The true definition of mental illness is when the majority of your time is spent in the past or future, but rarely living in the realism of NOW.

I ran across an excerpt today (in English translation) of some dialogue/narration from the modern popular writer, Paulo Coelho in his book: Aleph.(Note: bracketed text is mine.)... 'I spoke to three scholars,' [the character says 'at last.'] ...two of them said that, after death, the [sic (misprint, fault of the publisher)] just go to Paradise. The third one, though, told me to consult some verses from the Koran. [end quote]' ...I can see that he's excited. [narrator]' ...Now I have many positive things to say about Coelho: He is respectable, inspiring as a man, a truth-seeker, and an appealing writer; but one should hesitate to call him a 'literary' writer based on this quote. A 'literary' author knows that a character's excitement should be 'shown' in his or her dialogue and not in the narrator's commentary on it. Advice for Coelho: Remove the 'I can see that he's excited' sentence and show his excitement in the phrasing of his quote.(Now, in defense of Coelho, I am firmly of the opinion, having myself written plenty of prose that is flawed, that a novelist should be forgiven for slipping here and there.)Lastly, it appears that a belief in reincarnation is of great interest to Mr. Coelho ... Just think! He is a man who has achieved, (as Leonard Cohen would call it), 'a remote human possibility.' He has won lots of fame and tons of money. And yet, how his preoccupation with reincarnation—none other than an interest in being born again as somebody else—suggests that he is not happy!

ARTThe world is full of confusion and contradiction. We cannot expect to do anything that is absolutely right. We can only measure rightness by the truth within ourselves. And our own truth will never be quite the same as somebody else's. I wish that I could touch you and be sure that it was the right thing to do. I only want to touch you briefly. Just once so that you will know. We are flesh and blood and full of faults. But we are also full of warmth. The world is full of confusion but there is compassion in its midst. communication via simple touch can transmit so much of us in just one minute. Like a painting or a piece of music. I want to touch your soul. I only wish I could be sure it was the right thing to do.

It was not curiosity that killed the goose who laid the golden egg, but an insatiable greed that devoured common sense.

Beware trying to iron out all your quirks, perceived flaws and doubts. It's often these things that help you find strength, compassion, empathy for others and heart.

The good ones put your character to the flame and burn away all the rest of the shit until you come out a better you.

Stop counting your losses and start counting your blessings. Only then will you discover that losses are always easier to point out and count than blessings. And that your blessings will always outnumber your losses, for they are truly immeasurable.

Kiss your scars. Fall in love with them. They ought to serve as life-affirming reminders—a lingering trace of hope. The only reason we have these scars is because we survived and are still here.

The heavenly Father knows all my faults. But still forgives all my sins.

As long as one sees faults with the world, he prevails in the knowledge of the senses. The inner purification has not yet occurred in him.

Arrogance based on relentless denial of faults eventually makes a person weary.

Always look at good side of a man. And forget his faults.

You'll notice you don't have both feet on the ground when you don't have any friends around

Men who do not forgive women their little faults will never enjoy their great virtues.

Immodest creature, you do not want a woman who will accept your faults, you want the one who pretends you are faultless – one who will caress the hand that strikes her and kiss the lips that lie to

As long as one finds faults with the world, he won’t be able to find anything about the Soul (Self). He who sees his own faults is the Soul (Self) himself!

When one sees one’s own faults, he attains a state of an abode of Self-illuminated Bliss!

Such excessive preoccupation with his faults is not a truly spiritual activity but, on the contrary, a highly egoistic one.The recognition of his own faults should make a man humbler, when it is beneficial, not prouder, which the thought that he ought to have been above these faults makes him.

When you see the members of your household as faultless (nirdosh) and see only your own faults, then true pratikraman will be done.

There are only two things to understand in this world. First is, one’s own True Self, and the other is, our faults from the past [life]. Won’t these faults have to be broken?

When one cautions you, he is a 'lighthouse' and if one find faults with the lighthouse, when will that ship reach safely [to its destination]?.

When the vision becomes right [correct], one sees only his own faults and when the vision is wrong [incorrect], he sees others at fault.

What spreads the stench of bad conduct? It is the egoism and other ‘flaws’.

Flaw laden intellect shows faults in others. If you deviate even slightly in the wrong direction, you will see everyone at fault.

