#isolation

He had been for many years, a quiet silent man, associating but little with other men, and used to companionship with his own thoughts. He had never known before the strength of the want in his heart for the frequent recognition of a nod, a look, a word; or the immense amount of relief that had been poured into it by drops through such small means. ↗

— Charles Dickens

#loneliness #sadness #solitude #men

We all grew up, those of us who took On the Road to heart. We came to cringe a little at our old favorite poet, concluding that God was likely never Pooh Bear, that sometimes New York and California could be just as isolated as our provincial hometown, and that grown men didn't run back and forth all the time bleeding soup and sympathy out of sucker women. But those are just details, really. We got what we needed, namely a passion for unlikely words, the willingness to improvise, a distrust of authority, and a sentimental attachment to a certain America.... ↗

— Sarah Vowell

#kerouac #modernism #on-the-road #men

You can only afford to be generous if you actually have some money in the bank to give. In the same way, if your only source of love and meaning is your spouse, then anytime he or she fails you, it will not just cause grief but a psychological cataclysm. If, however, you know something of the work of the Spirit in your life, you have enough love "in the bank" to be generous to your spouse even when you are not getting much affection or kindness at the moment. ↗

— Timothy Keller

#isolation #love #marriage #life

This is a fundamental view of the world. It says that when you build a thing you cannot merely build that thing in isolation, but must repair the world around it, and within it, so that the larger world at that one place becomes more coherent, and more whole; and the thing which you make takes its place in the web of nature, as you make it. ↗

— Christopher Alexander

#becomes #build #cannot #coherent #fundamental

I was obsessed with the idea of fasting and isolation. ↗

— David Blaine

#i #idea #isolation #obsessed

The one happiness is to shut one's door upon a little room, with a table before one, and to create; to create life in that isolation from life. ↗

— Eleanora Duse

#create #door #happiness #isolation #life

As has been pointed out with Libya, the debate over Libya, sometimes we allow diplomatic relations with imperfect regimes because progress can best be made through engagement instead of isolation. ↗

— Earl Blumenauer

#because #been #best #debate #diplomatic

Unfortunately, we are not painters and authors, where we can do something in isolation. We require a lot of money to create what we create. It's almost like being an architect: You can't be an architect and build whatever buildings you want to. ↗

— Jon Favreau

#architect #authors #being #build #buildings

If a man were living in isolation his income would be literally his product. Make him the monarch and owner of an island, and the fruits that he raises and the clothing that he makes constitute, in themselves, his income. This ceases to be true when trading begins. ↗

— John Bates Clark

#begins #ceases #clothing #constitute #fruits

Roosevelt was the one who had the vision to change our policy from isolationism to world leadership. That was a terrific revolution. Our country's never been the same since. ↗

— W. Averell Harriman

#change #country #had #isolationism #leadership