#meaning

Meanings are not determined by situations, but we determine ourselves by the meanings we give to situations. ↗

— Alfred Adler

#determined #give #meanings #ourselves #situations

Life is filled with unanswered questions, but it is the courage to seek those answers that continues to give meaning to life. You can spend your life wallowing in despair, wondering why you were the one who was led towards the road strewn with pain, or you can be grateful that you are strong enough to survive it. ↗

— J.D. Stroube

#despair #inspiration #life #meaning #pain

Our revels now are ended. These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits and Are melted into air, into thin air: And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff As dreams are made on, and our little life Is rounded with a sleep. ↗

— William Shakespeare

#life #meaning #death

I want to give the audience a hint of a scene. No more than that. Give them too much and they won't contribute anything themselves. Give them just a suggestion and you get them working with you. That's what gives the theater meaning: when it becomes a social act. ↗

— Orson Welles

#anything #audience #becomes #contribute #get

In the beginning, God created the earth, and he looked upon it in his cosmic loneliness. And God said, "Let Us make living creatures out of mud, so the mud can see what We have done." And God created every living creature that now moveth, and one was man. Mud as man alone could speak. God leaned close to mud as man sat, looked around, and spoke. "What is the purpose of all this?" he asked politely. "Everything must have a purpose?" asked God. "Certainly," said man. "Then I leave it to you to think of one for all this," said God. And He went away. ↗

— Kurt Vonnegut

#meaning-of-life #purpose #life

Later on in life, you expect a bit of rest, don't you? You think you deserve it. I did, anyway. But then you begin to understand that the reward of merit is not life's business. ↗

— Julian Barnes

#history #life #meaning #memory #philosophy

There is a widespread sense of loss here, if not always of God, then at least of meaning. ↗

— Charles Taylor

#loss #meaning #age

All any of us wanted, really, was to know that we counted. That someone else's life would not have been as rich without us here. ↗

— Jodi Picoult

#love #meaning #life

Each day is an adventure in discovering the meaning of life. It is each little thing that you do that day - whether it be spending time with your friends, running in a cross-country meet or just simply staring at the crashing ocean- that holds the key to discovering the meaning of life. I would rather be out enjoying these things than pondering them. We may never really discover the meaning of life, but the knowledge we gain in our quest to discover it is truly more valuable. ↗

— Jack Canfield

#knowledge #life #meaning #life

This, it may be said, is no more than a hypothesis... only of that force of precedent which in all times has been so strong to keep alive religious forms of which the original meaning is lost. ↗

— William Robertson Smith

#been #force #forms #hypothesis #keep