To see others’ faults is a terrible mistake!

All day long, no one is at fault for anything. Whatever faults we see; we see them because of our own defects.

In this world, it is not worth finding anyone’s faults. One becomes bound (by karma) by finding faults.

When one sees his own faults, he will not have the time to see the others’ faults.

All this has been created from self-fault and self-imagination!

One should become free of mistakes so that there will be no superior over him.

Where there is love, there are no faults. Where the love of give-and-take (dealer) arose, all faults will be seen there.

...somehow, the very errors and faults of one individual served to call out the higher excellencies in another, and so they re-acted upon each other, and the result of short discords was exceeding harmony and peace.

By staying married, we give something to ourselves and to others: hope. Hope that in steadfastly loving someone, we ourselves, for all our faults, will be loved; that the broken world will be made whole. To hitch your rickety wagon to the flickering star of another fallible human being -- what an insane thing to do. What a burden, and what a gift.

The reason why some of us love when it rain is because it fills in the faults of our broken hearts and makes us feel complete, even if it is temporary.

To my mind the most interesting thing in art is the personality of the artist; and if that is singular, I am willing to excuse a thousand faults.

I am responsible for my life, my happiness, and my joy. I am responsible for my faults, which will destroy.

Children do not find fault with their parents until later. In the beginning, the love you get is the love that sets.

Conscience is a coward, and those faults it has not strength enough to prevent it seldom has justice enough to accuse.

No matter what happens, I will always love myself.

Check yourself often and correct your faults. Quit blaming others. Take responsibility for your own life. That's the only way you can grow!

One who enjoys finding errors will then start creating errors to find.

I could be anything but for the faults that I've acquired on my way.

Our systems, perhaps, are nothing more than an unconscious apology for our faults, a gigantic scaffolding whose object is to hide from us our favorite sin

...their relationship was a point of near-constant discussion in Night Vale, all of their imperfections and faults, which made them individuals worth loving. They had built those faults into the usual messy, comfortable, patched-up, beautiful structure that any functioning long-term relationship ended up being.

Consider a man’s good qualities, and consider his faults; and judge his character by that which is more.

Do not be concerned with the faults of other persons. Do not see others' faults with a hateful mind. There is an old saying that if you stop seeing others' faults, then naturally seniors and venerated and juniors are revered. Do not imitate others' faults; just cultivate virtue. Buddha prohibited unwholesome actions, but did not tell us to hate those who practice unwholesome actions.

Because he has never forgiven himself any fault, he can forgive no one else's.

When you say the word 'sorry' make sure you understand that an apology has 3 parts. "I'm sorry", "It's my fault and I won't do it again" and "How can I make things better". The last part is the most important.

As a matter of fact, we are none of us above criticism; so let us bear with each other's faults.

men do not suspect faults which they do not commit

Aging is not our fault, but we certainly are guilty of feeling it.

People may flatter themselves just as much by thinking that their faults are always present to other people's minds, as if they believe that the world is always contemplating their individual charms and virtues.

When you only know your faults and failures, you allow yourself and others to downgrade your dreams and belittle your wants.

But, ah me! where is the faultless human creature who can persevere in a good resolution, without sometimes failing and falling back?

Never say never or it becomes a vice, and there you have it, you just did it twice.

The desire to criticise becomes less and less as the character is developed. It is the mark of a fine character never to be critical and to mention but rarely the faults of others. A strong character does not resist evil, but uses their strength in building the good. They know that when the light is made strong, the darkness will disappear of itself.

You're overconfident, mysterious, dark, picky, edgy, cold and have sixty-nine more faults. That's why you're perfect.

And here's the surprising truth: As you gaze at yourself in the mirror held by another, you will see far more than your flaws. You also will see the beauty that is uniquely you; beauty that others see clearly and you may hardly know exists. That is also part of the truth about you.

Do not find faults, only forgive.

Most writers deserve the reputation posterity has bestowed upon them: You can’t for long conceal the toxic spots on your character—Philip Larkin is Exhibit A—nor can you conceal your dignity, your humanism, your regard for veracity and freedom.

The ancient commission of the writer has not changed. He is charged with exposing our many grievous faults and failures, with dredging up to the light our dark and dangerous dreams for the purpose of improve

Maturity is when you're able to say, 'It's not just them. It's me.

