Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Elizabeth Carlton

Quote by Elizabeth Carlton

“Recently, I read a stack of old journals I had stored in a box. They held the musings of different versions of myself stretching from age nine to 29. As I read through them, I realized how foreign the words on those pages felt. I didn't hear my own voice in those journals, but rather someone else's; someone distinctly different from the person I am today. And I realize that who I was is not who I am. Who I am is a state of consciousness that changes with time and experience. More than that, it changes with every wave of emotion as it comes and goes. To be is a fluid experience. The joy of being is learning how to embrace that flow.”

Quote by Elizabeth Carlton

Create image

Author

Elizabeth Carlton

Browse famous quotes and profile details for Elizabeth Carlton. more

You May Also Like

“Gradually, it begins to dawn on us that we are merely part of a process. Think about that: You and I are nothing more than process. I am a process of continuing mind-moments, each one separate from the others. There is no permanent “me, ” being incarnated and reincarnated—there’s merely the law of cause-and-effect, cause-and-effect, cause-and-effect, running on and on and on. It’s all just the passing parade of the laws of prakriti, of the laws of nature, of the laws of an unfolding illusion of manifestation.”

SelfReincarnationCause And EffectLaws
Book:Paths to God: Living the Bhagavad Gita
Create image

“Gradually, as our perspective deepens, we begin to experience our own lives in the context of a wider purpose. We begin to look at all our melodramas and our desires and our sufferings, and instead of seeing them as events happening within a lifetime bounded by birth and death, we begin experiencing them as part of a much vaster design.We begin to appreciate that there is a wider frame around our lives, within which our particular incarnation is happening. One of the first things that kind of perspective does for us is to calm us down a great deal. The whole game isn’t riding on this one lifetime! Whew! There’s a great feeling of release inherent in that; it removes the anxiety and the sense of urgency. We don’t have to do it all right now—and in fact we see we’re not “doing it” anyway! It’s the lawful continuity of karma and reincarnation flowing through us lifetime after lifetime, kalpa after kalpa. What a relief!”

SelfKarmaReincarnationCause And EffectLaws
Book:Paths to God: Living the Bhagavad Gita
Create image

“And like Vera, I know that "truth lies beyond." I know that faith - like chastity, like intimacy, like the journey to the self - is an ongoing process. Yes, we do walk the labyrinth to the center of every greater knowledge of ourselves as we do in books like Gordimer's. We may also learn from them, as Vera learned, that no single human relationship can fulfill us, draw a small circle around who we are or can be. Others, alas, are as limited, as frail - and as mortal - as we are. We will be compelled, somehow, to leave the center we have found, and continue on our journey. For, self-transcending beings that we are, it is not the center that symbolizes our true selves but the entire labyrinth. If we are courageous enough not to give up on life, on human relationships, or on ourselves - as we surmise from the tone of the last passage is the case with Vera - we will walk it many times, inward and outward, each time going more deeply within, each time reaching out in a wider embrace. And we will have, thanks to the writers among us, not a single book - no single book can satisfy us, either - but many books to accompany us like intimate friends at each stage of the journey, to lead us yet closer to the truth that, as long as we live, lies beyond. Unlike Vera, in the doctrines and dogmas of my faith, to which I could cling even in my unbelief, I have always had at least a small hope, sometimes a blind trust, and finally in these later years, even a quiet confidence that I am not alone on my journey. God doesn't wait for us to reach the goal; God is with us at every step. Like the mysterious stranger with whom Jacob wrestles in the book of Genesis (32:24-30), or who meets the disciples on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:13-32), God blesses us on the way, is the companion who breaks bread with us, even when we, like them, don't recognize him.”

LifeBookSelfGodTruthReadingMeaningLabyrith
Book:Walking a Literary Labryinth
Create image

“Denying God is "ad hominem" to all humanity. Atheism commits ad hominem at every moment because it attacks God who is our Self. In this way, every man is characterized as incapable of achieving the goal, which is the main ad hominem attack.”

SelfHumanityAtheismPersonalAttackAd HominemDeny God
Book:A Guide to the Psyche of Atheism, Religion and Philosophy and Their Impact on Contemporary Spirituality
Create image

“There are all these things that you never know whether they're features or bugs- in a company or organization, or even in a personal trait. I'm interested in lots of different things. I'm interested in business but also economics and philosophy and literature. I always like to rationalize that as helping me think about things better, or that these things are interdisciplinary. But maybe it's just being a dilettante or procrastinating and not ever really getting focused.”

SelfAttentionFocusFeaturesBugsExamined LifeDouble Edged Sword
Author:Peter Thiel
Create image