Clarissa Pinkola Estes Quotes

Asking the proper questions is the central action of transformation. Questions are the key that causes the secret doors of the psyche to swing open.

As the body fades - which it will inevitably do as we stay here on the planet - it really behooves us to wake up to who we really are. You can either go along willingly or be dragged, because it will happen.

Asking the proper question is the central act of transformation!

Asking the questions - that's what changes lives. Every cell in your body is awake with inquiry. And you cannot believe the old thoughts again.

There's a wonderful saying that's dead wrong. 'Why did you climb the mountain?' 'I climbed the mountain because it was there.' That's utter nonsense...You climbed the mountain because you were there, and you were curious if you could do it. You wondered what it would be like.

For I have always been a seeker, a dreamer, and a ponderer on seeking and dreaming.

Seeker of truth follow no path all paths lead where truth is here.

I cannot tell you any spiritual truth that deep within you don't know already. All I can do is remind you of what you have forgotten.

No matter how many levels of consciousness one reaches, the problem always goes deeper.

The "I" thought is said to be the sum total of all thoughts. The source of the "I" thought has to be inquired into.

Who I am really keeps surprising me.

...being Lulu, it made me realize that all my life I've been living in a small, square room, with no windows and no doors. And I was fine. I was happy, even. I thought. Then someone came along and showed me there was a door in the room. One that I'd never even seen before. Then he opened it for me. Held my hand as I walked through it. And for one perfect day, I was on the other side. I was somewhere else. Someone else. And then he was gone, and I was thrown back into my little room. And now, no matter what I do, I can't seem to find that door.

My eyes were closed, they're open now

I insist on knowing the names, on being interested only in books left ajar, like doors; I will not go looking for keys.

It's the questions we can't answer that teach us the most. They teach us how to think.

Your adventure has to be coming out of your own interior. If you are ready for it then doors will open where there were no doors before, and where there would not be doors for anyone else. And you must have courage. It's the call to adventure, which means there is no security, no rules.

This is the key to life: the ability to reflect, the ability to know yourself, the ability to pause for a second before reacting automatically. If you can truly know yourself, you will begin the journey of transformation.

One must know oneself as one is, not as one wishes to be, which is merely an ideal and therefore fictitious, unreal; it is only that which is that can be transformed, not that which you wish to be.

Awareness is always the first step.

So coming back from a journey, or after an illness, before habits had spun themselves across the surface, one felt that same unreality, which was so startling; felt something emerge. Life was most vivid then.

One of the keys to harnessing this potentially unlimited power of the mind is to expand your level of self-awareness.

Doubt . . . impels a search for the truth. It opens the door to knowledge. Faith puts a lock on the door. Indeed, . . . faith anesthetizes the desire to seek knowledge and truth.

Working on our own consciousness is the most important thing that we are doing at any moment, and being love is a supreme creative act.

The book that I shall make people read is the book of the heart, which holds the key to the mystery of life

There are worlds of possibility inherent in our consciousness that can facilitate our own transformation. What future have you imagined for yourself?