MetaChat - Quote that explains your personal philosophy

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16 June 2006

Quote that explains your personal philosophy →[More:]Inspired by several older posts, I want to know this:

Do you have a quote that best describes you, your outlook on life, or serves as a mantra?

I ask because I found this quote the other day and it really resonated with me. I shared it in IRC, but want to hear from you guys now, too!

"At times I suffer from the strangest sense of detachment from myself and the world about me; I seem to watch it all from the outside, from somewhere inconceivably remote, out of time, out of space, out of the stress and tragedy of it all."

HG Wells,
War of the Worlds

post by: SassHat at: 15:02 | 41 comments

You Fit Into Me by Margaret Atwood

You fit into me
Like a hook into an eye

A fish hook
An open eye

(Ok, not really my philosophy, but I love it.)

posted by omiewise 16 June | 15:23

"If I try to be like him, who will be like me?"
-Hebrew proverb

posted by BoringPostcards 16 June | 15:23

(I was highly amused when the formatting of this post was screwed up on the front page, so that it looked like Sasshat's personal philosophy was "OMG Hitler Cats!" That is all.)

posted by occhiblu 16 June | 15:27

Omie, I love Atwood, but being Canadian this makes me some sort of walking cliche or something. We have the same birthday and birthplace, Margaret and I do.

posted by SassHat 16 June | 15:28

I've always liked her early poetry better than anything else, but I want to read her more recent Penelope (?) novel. I'm still trying to think of a better answer to your question.

posted by omiewise 16 June | 15:31

Now with our Steppenwolf it was so that in his conscious life he lived now as a wolf, now as a man, as indeed the case is with all mixed beings. But, when he was a wolf, the man in him lay in ambush, ever on the watch to interfere and condemn, while at those times that he was man the wolf did just the same. For example, if Harry, as man, had a beautiful thought, felt a fine and noble emotion, or performed a so-called good act, then the wolf bared his teeth at him and laughed and showed him with bitter scorn how laughable this whole pantomime was in the eyes of a beast, of a wolf who knew well enough in his heart what suited him, namely, to trot alone over the Steppes and now and then to gorge himself with blood or to pursue a female wolf. Then, wolfishly seen, all human activities became horribly absurd and misplaced, stupid and vain. But it was exactly the same when Harry felt and behaved as a wolf and showed others his teeth and felt hatred and enmity against all human beings and their lying and degenerate manners and customs. For then the human part of him lay in ambush and watched the wolf, called him brute and beast, and spoiled and embittered for him all pleasure in his simple and healthy and wild wolf's being.

posted by Wolfdog 16 June | 15:33

And three gives birth to all things.

posted by danostuporstar 16 June | 15:42

Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly

-A Watts

posted by danf 16 June | 15:42

not really my personal philosophy, but something I always liked when I read it "We are what we pretend to be, so we must be very careful as to what we pretend to be." - Kurt Vonnegut

posted by Lipstick Thespian 16 June | 15:42

I don't have a personal philosophy. I try to take life as it comes.

posted by Eideteker 16 June | 15:48

It is easier to get forgiveness than permission.

posted by danf 16 June | 15:49

"Don't break the membranes!"

posted by Hugh Janus 16 June | 15:52

Imagination and fiction make up more than three-quarters of our real lives. (Simone Weil)

posted by jokeefe 16 June | 16:07

It is easier to get forgiveness than permission.

One of my top three, for sure.

posted by ThePinkSuperhero 16 June | 16:07

For a long time my go-to quote was, "In the midst of winter, I finally learned that there was in me an invincible spring" by Albert Camus. I adopted it at a time in my early 20s when I really needed to convince myself that I could get through anything, and times aren't as tough now (knock on wood). But, I still love the quote, and I will forever feel empowered by the idea that I can't be defeated.

posted by amro 16 June | 16:10

I shared this one with LT awhile back:

“The living self has one purpose only: to come into its own fullness of being, as a tree comes into full blossom, or a bird into spring beauty, or a tiger into lustre.”

That's DH Lawrence, whose books I don't really like, but whose thoughts I often do.

And then there's Rilke:

"For one human being to love another; that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks, the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation."

and

"So you must not be frightened...if a sadness rises up before you larger than
any you have ever seen; if a restiveness, like light and cloud-shadows, passes over your hands and over all you do. You must think that something is happening with you, that life has not forgotten you, that it holds you in its hand; it will not let you fall."

Can I marry Rilke?

posted by Miko 16 June | 16:12

Since everything is but an apparition, having nothing to do with good or bad, acceptance or rejection, one may well burst out in laughter. --Longchenpa ...

posted by mygothlaundry 16 June | 16:13

Miko, I love Rilke. I think I've mentioned this one here before:

"Once the realization is accepted that even between the closest human beings infinite distances continue, a wonderful living side by side can grow, if they succeed in loving the distance between them which makes it possible for each to see the other whole against the sky."

I also think of this quote every spring:

"Everything is blooming most recklessly, if it were voices instead of colors, there would be an unbelievable shrieking into the heart of the night."

posted by amro 16 June | 16:17

A friend and I once went to hear Marcus Greil speak about Bob Dylan and "Like a Rolling Stone." It had been just a short while since my life had basically imploded -- mother died, boyfriend and I broke up, living on my very own for the first time and not sure what the hell I was going to do with my life, generally feeling totally vulnerable and stripped down and raw.

