30 Perspective Quotes To Radically Shift How You See The World

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Excerpt: Change your perspective and you will change the way you see everything in life. These 30 perspective quotes will help you do just that…

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Introduction: Shifting from “comparing” to “understanding”

Life isn’t easy—for any of us. I think we all can agree on that. If so, it can be assumed that life is hard—for all of us. Now, we can never know for sure how “hard” life is or isn’t for another person. We can only ever judge another person’s life from the outside looking in, which is an INCREDIBLY limited and superficial perspective.

Of course, if someone is homeless or without basic needs for survival, there are assumptions of “hard” that we can validly make. But, when it comes to judging the other people around us, how a person’s life appears to be versus how their life actually is should never be assumed to be the same thing.

Even if you’ve seen a person’s life from “every” perspective. Even if you think you’re an incredibly “good” judge of character. Even if you feel like a person wears their emotions on their sleeve. Even if you think you’ve seen it all and know how “it all” feels—there are worlds of emotion and a lifetime of experience contained within that simply cannot be understood by anyone except he/she who is looking from the inside-out. Period.

And as tempting as it might be to compare your life to others—to see where yours lands—it’s important to realize that it’s simply a waste of time that serves no higher purpose. First of all, because you can never truly compare that which you can’t truly measure (as just discussed). And secondly, because creating a hierarchy of everybody else’s problems doesn’t do anything for solutions—it’s just a distraction.

When you sort through and organize the hard that you think everyone around you is experiencing—how does that help you deal with your hard? If you believe your hard is greater than everyone else’s, what kind of action will that inspire? Spite that you were dealt a “harder” hand? A sense of entitlement to what’s easier? Resentment towards others who you think have it easier? Thinking you have it worse off, in my estimation, only creates more challenges and mental barriers.

On the other hand, if you believe your hard is less than everyone else’s, what kind of action will that inspire? Guilt that you were dealt an “easier” hand? A sense of entitlement (again) because it has always been easier? A feeling of relief that your problems aren’t as “bad” as others? Thinking that you’re “ahead” or that you have it “easier,” in my estimation, only handicaps you and prevents you (again) from dealing with your own “hard” in life.

The only time I can see comparison being of value is when it’s to expand a person’s perspective who is caught up in relatively “small,” “first-world-type-problems.” A person’s perspective of “hard” is proportional to the size of their experience. And a person with limited experience has a limited perspective of what’s “hard.” A person with more experience, however, sees the world through a broader context and takes on a more broad definition of “hard.” When a person’s biggest problem in life is the stupid thing that someone said to them, then experiencing a broader context of “hard” might be worthwhile, indeed.

Here’s where you have to get it straight, though: broadening your range of experience really shouldn’t entail comparison. And comparison is a destructive way to broaden your range of experience. Comparison involves the ego. Broadening experience—understanding—shouldn’t.

Comparison focuses on you and makes you feel privileged or underprivileged which will evoke distracting, unproductive feelings. Broadening experience focuses on understanding which is best done without the ego/ judgement. Comparison, generally speaking, creates more personal problems. Broadening experience is, notably, the key to coming up with personal solutions.

For what else is a problem but a question you don’t have enough experience yet to answer? The distinction between the two can be blurry, but the difference in outcome couldn’t be more sharp.

Below, you will find our collection of perspective quotes that will radically shift the way you see. Because while it’s easy to assume that what you see is reality—the reality is that the same notion applies to everybody else who sees. And nobody sees anything in the world exactly the same.

So, rather than focus on other people’s perspectives, focus on your own. Change your perspective and you will change the way you see everything in life. The person who understands this, understands their true power in life.

A power that comes not from making the world change to fit their perspective, but from changing their perspective to better see the realities of the world. These perspective quotes will not only help you get there, but when applied, will help you change your life. Thank you for reading and good luck.

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The List: 30 Perspective Quotes To Radically Shift How You See The World

“The way I see it, every life is a pile of good things and bad things. The good things don’t always soften the bad things but vice versa, the bad things don’t necessarily spoil the good things or make them unimportant.”

