supposed to take center stage, cracking us open to an entirely new variety of experience.

During relaxation we drop our guard. Particularly in conversation. Relaxed conversation leads to openness. And in openness we often reveal what should never be revealed.

Travel was a species of warfare.

Openness is allowing and directing the energy of the Universe to flow through you freely, giving and taking with ease.

She remembered the intensity of her desire to undress him, to be naked with him, the way she felt like she could say whatever she wanted and be fully understood and do whatever she wanted and be totally accepted. She remembered how easy it had all been, how open and bright, like being in a whitewashed room with all the windows wide open.

He never hears the truth about himself by not wishing to hear it." Pope Alexander

Let your heart be as big as it can possibly be.

•tJudge less–or at least later.•tGive new ideas and images a chance.•tUnderstand that everyone has his own truth or her own.•tRemember: you are not married to any belief, opinion, or ideology.•tExpect to discover something delicious every day. (260)

To come to know that nothing is good, nothing is bad, is a turning point; it is a conversion. You start looking in; the outside reality loses meaning. The social reality is a fiction, a beautiful drama; you can participate in it, but then you don’t take it seriously. It is just a role to be played; play it as beautifully, as efficiently, as possible. But don’t take it seriously, it has nothing of the ultimate in it.

When someone is seeking,” said Siddartha, “It happens quite easily that he only sees the thing that he is seeking; that he is unable to find anything, unable to absorb anything, because he is only thinking of the thing he is seeking, because he has a goal, because he is obsessed with his goal. Seeking means: to have a goal; but finding means: to be free, to be receptive, to have no goal. You, O worthy one, are perhaps indeed a seeker, for in striving towards your goal, you do not see many things that are under your nose.

The old-fashioned sins of reading is the only sense that matters.

Watch for subjects as you go but the city or the country. Keep your eyes and ears open, and you will hear and see angels.

When Muslim radicals and fundamentalists look at the West, they see only the openness that makes us, in their eyes, decadent and promiscuous. They see only the openness that has produced Britney Spears and Janet Jackson. They do not see, and do not want to see, the openness - the freedom of thought and inquiry - that has made us powerful, the openness that has produced Bill Gates and Sally Ride. They deliberately define it all as decadence. Because if openness, women's empowerment, and freedom of thought and inquiry are the real sources of the West's economic strength, then the Arab-Muslim world would have to change. And the fundamentalists and extremists do not want to change.

The more open we are, the more we can learn. The more we learn, the more we recognize that every one of us is a hero

Real winners in a rapidly changing world will be those who are open to alternatives and able to respect and value those who are different.

If you get stuck, get away from your desk. Take a walk, take a bath, go to sleep, make a pie, draw, listen to ­music, meditate, exercise; whatever you do, don't just stick there scowling at the problem. But don't make telephone calls or go to a party; if you do, other people's words will pour in where your lost words should be. Open a gap for them, create a space. Be pat

The day that lay before (was) full of infinite possibilities, though in a million superficial ways it was identical to the day before.

If you are going to judge others it is wisest to do so individually not collectively and on your own direct experience of them personally. But first - and throughout - examine yourself closely. Blurred vision can often occur due to the lens, perspective and perceptions of the viewer projected onto the object that it sees. Be wary of taking to the judges seat. Above all meet at treat yourself and everyone else mindfully, compassionately with humanity.

The utility of perseverance in absurdity is more than I could ever discern. Edmund Burke

It is praiseworth to be open and honest, but you must be very discriminating on where and with whom you apply that most sacred virtue.

One should show one's scars, not hide them.

Life provides chances to open your heart all the time.

Pat Conroy embraced his new hometown with the grateful passion of a refugee.

He called himself Jack, a plain handshake of a name, a far cry from the Clive Staples he had been christened, and to be Jack was the hard work of a lifetime.

Abilene possessed greater vision, perhaps because it possessed little else.

Life is something that really cannot be explained. It got to be experienced! For experiencing life to its fullest an attitudes of openness, gratefulness, happiness, flexibility are required. But most of all 'being in love' is crucial to live life to its fullest potential.

I want a future abortion conversation known for its openness, respect and empathy, so instead of generating more heat, anger and conflict, I practice pro-voice.

Carried to its final extreme, the logical end of this type of reaction to life is suicide. The hard-bitten kind of person is always, as it were, a partial suicide; some of himself is already dead

Regrets are the last words you speak to your loved ones when you die and the one thing we all fear when we live. I'd rather regret the things I've done and said than regret the things I haven't done or said. It is all the experiences and people you missed out on in life that you will feel the most regretful for in the end. God will forgive you of your mistakes, but there is nothing to forgive if you have never even tried, done or said anything that made a difference in your life or others.