What does it mean to know and experience my own “nothingness?” It is not enough to turn away in disgust from my illusions and faults and mistakes, to separate myself from them as if they were not, and as if I were someone other than myself. This kind of self-annihilati on is only a worse illusion, it is a pretended humility which, by saying “I am nothing” I mean in effect “I wish I were not what I am. ✨ Thomas Merton (2011). Thoughts In Solitude, p.49, Macmillan
More Author Quotes
- Be human in this most inhuman of ages; guard the image of man for it is the image of God. ✨ Thomas Merton (1966). Raids on the Unspeakable, p.6, New Directions Publishing
- We are so obsessed with doing that we have no time and no imagination left for being. As a result, men are valued not for what they are but for what they do or what they have - for their usefulness. … ▶
- I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. ✨ Thomas Merton (2009). Dialogues with Silence: Prayers & Drawings, p.8, Harper Collins
- What can we gain by sailing to the moon if we cannot cross the abyss that separates us from ourselves? ✨ Thomas Merton (2015). Choosing to Love the World: On Contemplation, p.35, Sounds True
- There is not true intimacy between souls who do not know how to respect one another's solitude. ✨ Thomas Merton (2005). No Man is an Island, p.175, Shambhala Publications
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