Quotes 891082
To every man his little cross. Till he dies. And is forgotten.
- Samuel Beckett
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Life is not always what one wants it to be, but to make the best of it, as it is, is the only way of being happy.
- Jennie Jerome Churchill
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They met several times that spring, and each time they shared their work with each other. By April, Vincent told her mother, “I call her ‘Sara’ and she me ‘Vincent.’… I love her… Here’s one of Sara’s little things.
I hoped that he would love me,
And he has kissed my mouth,
But I am like a stricken bird
That cannot reach the south.
For tho’ I know he loves me,
Tonight my heart is sad;
His kiss was not so wonderful
As all the dreams I had.
Isn’t that perfect? … All her little songs are like that. You think they’re going to be like something else you’ve read, but they never are.”
- Nancy Milford, quoting Edna St Vincent Millay
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Forget mistakes. Forget failures. Forget everything except what you’re going to do now and do it. Today is your lucky day.
- Will Durant
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Another client grew up under similar circumstances. “My father saw me as something of a saint.” She told me. “He would say to me. “You are so good. You are always willing to help others, but you ask for nothing for yourself. I am so proud of you!”
What her father was really saying was: “My life is easier when I don’t have to respond to your needs. Therefore, you and I will both pretend you don’t have any. Your reward is my love and admiration.” As a result, she went through life with a one-dimensional personality, admired by many but loved by few. Few people could get close to her, because she couldn’t get close to herself. A part of her psyche was locked away, unavailable for use.
- Patricia Love, The Emotional Incest Syndrome.
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Many behaviors judged insane are efforts by people in altered states of consciousness to share nonconsensual versions of reality in ways that profoundly disturb their associates. The communications are so disagreeable because successfully socialized people are usually convinced that the consensus reality events of their culture define the limits of possible experience.
- John Nelson
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In the unconscious, nothing can be brought to an end, nothing is past or forgotten
- Sigmund Freud
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“My dear friend, I’ve seen many things in my life, but never anything as remarkable as this. Would you be willing to share with me the secret of Rule Number 6?” “Very simple,” replies the resident prime minister. “Rule Number 6 is “Don’t take yourself so g--damn seriously.” “Ah,” says his visitor, “that is a fine rule.” After a moment of pondering, he inquires, “And what, may I ask, are the other rules?”
“There aren’t any.”
- Rosamund Stone Zander
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Frank Sulloway, a former research scholar at the Massachusettes Institute of Technology in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, suggests that we think of “personality” as a strategy for “getting out of childhood alive.” Each child in a family stakes out her own territory of attention and importance by developing certain aspects of her character into “winning ways.” One child may be sociable and outgoing, another may be quiet and thoughtful, but both are aimed at the same thing: to find a safe and identifiable niche in the family and the community and to position themselves to survive… A child comes to think of himself as the personality he gets recognition for…
- Rosamund Stone Zander
-----------------------------------------------------------
The way I now saw things was the way I would write about them one day. Immediately questions assailed me, like slings and darts from angry gods. Would I remember? Would I be able, on a sheet of paper, to exfoliate in all directions at once? Was it the purpose of art to stagger from fit to fit, leaving a bloody hemorrhage in one’s wake? Was one merely to report the “dictation”--like a faithful chela obeying the telepathic behest of his master? Did creation begin, as with the earth itself, in the fiery bubble of inchoate magma, or was it necessary that the crust first cool?
Rather frantically I excluded all but the question of remembrance. It was hopeless to think of reproducing a mental cloudburst. I could merely try to retain certain definite clues, transform them into mnemonic touchstones. To find the vein again was the all-important--not how much gold I could mine. My task was to develop a mnemonic index to my inspirational atlas. Even the hardiest adventurer scarcely deludes himself that he will be able to cover every square foot of earth on this mysterious globe.
- Henry Miller
-------------------------------------------------------
“Could I give you a little bit of advice, Mr De Worde?
“Please do, Sir”
“Be careful. People like to be told what they already know. Remember that. They get uncomfortable when you tell them new things. New things… well, new things aren’t what they expect. They like to know that, say, a dog will bite a man. That is what dogs do. They don’t want to know that a man bites a dog, because the world is not supposed to happen like that. In short, what people think they want is news, but what they really crave is olds. I can see you’ve got the hang of it already.”
“Yes, sir,” said William, not at all sure he fully understood this, but certain that he didn’t like the bit he did understand.
- Terry Pratchett
To every man his little cross. Till he dies. And is forgotten.
