#oneself

A taste for irony has kept more hearts from breaking than a sense of humor, for it takes irony to appreciate the joke which is on oneself. ↗

— Jessamyn West

#appreciate #breaking #hearts #irony #joke

Character is just an invention.... It is the self-fulfilling prophecy that guides our lives... and the longer we live with it the more boxed in we are by the rapidly diminishing variedness of our imagined selves. What we can't ever accept is that we might never know who we are. ↗

— Kamila Shamsie from Broken Verses

#knowing-oneself #imagination

This time, there was no escape, I could not turn away, could not leave without accepting what I had done. There was only one way to the other side, and that was through the pain. ↗

— Vanessa Diffenbaugh

#life #pain #philosophy #life

Derive happiness in oneself from a good day's work, from illuminating the fog that surrounds us. ↗

— Henri Matisse

#derive #fog #good #happiness #illuminating

I don't know whether I believe in God or not. I think, really, I'm some sort of Buddhist. But the essential thing is to put oneself in a frame of mind which is close to that of prayer. ↗

— Henri Matisse

#buddhist #close #essential #essential thing #frame

Offspring, the due performance on religious rites, faithful service, highest conjugal happiness and heavenly bliss for the ancestors and oneself, depend on one's wife alone. ↗

— Guru Nanak

#ancestors #bliss #conjugal #depend #due