And God does have a personality. He can't hide from us. His personality shines through every Hebrew letter, on every page. Sometimes we forget that God is a person--not a fleshly person, but a person nonetheless. (page iii)

Unconditional Love is a perpetual emotion machine. It inspires us to include others. The longer I am bathed in its radiance, the more I find myself looking at others with an open heart. I can look past their faults and love them. I can say, “I may not like the things you do, but I love you.

Yet the human heart is disheartened by the most unreasonable self-judgments, because even when we take on giants, we too often confuse failure with fault, which I know too well. The only way back from such a bleak despondency is to shape humiliation into humility, to strive always to triumph over the darkness while never forgetting that the honor and the beauty are more in striving than in winning. When triumph at last comes, our efforts alone could not have won the day without that grace which surpasses all understanding and which will, if we allow it, imbue our lives with meaning.

As a matter of fact, when it comes to seeing, men display two tendencies: they see what they wish to see, what is useful to them, what is agreeable. The second is the tendency toward inhibition; they do not see what they do not wish to see, what is useless to them, or disagreeable.

When we make mistakes, we simply say sorry. And saying the words would cost us our pride most of the time.

All of us sport an invisible sign around our necks -- “AS IS.” It means, take me as I am. I may not become what you want me to be. And I’m far, far from perfect. But I have some great qualities, too, as well as my share of faults. You will have to take me “AS IS” and I’ll take you that way, too.

He well knew his mind's natural tendency to be endlessly on a thousand subjects at once, to flit from this to that and to the next thing to no particular purpose--indeed, he called it his "butterfly mind.

Perhaps, if you weren't so busy regarding my shortcomings, you'd find that I do possess redeeming qualities, discreet as they may be.  I notice when the sky is blue.  I smile down at children.  I laugh at any innocent attempt at humor.  I quietly carry the burdens of others as though they were my own.  And I say 'I'm sorry' when you don't.  I am not without fault, but I am not without goodness either.

Oh, how clearly I see your faults! Such distinctly highlighted flaws; it's as if the sun and moon mean to keep them illuminated in my eyes. My mind is quick to spell out a simple remedy for those defects. But alas, poor me! My own faults―which I only assume to have because all do―are blurred and obscured by a mental fog. I've no eyes with which to gaze back at myself. The sun and moon refuse their illumination, and my mind offers no sure elixir but a complex recipe scribbled in foreign words I scarcely comprehend.

We all have to face our faults and mistakes, and then choose to overcome them or let them drag us down.

I saw the light blinking in my living room and changed it over and over, at the end I realized it was my eye blinking.

You don't grow up, she reasoned now, until you begin to evaluate yourself, to recognize your good traits and acknowledge that you have a few faults.

Our natures own predilections and antipathies alike strange. There are people from whom we secretly shrink, whom we would personally avoid, though reason confesses that they are good people: there are others with faults of temper, &c., evident enough, beside whom we live content, as if the air about them did us good.

No weakness of the human mind has more frequently incurred animadversion, than the negligence with which men overlook their own faults, however flagrant, and the easiness with which they pardon them, however frequently repeated.

He never looks away, searching my eyes for truth. His reaction has left my heart pounding, shocked at how quick he was to dismiss any fault I may have had. I wish he was just as quick to dismiss his own faults, but he isn't.

When anyone is going wrong, it is a mistake to warn him not to go further. It is also a mistake to leave him alone. The proper course is to call his attention to something better, and frame our conversation in such a way that he becomes wholly absorbed in the better. He will then forget his old mistakes, his old faults and his old desires, and will give all his life and power to the building of that better which has engaged his new interest.

Too much salt will spoil the curryand too many faults will spoil the harmony.

Yesterday's faults become today's lessons. Today's dreams become tomorrow's reality.

Was there ever a great true love? Anyone who became the object of my obsession and not simply my affections?...I could not let myself become that unmindful. Isn't that what love is - losing your mind? You don't care what people think. You don't see your beloved's faults, the slight stinginess, the bit of carelessness, the occasional streak of meanness. You don't mind that he is beneath you socially, educationally, financially, and morally - that's the worst, I think, deficient morals.

It is in our faults and failings, not in our virtues, that we touch one another and find sympathy. We differ widely enough in our nobler qualities. It is in our follies that we are at one.