"It is this nothingness (in solitude) that I……" — Henri Nouwen
"It is this nothingness (in solitude) that I have to face in my solitude, a nothingness so dreadful that everything in me wants to run to my friends, my work, and my distractions so that I can forget my nothingness and make myself believe that I am worth something. The task is to persevere in my solitude, to stay in my cell until all my seductive visitors get tired of pounding on my door and leave me alone. The wisdom of the desert is that the confrontation with our own frightening nothingness forces us to surrender ourselves totally and unconditionally to the Lord Jesus Christ."
—
Henri Nouwen
★
★
★
★
★
0.0 avg (0 ratings)
343 Quotes by Henri Nouwen
Henri Nouwen has 343 quotes on this site.
A few more worth reading:
-
Those we most love cause us not only great joy but also great pain. LOVE is stronger than fear, life…
-
Why is it important that you are with God and God alone on the mountain top? It's important because it's…
-
All the great spiritual leaders in history were people of hope. Abraham, Moses, Ruth, Mary, Jesus, Rumi, Gandhi, and Dorothy…
-
Joy does not simply happen to us. We have to choose joy and keep choosing it every day. It is…
-
In true love the smallest distance is too great, and the greatest distance can be bridged.
-
A life without a lonely place, that is, a life without a quiet center, easily becomes destructive. When we cling…
-
Life is not a possession to be defended, but a gift to be shared.
-
Real grief is not healed by time... if time does anything, it deepens our grief. The longer we live, the…
-
When everything is dark, when we are surrounded by despairing voices, when we do not see any exits, then we…
-
...When you can look into the face of human beings and you have enough light to recognize them as your…
-
Your body needs to be held and to hold, to be touched and to touch. None of these needs is…
-
To live a spiritual life we must first find the courage to enter into the desert of loneliness and to…
See all 343 quotes by Henri Nouwen »
More All Quotes
This quote is filed under All Quotes,
one of 128,558 quotes in that category. Here are a few more:
-
Total loyalty is possible only when fidelity is emptied of all concrete content, from which changes of mind might naturally…
— Hannah Arendt
-
No cause is left but the most ancient of all, the one, in fact, that from the beginning of our…
— Hannah Arendt
-
The ultimate end of human acts is eudaimonia, happiness in the sense of living well, which all men desire; all…
— Hannah Arendt
-
The new always happens against the overwhelming odds of statistical laws and their probability, which for all practical, everyday purposes…
— Hannah Arendt
-
Where all are guilty, no one is; confessions of collective guilt are the best possible safeguard against the discovery of…
— Hannah Arendt
-
We have almost succeeded in leveling all human activities to the common denominator of securing the necessities of life and…
— Hannah Arendt
-
I keep my friends as misers do their treasure, because, of all the things granted us by wisdom, none is…
— Pietro Aretino
-
We must all make peace so that we can all live in peace.
— Jean-Bertrand Aristide
-
The spirit of Ubuntu, that once led Haiti to emerge as the first independent black nation in 1804, helped Venezuela,…
— Jean-Bertrand Aristide
-
As we all know, many people remain buried under tons of rubble and debris, waiting to be rescued. When we…
— Jean-Bertrand Aristide
-
Wise people, even though all laws were abolished, would still lead the same life.
— Aristophanes
-
A friend to all is a friend to none.
— Aristotle
See all 128,558 All Quotes »