Ernest Holmes Quotes

Solitude is the furnace of transformation. Without solitude we remain victims of our society and continue to be entangled in the illusions of the false self.

The first step toward finding God, Who is Truth, is to discover the truth about myself: and if I have been in error, this first step to truth is the discovery of my error.

In the year of 1957, I experienced, by the grace of God, a spiritual awakening, which was to lead me to a richer, fuller, more productive life.

To know God is to be transformed, and thus to be introduced to a life that could not otherwise be experienced.

I think one of the most rewarding experiences in life is to see people come to Christ and make lifestyle changes. When that happens, you definitely see God behind it. This year we've seen eight students make first-time decisions for Christ and when I see that, it's a great feeling. I'm really thankful that God is changing somebody, or sometimes he's changing me.

I do believe that the outward and the inward life correspond; that if any should succeed to live a higher life, others would not know of it; that difference and distance are one. To set about living a true life is to go on a journey to a distant country, gradually to find ourselves surrounded by new scenes and men; and as long as the old are around me, I know that I am not in any true sense living a new or a better life.

In Holman Hunt's painting, "The Light of the World, "Christ is shown in a garden at midnight, holding a lantern in His left hand. With His right hand He is knocking on a heavily paneled door. When the painting was unveiled, a critic remarked to the painter, "Mr. Hunt, the work is unfinished. There is no handle on the door." "That," Hunt answered, "is the door to the human heart. It can be opened only from the inside."

Anybody who travels knows that you're not really doing so in order to move around - you're traveling in order to be moved. And really what you're seeing is not just the Grand Canyon or the Great Wall but some moods or intimations or places inside yourself that you never ordinarily see when you're sleepwalking through your daily life.

We are not converted only once in our lives but many times and this endless series of conversions and inner revolutions leads to our transformation.

It just took all of that to come to a screeching halt, to get to the point of having nothing, for me to finally realize, Hey, what are you fighting with this for? Until then, I hadn't claimed my faith as my own; I had just grown up with it.

Every worldview I chose, it seemed, edged me toward belief.

I believe that a man is converted when first he hears the low, vast murmur of life, of human life, troubling his hitherto unconscious self.

Very often a change of self is needed more than a change of scene.

In my book, I was trying to get into my own soul.

I knew I had a lot to say. Not politically - politics have always confused me - but perhaps spiritually.

Begin within. If it shows up in your life, it's coming to tell you something about you that you're acting like you don't know. Something about yourself, or your relationship with God.

No great inner event befalls those who summon it not.

The future enters into us, in order to transform itself in us, long before it happens.

Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.

There has already been the karmic work: that what life has transformed in me, this initiation brought on, of necessity, by trials.

Right before I decided to come out, I went on a spiritual retreat called 'Changing the Inner Dialogue of Your Subconscious Mind.' I'd never been to anything like it before, and all my friends were taking bets on how long I'd last with no TV, no radio, no phone. But for me that was the beginning of paying attention to all the little things.

I found thee not, O Lord, without, because I erred in seeking thee without that wert within.

I saw Krishnamurti speak one time. And I thought, I'm not going to live here.

Men do change, and change comes like a little wind that ruffles the curtains at dawn, and it comes like the stealthy perfume of wildflowers hidden in the grass. Change may be announced by a small ache, so that you think you're catching cold. Or you may feel a faint disgust for something you loved yesterday. It may even take the form of a hunger that peanuts won't satisfy. Isn't overeating said to be one of the strongest symptoms of discontent. And isn't discontent the lever of change?

How many times have I heard people say, 'I became very ill a couple of years ago; it got very serious, and I look back and give thanks for how it changed me and the truth I found.'