- Samuel Beckett
------------------------------------------------
Life is not always what one wants it to be, but to make the best of it, as it is, is the only way of being happy.
- Jennie Jerome Churchill
--------------------------------------
They met several times that spring, and each time they shared their work with each other. By April, Vincent told her mother, “I call her ‘Sara’ and she me ‘Vincent.’… I love her… Here’s one of Sara’s little things.
I hoped that he would love me,
And he has kissed my mouth,
But I am like a stricken bird
That cannot reach the south.
For tho’ I know he loves me,
Tonight my heart is sad;
His kiss was not so wonderful
As all the dreams I had.
Isn’t that perfect? … All her little songs are like that. You think they’re going to be like something else you’ve read, but they never are.”
- Nancy Milford, quoting Edna St Vincent Millay
---------------------------------------------------------
Forget mistakes. Forget failures. Forget everything except what you’re going to do now and do it. Today is your lucky day.
- Will Durant
------------------------------------------------
Another client grew up under similar circumstances. “My father saw me as something of a saint.” She told me. “He would say to me. “You are so good. You are always willing to help others, but you ask for nothing for yourself. I am so proud of you!”
What her father was really saying was: “My life is easier when I don’t have to respond to your needs. Therefore, you and I will both pretend you don’t have any. Your reward is my love and admiration.” As a result, she went through life with a one-dimensional personality, admired by many but loved by few. Few people could get close to her, because she couldn’t get close to herself. A part of her psyche was locked away, unavailable for use.
- Patricia Love, The Emotional Incest Syndrome.
------------------------------------------
Many behaviors judged insane are efforts by people in altered states of consciousness to share nonconsensual versions of reality in ways that profoundly disturb their associates. The communications are so disagreeable because successfully socialized people are usually convinced that the consensus reality events of their culture define the limits of possible experience.
- John Nelson
----------------------------------------------
In the unconscious, nothing can be brought to an end, nothing is past or forgotten
- Sigmund Freud
--------------------------------------------------------------
“My dear friend, I’ve seen many things in my life, but never anything as remarkable as this. Would you be willing to share with me the secret of Rule Number 6?” “Very simple,” replies the resident prime minister. “Rule Number 6 is “Don’t take yourself so g--damn seriously.” “Ah,” says his visitor, “that is a fine rule.” After a moment of pondering, he inquires, “And what, may I ask, are the other rules?”
“There aren’t any.”
- Rosamund Stone Zander
-------------------------------------
Frank Sulloway, a former research scholar at the Massachusettes Institute of Technology in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, suggests that we think of “personality” as a strategy for “getting out of childhood alive.” Each child in a family stakes out her own territory of attention and importance by developing certain aspects of her character into “winning ways.” One child may be sociable and outgoing, another may be quiet and thoughtful, but both are aimed at the same thing: to find a safe and identifiable niche in the family and the community and to position themselves to survive… A child comes to think of himself as the personality he gets recognition for…
- Rosamund Stone Zander
-----------------------------------------------------------
The way I now saw things was the way I would write about them one day. Immediately questions assailed me, like slings and darts from angry gods. Would I remember? Would I be able, on a sheet of paper, to exfoliate in all directions at once? Was it the purpose of art to stagger from fit to fit, leaving a bloody hemorrhage in one’s wake? Was one merely to report the “dictation”--like a faithful chela obeying the telepathic behest of his master? Did creation begin, as with the earth itself, in the fiery bubble of inchoate magma, or was it necessary that the crust first cool?
Rather frantically I excluded all but the question of remembrance. It was hopeless to think of reproducing a mental cloudburst. I could merely try to retain certain definite clues, transform them into mnemonic touchstones. To find the vein again was the all-important--not how much gold I could mine. My task was to develop a mnemonic index to my inspirational atlas. Even the hardiest adventurer scarcely deludes himself that he will be able to cover every square foot of earth on this mysterious globe.
- Henry Miller
-------------------------------------------------------
“Could I give you a little bit of advice, Mr De Worde?
“Please do, Sir”
“Be careful. People like to be told what they already know. Remember that. They get uncomfortable when you tell them new things. New things… well, new things aren’t what they expect. They like to know that, say, a dog will bite a man. That is what dogs do. They don’t want to know that a man bites a dog, because the world is not supposed to happen like that. In short, what people think they want is news, but what they really crave is olds. I can see you’ve got the hang of it already.”
“Yes, sir,” said William, not at all sure he fully understood this, but certain that he didn’t like the bit he did understand.
- Terry Pratchett