These two lines really hit me:

When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose
You're invisible now, you got no secrets to conceal.

especially that last idea. It ties in with a lot of what appeals to me about meditation, the idea that if you let go of ego and of rigid constructs about "who you are," you'll find yourself in that unveiling -- you'll have nothing to conceal, and (more scary!) nothing to hide behind.

I had kinda forgotten about it, but I was listening to that song again last weekend and was struck anew. So I'll go with that for now.

posted by occhiblu 16 June | 16:17

Barn's burnt down.
Now I can see the moon.

posted by Specklet 16 June | 16:23

"This page intentionally left blank"

posted by trondant 16 June | 16:30

"Be excellent to each other."

posted by nomad 16 June | 16:34

and to be a little more highbrow, Vonnegut:
"incidentally, he had a tremendous wang. you never know who'll get one."

posted by nomad 16 June | 16:35

"This is not 'Nam. This is bowling. There are rules."

posted by mullacc 16 June | 16:38

Grah! The tiger is in lustre again. Oh mercy!

posted by Lipstick Thespian 16 June | 16:43

"Just because I don't care doesn't mean I don't understand"
-Homer Jay Simpson

posted by miles 16 June | 16:46

Also there's a lot to be said for "Long live rock and roll."

posted by Wolfdog 16 June | 16:47

Not as highbrow as many of these, but I find Nomeansno's song 'Victory' very helpful at times. Full lyrics here. Favourite bits (of course, for the full effect you need the Wright brother's pounding drums and intense vocals):

Now what do you think I see
Standing like a wall in front of me
Defeat, not victory
Defeat, not victory
Defeat, not victory

So what are you going to do, die?
No.
You going to lay down and die?
No.
I will not admit defeat
I will not admit defeat
I will see victory

and

Now I can't show you all the things I've seen
And I can't make you feel anything
Certainly not what they meant to me
And someday I know, no matter how hard we try
We are all going to have to lay down and die
So maybe I should just tell you what I hope and believe
For every defeat there will be a victory
For every defeat there will be a victory
In defeat
victory

(apologies for the length)

posted by elizard 16 June | 17:02

Or,

Fame

If I didn't care for fun and such,
I'd probably amount to much.
But I shall stay the way I am,
Because I do not give a damn.

and, in my darker moments (and yes, they do get darker):

Résumé

Razors pain you, Rivers are damp,
Acids stain you, And drugs cause cramp.
Guns aren't lawful, Nooses give,
Gas smells awful. You might as well live.

-Dorothy Parker (both)

posted by elizard 16 June | 17:25

"I used to be disgusted, now I try to be amused"
- E. Costello

posted by wendell 16 June | 17:32

elizard: My Google homepage had a quote from Dorothy Parker as its "Quote of the Day" on Wednesday. It made me laugh:

"If all the girls who attended the Yale prom were laid end to end, I wouldn't be a bit surprised."

posted by mullacc 16 June | 17:39

I would like my life to leave after it no other murmur than that of a watchman's song, of a song to while away the waiting. Independent of what happens and what does not happen, the wait itself is magnificent.

Andre Breton
Mad Love (or maybe it's in Nadja)

posted by PinkStainlessTail 16 June | 17:48

Oh, make no mistake, my friend
All of this will end,
So sing it now (sing your life)
All the things you love (sing your life)
All the things you loathe
Oh, sing your life...

- Morrissey

posted by amberglow 16 June | 18:00

...and of course the MC5 classic, "Kick out the jams, motherfuckers!" although I think Rollins added that last word

mullacc: yep, Dorothy Parker is my hero. If you haven't yet read them, I think you'd enjoy her short stories. The woman was a genius.

posted by elizard 16 June | 18:17

elizard, I just read Song of the Shirt, 1941 the other day.

posted by amro 16 June | 18:27

"That's the funny thing about memory, isn't it. We are not what we remember of ourselves: we are what people say we are. They project upon us their convictions. We are nothing but blank screens."

"That which does not kill us, makes us stranger."
-Trevor Goodchild, Peter Chung's Aeon Flux

"A chained man need only shut his eyes to make the world explode."
- Octavio Paz

posted by Zack_Replica 16 June | 18:51

"Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end." From Semisonic and their song "Closing Time". I adopted it during the scary time in my life when I left my first husband and was alone with my two small sons. I'd never been the only one in charge before. Now I look forward to every day, and every change-life is, after all, a journey.

And an unwritten book. I like that too.

posted by redvixen 16 June | 18:53

"We are not angry men. We are enraged. You can no longer defer my dream. I'm gonna sing it. Dance it. Scream it. And if need be, I'll steal it from this very earth." -- Archie Shepp

posted by dobbs 16 June | 19:36

During my last years of college my quote was, "Each thing I do I rush through so that I can do something else." That's the start of Stephen Dobyns' poem Pursuit, from Cemetery Nights. It just described my life at that time so perfectly, and contemplating that line was a major reason I withdrew from grad school. But I'm not sure it fits me so well anymore.

Incidently, I read it in Stephen King's novel Insomnia, which is a great book as far as King's later works go.

posted by sbutler 16 June | 20:44

A system is a tail to truth.
Truth is a lizard that will run away leaving it's tail in your hand,
knowing full well it can grow another tail.
- some german, I think, wish I knew.

posted by pointilist 16 June | 22:41

It's a paraphrase of a Buddhist quote:

If you have a problem and you can fix it, there is no reason to worry
If you have a problem and you cannot fix it, then why worry?

My other main one:

Nothing's forever, so make sure it's good

posted by gaspode 17 June | 01:27

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