Unknown, See Picture Quote Version ➜

“Be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never, ever have enough.”

Oprah Winfrey

“I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, it’s a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope. Which is what I do, and that enables you to laugh at life’s realities.”

Dr. Seuss, See Picture Quote Version ➜

“Fairness is an illusion.  Fairness never existed and never will.  No one in life gets less or more than anyone else.  We just get different stuff.  That’s right.  No one is dealt a bad or a good hand in life; we’re just dealt cards.  It’s up to us to stay in the game and play.  Sure, some cards look ‘better,’ but they’re really not.  If you look closely, you’ll see that anything you feel has been taken from you – or never given to you at all – was replaced with other amazing opportunities and gifts.  It’s up to you to find them.”

Sean Stephenson, Get Off Your “But”

“Problems [are] only problems if you [think] about them that way.  Otherwise they [are] life—and yours for the living.”

John Leland, Happiness is a Choice You Make (Page 113) | More quotes from this book ➜

“It is very rare or almost impossible that an event can be negative from all points of view.”

Tenzin Gyatso

“If things are not going well for you—well, that might be because, as the most cynical of aphorisms has it, life sucks, and then you die.  Before your crisis impels you to that hideous conclusion, however, you might consider the following: Life doesn’t have the problem.  You do.  At least that realization leaves you with some options.  If your life is not going well, perhaps it is your current knowledge that is insufficient, not life itself.  Perhaps your value structure needs some serious retooling.  Perhaps what you want is blinding you to what else could be.  Perhaps you are holding on to your desires, in the present, so tightly that you cannot see anything else—even what you truly need.”

Jordan Peterson, via 12 Rules for Life (Page 94) | More quotes from this book ➜

“Nothing lasts forever, and that’s both tragic and comic, depending on how we look at it—so how we look at it, our perspective, is the thing we can, and should, control.  We can give ourselves a facepalm when we look at that old outfit, or we can try it on and dance around the room summoning up the spirits and smiles of yesterday—a beautiful reminder of how far we’ve come.”

Humble the Poet, Things No One Else Can Teach Us (Page 15) | More quotes from this book ➜

“There once was a monk who would carry a mirror wherever he went. A priest noticed this, and thought, ‘He must be so preoccupied with the way he looks that he has to carry that mirror all the time, he should not worry about the way he looks on the outside, it’s what’s on the inside that counts.’ So he went up to the monk and asked, ‘Why do you always carry that mirror?’ Thinking for sure this would prove his guilt. The monk pulled out the mirror and pointed it at the priest and said, ‘I use it in times of trouble, I look into it, and it shows me the source of problems, as well as the solution to my problems.”

Unknown, See Picture Quote Version ➜

“We can’t change what life is, but we can change how we react to and interpret it.”

Jacob Held | Read Matt’s Blog on this quote ➜

“Why do we let the one thing we don’t have affect how we feel about all the things we do have?”

Carrie Bradshaw, Sex and the City, See Picture Quote Version ➜

“Once in a while it really hits people that they don’t have to experience the world in the way they have been told to.”

Alan Keightley, See Picture Quote Version ➜

“When we help others, the focus of our mind assumes a broader horizon within which we are able to see our own petty problems in a more realistic proportion.  What previously appeared to be daunting and unbearable, which is what often makes our problems so overwhelming, tends to lose its intensity.”

Dalai Lama, The Art of Happiness | Read Matt’s Blog on this quote ➜

“Life is so short. We spend so much time sweating the small stuff; worrying, complaining, gossiping, comparing, wishing, wanted and waiting for something bigger and better instead of focusing on all the simple blessings that surround us everyday. Life is so fragile and all it takes is a single moment to change everything you take for granted. Focus on what’s important and be grateful! You are blessed! Believe it! Live your life and leave no regrets.”

Melanie Koulouris, See Picture Quote Version ➜

“He said, ‘Don’t you feel lonely living in your own little world?’ She whispered, ‘Don’t you feel powerless living in other peoples worlds?'”

