#illusion

Things aren't like this," he kept repeating. "It shouldn't be this way." As if he had access to some other plane of existence, some parallel, "right" universe, and had sensed that our time had somehow been put out of joint. Such was his vehemence that I found myself believing him, believing, for example, in the possibility of that other life in which Vina had never left and we were making our lives together, all three of us, ascending together to the stars. Then he shook his head, and the spell broke. He opened his eyes, grinning ruefully. As if he knew his thoughts had infected mine. As if he knew his power. "Better get on with it," he said. "Make do with what there is. ↗

— Salman Rushdie

#parallel-universe #pragmatism #reality #life

The novel is born of disillusionment; the poem, of despair. ↗

— Jose Bergamin

#born #despair #disillusionment #novel #poem

Love may precede respect but it cannot survive the loss of it. ↗

— Joe L. Wheeler

#grief #loss #love #love

Love can sometimes be magic. But magic can sometimes...just be an illusion. ↗

— Javan

#love

[On Schopenhauer in Black and White] Schopenhauer's views of love are flawed. Love can't be merely an illusion of the mind to aid in procreation, but the path to redemption for an otherwise violently selfish species. Past human greatness has proven that when challenged, love can overpower impulsive instinct, and in essence, the vilest aspects of our nature. ↗

— Tiffany Madison

#essence #flaw #human #human-condition #human-nature

...all my life I prayed to a star – Later discovered it was Venus – I was praying to Aphrodite and wondering why she was sending me you -sad... ↗

— John Geddes

#love #poetry #prayer #life

If men could see us as we really are, they would be a little amazed; but the cleverest, the acutest men are often under an illusion about women: they do not read them in a true light: they misapprehend them, both for good and evil: their good woman is a queer thing, half doll, half angel; their bad woman almost always a fiend. ↗

— Charlotte Brontë

#double-standards #empowerment #expectations #false-belief #feminism

The only thing that keeps us from a place of joy is an illusion, the illusion of fear. ↗

— Molly Friedenfeld

#happiness #illusion #inspiration #inspirational-quotes #joy

Fear has no place in the lives of those who choose to be victorious. ↗

— Molly Friedenfeld

#honor #illusion #inspiration #inspirational-quotes #joy

There's a difference between playing and playing games. The former is an act of joy, the latter — an act. ↗

— Vera Nazarian

#acting #artifice #falsehood #game #games