up:: Psychology, Thinking, Mind, The Self
Introspection
Introspection is the examination of one’s own conscious thoughts and feelings. In psychology, the process of introspection relies on the observation of one’s mental state, while in a spiritual context it may refer to the examination of one’s soul. Introspection is closely related to human self-reflection and self-discovery and is contrasted with external observation.
It generally provides a privileged access to one’s own mental states, not mediated by other sources of knowledge, so that individual experience of the mind is unique. Introspection can determine any number of mental states including: sensory, bodily, cognitive, emotional and so forth.Introspection has been a subject of philosophical discussion for thousands of years. The philosopher Plato asked, “…why should we not calmly and patiently review our own thoughts, and thoroughly examine and see what these appearances in us really are?” While introspection is applicable to many facets of philosophical thought it is perhaps best known for its role in epistemology; in this context introspection is often compared with perception, reason, memory, and testimony as a source of knowledge.
Quotes
- “…why should we not calmly and patiently review our own thoughts, and thoroughly examine and see what these appearances in us really are?” – Plato, ~369 BC
“I do not understand what I do.
For what I want to do I do not do,
but what I hate I do.”
– Romans 7:15, ~50 AD
- “The greatest thing in the world is to know how to belong to oneself.” ― Michel de Montaigne, Essays, 1580
“And since you know you cannot see yourself,
so well as by reflection, I, your glass,
will modestly discover to yourself,
that of yourself which you yet know not of.”
— Cassius to Brutus, William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, 1599
- “We are so accustomed to disguising ourselves to others, that in the end, we become disguised to ourselves.” ― François de La Rochefoucauld, 1665
- “As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.” ― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust (First Part), 1780
- “The one thing in the world, of value, is the active soul. This every man is entitled to; this every man contains within him, although, in almost all men, obstructed, and as yet unborn. The soul active sees absolute truth; and utters truth, or creates. In this action, it is genius; not the privilege of here and there a favorite, but the sound estate of every man.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson, The American Scholar, 1837
- Who in the world am I?” Ah, that’s the great puzzle.” – Alice, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll, ~1865
- “Everything is vague to a degree you do not realize till you have tried to make it precise, and everything precise is so remote from everything that we normally think, that you cannot for a moment suppose that is what we really mean when we say what we think.” – Bertrand Russell, ~1918
- “Nobody can advise you and help you, nobody. There is only one way. Go into yourself.” – Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters To A Young Poet, 1929
- “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.” – Carl Jung, ~1931
- “My own brain is to me the most unaccountable of machinery - always buzzing, humming, soaring, roaring, diving, and then buried in mud. And why? What’s this passion for?” – Virginia Woolf, 1932
- “To free us from the expectations of others, to give us back to ourselves there lies the great, the singular power of self-respect. Without it, one eventually discovers the final turn of the screw: one runs away to find oneself and finds no one at home.” – Joan Didion, 1961
- “Every intelligent individual wants to know what makes him tick, and yet is at once fascinated and frustrated by the fact that oneself is the most difficult of all things to know.” – Alan Watts, 1966
- “Why am I so bad at being good?” – Zuko, Avatar: The Last Airbender, 2008