Unknown, See Picture Quote Version ➜

“Why do you go away? So that you can come back. So that you can see the place you came from with new eyes and extra colors. And the people there see you differently, too. Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving.”

Terry Pratchett, A Hat Full Of Sky, See Picture Quote Version ➜

“What you see and what you hear depends a great deal on where you are standing. It also depends on what sort of person you are.”

C. S. Lewis, See Picture Quote Version ➜

 “If you understand something in only one way, then you don’t really understand it at all. The secret of what anything means to us depends on how we’ve connected it to all other things we know. Well-connected representations let you turn ideas around in your mind, to envision things from many perspectives until you find one that works for you. And that’s what we mean by thinking!”

Scott Young, Zen Habits

“Seven billion people experienced today in a different way.”

Unknown, See Picture Quote Version ➜

“When someone acts in a way that seems strange to you, rather than reacting in your usual way, such as, ‘I can’t believe they would do that,’ instead say something to yourself like ‘I see, that must be the way she sees things in the world. Very interesting.’”

Richard Carlson, Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff | More quotes from this book ➜

“Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.”

Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

“A man who views the world the same at fifty as he did at twenty has wasted thirty years of his life.”

Muhammad Ali

“There is no absolute good and bad; everything is what we make of it.  As we strive to understand more than we evaluate, we open up more possibilities and opportunities for things to improve and unfold the way we want them to.  This requires paying attention, and allowing a situation to be complicated, and sorting through the details—zooming in—to find where all the magic is hiding.”

Humble the Poet, Things No One Else Can Teach Us (Page 199) | More quotes from this book ➜

“Zooming out helps us to think more in the long term and recognize patterns so we don’t overreact in the short term.  Life isn’t what happens to us; it’s how we deal with it, and how we deal with it always depends on the perspectives we can find.  Zooming out helps us realize that the story is still playing out, and we shouldn’t rush to any conclusions.”

Humble the Poet, Things No One Else Can Teach Us (Page 140) | More quotes from this book ➜

“Whoever wants to see a brick must look at its pores, and must keep his eyes close to it. But whoever wants to see a cathedral cannot see it as he sees a brick. This demands a respect for distance.”

José Ortega y Gasset, via Sunbeams (Page 45)

“What you focus on expands. If you focus on the goodness in your life, you create more of it. And if you live with an open palm rather than a closed fist, you leave room for immeasurable blessings to flow through your hands.”

Alicia Keys, More Myself (Page 81) | More quotes from this book ➜

“I don’t fix problems, I fix my thinking. Then problems fix themselves.”

Louise Hay

“You can destroy your now by worrying about tomorrow. Tomorrow never happens. It’s all the same fucking day, man. You are only as much as you settle for. Don’t compromise yourself—you are all you’ve got. You’ll end up anything you want to be.”

Janis Joplin, See Picture Quote Version ➜

“Sometimes when things feel too heavy, I ask myself, ‘Will this matter in three hundred years?’ and I think about the fact that no one I know will be around then—none of their judgments, opinions, debts, or drudges—and that I should enjoy this journey while I’m still healthy enough to do so.  In three hundred years it won’t matter that I wasn’t invited to this or that event or included on this or that list or was able to connect with this or that person.  It won’t matter that I showed up wearing a mustard stain on my outfit or that I didn’t proofread my text message before I hit ‘send.’  Figuring out what will matter in three hundred years will result in a much shorter list—almost next to nothing.”

Humble the Poet, Things No One Else Can Teach Us (Page 37) | More quotes from this book ➜

“We don’t need to be so dramatic and hyperbolic about everything.  Worrying rarely helps anything, and freaking out usually does more damage than good.  We need to acknowledge that trauma is an individual experience for everyone, but let’s also be mindful of how often we oversimplify the degree of our traumas while underestimating our resilience.  Nothing is the end of the world until it’s the end of the world, and then nothing will matter anyway.”

Humble the Poet, Things No One Else Can Teach Us (Page 204) | More quotes from this book ➜