Julie Mehretu Quotes

My fascination is not for cinema; it's for human nature and human beings because I find it quite difficult being one at times.

When you judge another, you do not define them, you define yourself.

Since Socrates and Plato first speculated on the nature of the human mind, serious thinkers through the ages - from Aristotle to Descartes, from Aeschylus to Strindberg and Ingmar Bergman - have thought it wise to understand oneself and one's behavior.

History gives you insight of the same quality of truth as poetry or philosophy or a novel.

What art and books do at their best is investigate why we are the way we are.

It's hard for me to characterise myself. I think I'm balanced. Some people might say I'm cold-hearted.

There is no self-knowledge except historical self-knowledge.

I've never been great at being really analytical about myself.

When I am talking to someone, I can constantly see whether I am failing or succeeding. I am regulating what I am saying in terms of how I think I'm doing. I'm always searching for the truth of a subject or person, and I look at every meeting as a grand experiment.

You want to feel, 'I know that character.'

I believe when people can find out who they are, then you can be equipped to handle life's situations.

The most important thing about a person is that you know who you are and what you want. You should be capable of introspection and evaluate yourself.

That's something that is important to me, that people know me and understand me.

I'm interested in how we understand ourselves in our relatioships and how we define ourselves.

It's been one of the most important tools for me in personal growth for understanding myself, how I am, and what effect I do have on other people.

In fact I'm in too much of a mental muddle to know where I am - an idealist or not. I'm a mere man of letters, and I do what I can with those subjects.

Through my own observations. I am convinced that an absolutely honest and direct inquiry into oneself will lead to understanding.

Only in an open, nonjudgmental space can we acknowledge what we are feeling. Only in an open space where we're not all caught up in our own version of reality can we see and hear and feel who others really are, which allows us to be with them and communicate with them properly.

It's in understanding yourself deeply that you can lend yourself to another person's circumstances and another person's experience.

To know yourself you have only to set down a true statement of those that ever loved or hated you.

The Work is merely four questions; it's not even a thing. It has no motive, no strings. It's nothing without your answers. These four questions will join any program you've got and enhance it. Any religion you have - they'll enhance it. If you have no religion, they will bring you joy. And they'll burn up anything that isn't true for you. They'll burn through to the reality that has always been waiting.

I must first know myself, as the Delphian inscription says; to be curious about that which is not my concern, while I am still in ignorance of my own self, would be ridiculous. And therefore I bid farewell to all this; the common opinion is enough for me. For, as I was saying, I want to know not about this, but about myself: am I a monster more complicated and swollen with passion than the serpent Typho, or a creature of a gentler and simpler sort, to whom Nature has given a diviner and lowlier destiny?

For all his understanding of worldly concerns, when it came to fathoming the deeper meaning of his own furious activity, Sir Bob displayed the sort of laziness for which he himself had no patience in others. He appeared to have only a passing interest in the overall purpose of his financial accumulation.

I call that man awake who, with conscious knowledge and understanding, can perceive the deep unreasoning powers in his soul, his whole innermost strength, desire and weakness, and knows how to reckon with himself.

We read books to find out who we are.