our reality QUOTES

2 " It comforts me to think that if we are created beings the thing that created us would have to be greater than us, so much greater, in fact, that we would not be able to understand it. It would have to be greater than the facts of our reality and so it would seem to us, looking out from within our reality that it would contradict reason. But reason itself would suggest it would have to be greater than reality or it would not be reasonable. "

― Donald Miller , Blue Like Jazz: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality

4 " The scientist is more religious than the poet because his belief rests in the faith of the intangible –– a reality that stands outside of ourselves who are the observers. The poet on the other hand realizes that concepts like Truth and Beauty which form the root of our reality and identities lie not in the fleeting nature of our world, but in the eternal universal aspects of humanity. "

6 " But what is the use of the humanities as such? Admittedly they are not practical, and admittedly they concern themselves with the past. Why, it may be asked, should we engage in impractical investigations, and why should we be interested in the past? The answer to the first question is: because we are interested in reality. Both the humanities and the natural sciences, as well as mathematics and philosophy, have the impractical outlook of what the ancients called vita contemplativa as opposed to vita activa. But is the contemplative life less real or, to be more precise, is its contribution to what we call reality less important, than that of the active life? The man who takes a paper dollar in exchange for twenty-five apples commits an act of faith, and subjects himself to a theoretical doctrine, as did the mediaeval man who paid for indulgence. The man who is run over by an automobile is run over by mathematics, physics and chemistry. For he who leads the contemplative life cannot help influencing the active, just as he cannot prevent the active life from influencing his thought. Philosophical and psychological theories, historical doctrines and all sorts of speculations and discoveries, have changed, and keep changing, the lives of countless millions. Even he who merely transmits knowledge or learning participates, in his modest way, in the process of shaping reality - of which fact the enemies of humanism are perhaps more keenly aware than its friends. It is impossible to conceive of our world in terms of action alone. Only in God is there a " Coincidence of Act and Thought" as the scholastics put it. Our reality can only be understood as an interpenetration of these two. "

8 " Half-Lieutenant Marsh’k Kluss’ta was not a happy man. Naturally, that didn’t bother him as things were rarely otherwise. As the commanding sub-officer of the Black Sunrise, happiness was not a state of mind expected of him, though in reality – our reality – he was probably not such a bad person. The crew, though terrified of him even under normal circumstances, believed that he had the heart of a little child. (Let’s leave it at that, shall we?) "

― Christina Engela , Black Sunrise

10 " Our decisions are influenced by our beliefs and this is why we say our reality is what we believe in. "

― Namrata Kumari , Change Your Beliefs To Change Your Reality

12 " We take off into the cosmos, ready for anything: for solitude, for hardship, for exhaustion, death. Modesty forbids us to say so, but there are times when we think pretty well of ourselves. And yet, if we examine it more closely, our enthusiasm turns out to be all a sham. We don't want to conquer the cosmos, we simply want to extend the boundaries of Earth to the frontiers of the cosmos. For us, such and such a planet is as arid as the Sahara, another as frozen as the North Pole, yet another as lush as the Amazon basin. We are humanitarian and chivalrous; we don't want to enslave other races, we simply want to bequeath them our values and take over their heritage in exchange. We think of ourselves as the Knights of the Holy Contact. This is another lie. We are only seeking Man. We have no need of other worlds. A single world, our own, suffices us; but we can't accept it for what it is. We are searching for an ideal image of our own world: we go in quest of a planet, a civilization superior to our own but developed on the basis of a prototype of our primeval past. At the same time, there is something inside us which we don't like to face up to, from which we try to protect ourselves, but which nevertheless remains, since we don't leave Earth in a state of primal innocence. We arrive here as we are in reality, and when the page is turned and that reality is revealed to us - that part of our reality which we would prefer to pass over in silence - then we don't like it anymore. "

― Stanisław Lem , Solaris

14 " The connections that we have with others, the things we learn, and yes, our prayers—all of it is a web of connections that bind us into the fabric of reality and make us part of something greater than ourselves. And if our reality is only a tiny reflection of a much greater reality, still it is also an essential part. And the same is true of each individual life. Each deed and thought—each word between friends—adds a new thread to a tapestry so vast that we may never be able to step back and see the whole. "

― Yael Shahar , Returning