F. Sionil Jose Quotes

I read to see myself in other people's lives.

People are people, and they want to know about their own experiences.

The more that we self-analyze ourselves, the nicer we are to people and to ourselves, and the more we understand each other.

We forge gradually our greatest instrument for understanding the world - introspection. We discover that humanity may resemble us very considerably - that the best way of knowing the inwardness of our neighbors is to know ourselves.

We read books to find out who we are. What other people, real or imaginary, do and think and feel... is an essential guide to our understanding of what we ourselves are and may become.

We have to listen to other people's stories. That's the thing. And that's the only way that we eventually get to know ourselves.

Most of your suffering comes from the lack of understanding of yourself and others.

You have to start knowing yourself so well that you begin to know other people. A piece of us is in every person we can ever meet.

All relationships are your mirrors and all people are your teachers.

Out: Reading is fundamental. In: Feeling is fundamental.

We read deeply for varied reasons, most of them familiar: that we cannot know enough people profoundly enough; that we need to know ourselves better; that we require knowledge, not just of self and others, but of the way things are.

Those who write about life, reflect about life. you see in others who you are.

You rehear your life by reading about what happens to other people.

I'm a lot more interested in people than I used to be. I used to be most interested in abstract ideas, and people were an afterthought, but that's changed a bit.

I'm curious about other people. That's the essence of my acting. I'm interested in what it would be like to be you.

If you don't understand yourself you don't understand anybody else.

When you have a problem, rules don't solve your problem. It's caring and education.

Criticism is a misconception: we must read not to understand others but to understand ourselves.

In every person, you have a world of personalities and souls, a world of perspectives that you can share. You can get into anyone's shoes. You've got to be willing to stare at the ugliest part of yourself and deal with it.

Sometimes, we only get to know someone as one aspect of who they are. Then you start peeling back the layers and understanding more and more about who they are - their vulnerabilities, their fears, their joys, all those other words that equal humanity.

Books can only reveal us to ourselves, and as often as they do us this service we lay them aside.

I enjoy learning about other people. I really didn't understand that until 'Moonlight.'

To me, acting used to be just, 'Get my face out there, get girls, make a little bit of money, make my mom proud.' It was just like sports. But there were moments in 'Moonlight' that I really felt like I had to know why he is the way he is. Or just people in general - why this person walks around with a frown on their face instead of a smile.

Stories teach us empathy. They reveal to us ourselves in the skins of others.

I was the 'no one understands me' teenager. But I think truly I've realized now that I didn't understand a thing myself. So I just had some livin' to do.