Teach me, O God, not to torture myself, not to make a martyr out of myself through stifling reflection, but rather teach me to breathe deeply in faith.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Faith, Prayer
The greatest hazard of all, losing one’s self, can occur very quietly in the world, as if it were nothing at all. No other loss can occur so quietly; any other loss – an arm, a leg, five dollars, a wife, etc. – is sure to be noticed.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Self-Discovery
A solitary person cannot help, or save, an age; he can only give expression to the fact that it is going under.
—Soren Kierkegaard
This is what is sad when one contemplates human life, that so many live out their lives in quiet lostness… they live, as it were, away from themselves and vanish like shadows. Their immortal souls are blown away, and they are not disquieted by the question of its immortality, because they are already disintegrated before they die.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Life
The difference between a man who faces death for the sake of an idea and an imitator who goes in search of martyrdom is that whilst the former expresses his idea most fully in death it is the strange feeling of bitterness which comes from failure that the latter really enjoys; the former rejoices in his victory, the latter in his suffering.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Since boredom advances and boredom is the root of all evil, no wonder, then, that the world goes backwards, that evil spreads. This can be traced back to the very beginning of the world. The gods were bored; therefore they created human beings.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Boredom
Old age realizes the dreams of youth: look at Dean Swift; in his youth he built an asylum for the insane, in his old age he was himself an inmate.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Age, Aging
People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Speech, Freedom, People, Thought, Thinking
The supreme paradox of all thought is the attempt to discover something that thought cannot think.
—Soren Kierkegaard
If an Arab in the desert were suddenly to discover a spring in his tent, and so would always be able to have water in abundance, how fortunate he would consider himself; so too, when a man who … is always turned toward the outside, thinking that his happiness lies outside him, finally turns inward and discovers that the source is within him.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Happiness, Thinking
If I were to wish for anything, I should not wish for wealth and power, but for the passionate sense of potential—for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible. Pleasure disappoints; possibility never.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Wishes, Potential
There are, as is known, insects that die in the moment of fertilization. So it is with all joy: life’s highest, most splendid moment of enjoyment is accompanied by death.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Enjoyment
Boredom is the root of all evil—the despairing refusal to be oneself.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Bores, Boredom
When you read God’s Word, you must constantly be saying to yourself, “It is talking to me, and about me.”
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Religion, Bible
In addition to my other numerous acquaintances, I have one more intimate confidant. My depression is the most faithful mistress I have known—no wonder, then, that I return the love.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Depression
The self is only that which it is in the process of becoming.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Discovery, Self-Discovery
If I were to wish for anything, I should not wish for wealth and power, but for the passionate sense of the potential, for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible. Pleasure disappoints, possibility never. And what wine is so sparkling, what so fragrant, what so intoxicating, as possibility!
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Positive Attitudes, Miscellaneous, Possibilities, Joy, Realistic Expectations, Health, Optimism, Potential
To cheat oneself out of love is the most terrible deception; it is an eternal loss for which there is no reparation, either in time or in eternity
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Cheating
The present generation, wearied by its chimerical efforts, relapses into complete indolence. Its condition is that of a man who has only fallen asleep towards morning: first of all come great dreams, then a feeling of laziness, and finally a witty or clever excuse for remaining in bed.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Laziness
Adversity not only draws people together, but brings forth that beautiful inward friendship.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Friendship
Spiritual superiority only sees the individual. But alas, ordinarily we human beings are sensual and, therefore, as soon as it is a gathering, the impression changes—we see something abstract, the crowd, and we become different. But in the eyes of God, the infinite spirit, all the millions that have lived and now live do not make a crowd, He only sees each individual.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: People
The function of prayer is not to influence God, but rather to change the nature of the one who prays.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Prayer
It is so hard to believe because it is so hard to obey.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Belief
Not just in commerce but in the world of ideas too our age is putting on a veritable clearance sale. Everything can be had so dirt cheap that one begins to wander whether in the end anyone will want to make a bid.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Ideas
Without risk, faith is an impossibility.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Perspective, Belief, Trying, Faith, Risk
Irony is a disciplinarian feared only by those who do not know it, but cherished by those who do. He who does not understand irony and has no ear for its whispering lacks of what might called the absolute beginning of the personal life. He lacks what at moments is indispensable for the personal life, lacks both the regeneration and rejuvenation, the cleaning baptism of irony that redeems the soul from having its life in finitude though living boldly and energetically in finitude.
—Soren Kierkegaard
It is really true what philosophy tells us, that life must be understood backwards. But with this, one forgets the second proposition, that it must be lived forwards.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Experience, Fail, Purpose, Sin, Challenges, Moving on, Failure, Nature, Courage, Meaning, Great, Perseverance, Life and Living, Living, Time, Past, Reflection, Life
I feel as if I were a piece in a game of chess, when my opponent says of it: That piece cannot be moved.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Discontent
Personality is only ripe when a man has made the truth his own.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Personality
Don’t forget to love yourself.
—Soren Kierkegaard
Topics: Love
Wondering Whom to Read Next?
- John Shelby Spong American Episcopal Bishop
- Friedrich Schleiermacher German Theologian
- Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach German Philosopher
- Augustine of Hippo Roman-African Christian Philosopher
- Emanuel Swedenborg Swedish Mystic, Theologian, Scientist
- Wilhelm Dilthey German Philosopher
- Karl Marx German Philosopher, Economist
- Dietrich Bonhoeffer German Lutheran Pastor
- John Macquarrie British Theologian
- Auguste Comte French Philosopher
Leave a Reply