#chaos

To study history means submitting to chaos and nevertheless retaining faith in order and meaning. ↗

— Hermann Hesse

#faith #history #meaning #means #nevertheless

The nature of life is mess, chaotic, exquisitely beautiful, excruciatingly painful, immensely joy-filled, and unpredictable. ↗

— Debra Moffitt

#happiness #joy #life #non-fiction-books-inspirational #pain

There are people like Senhor José everywhere, who fill their time, or what they believe to be their spare time, by collecting stamps, coins, medals, vases, postcards, matchboxes, books, clocks, sport shirts, autographs, stones, clay figurines, empty beverage cans, little angels, cacti, opera programmes, lighters, pens, owls, music boxes, bottles, bonsai trees, paintings, mugs, pipes, glass obelisks, ceramic ducks, old toys, carnival masks, and they probably do so out of something that we might call metaphysical angst, perhaps because they cannot bear the idea of chaos being the one ruler of the universe, which is why, using their limited powers and with no divine help, they attempt to impose some order on the world, and for a short while they manage it, but only as long as they are there to defend their collection, because when the day comes when it must be dispersed, and that day always comes, either with their death or when the collector grows weary, everything goes back to its beginnings, everything returns to chaos. ↗

— José Saramago

#collecting #death #hobbies #order #death

The abiding western dominology can with religion sanction identify anything dark, profound, or fluid with a revolting chaos, an evil to be mastered, a nothing to be ignored. 'God had made us master organizers of the world to establish system where chaos reigns. He has made us adept in government that we may administer government among savages and senile peoples.' From the vantage point of the colonizing episteme, the evil is always disorder rather than unjust order; anarchy rather than control, darkness rather than pallor. To plead otherwise is to write 'carte blanche for chaos.' Yet those who wear the mark of chaos, the skins of darkness, the genders of unspeakable openings -- those Others of Order keep finding voice. But they continue to be muted by the bellowing of the dominant discourse. ↗

— Catherine Keller

#colonialism #feminism #history #nature #oppression

Didn't you finish your chemistry in school?" "You closed the school and burnt all the books." "Ah, so I did. ↗

— Patrick Ness

#funny #monsters-of-men #funny

Humor is emotional chaos remembered in tranquility. ↗

— James Thurber

#chaos #emotional #remembered #tranquility

I saw his face change. His eyes widen. He lunged at me. I wouldn't let go. We stared into eachother's eyes and clawed at eachother's throats. As we rolled over the edge of the water tower and fell the whole way down, I was only thinking one thing ...Lena ↗

— Kami Garcia

#beautiful-creatures #beautiful-darkness #ethan #lena #love

We could not be fulfilled if we weren't inauthentic some of the time—inauthentic, that is, in relation to such things as our passing desires to throttle our children, poison our spouse, or end our marriage over a dispute about changing a lightbulb. ↗

— Alain de Botton

#chaos #civilization #desires #necessity #order

In times of widespread chaos and confusion, it has been the duty of more advanced human beings--artists, scientists, clowns and philosophers--to create order. In times such as ours, however, when there is too much order, too much management, too much programming and control, it becomes the duty of superior men and women to fling their favorite monkey wrenches into the machinery. To relive the repression of the human spirit, they must sow doubt and disruption. ↗

— Tom Robbins

#disruption #doubt #order #revolution #system

One more dance along the razor's edge finished. Almost dead yesterday, maybe dead tomorrow, but alive, gloriously alive, today. ↗

— Robert Jordan

#lord-of-chaos #military #military-quote #one-more-dance #robert-jordan