#lit

I do strongly feel that among the greatest pieces of luck for high achievement is ordeal. Certain great artists can make out without it, Titian and others, but mostly you need ordeal. My idea is this: the artist is extremely lucky who is presented with the worst possible ordeal which will not actually kill him. At that point, he's in business: Beethoven's deafness, Goya's deafness, Milton's blindness, that kind of thing. ↗

— John Berryman

#artists #beethoven #goya #literature #luck

The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. To be your own man is hard business. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. ↗

— Rudyard Kipling

#business

They are so busy, Julia, trying to help the world that they've forgotten how to help themselves. They've forgotten how to be happy, and it is a happy man or woman who helps the world most. ↗

— Christopher Pike

#spirituality #business

In business and in politics a man must carve and maul his way through men to get to be King of the Mountain. Once there, he can be great and kind--but he must get there first. ↗

— John Steinbeck

#politics #business

Waking up was a daily cruelty, an affront, and she avoided it by not sleeping. ↗

— Gregory Maguire

#death #immortality #insomnia #death

It must be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to plan, more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to manage than a new system. For the initiator has the enmity of all who would profit by the preservation of the old institution and merely lukewarm defenders in those who gain by the new ones. ↗

— Niccolò Machiavelli

#change #politics #change

Change we need ↗

— Barack Obama

#change

We're all pieces of the same ever-changing puzzle; some connected for mere seconds, some connected for life, some connected through knowledge, some through belief, some connected through wisdom, some through Love, and some connected with no explanation at all. Yet, as spiritual beings having a human experience, we're all here for the sensations this reality or illusion has to offer. The best anyone can hope for is the right to be able to Live, Learn, Love then Leave. After that, reap the benefits of their own chosen existence in the hereafter by virtue of simply believing in what they believe. As for here, it took me a while but this progression helped me with my life: "I like myself. I Love myself. I am myself. ↗

— Stanley Victor Paskavich

#god #happiness #life #love #peace

My clones better not wear invisible cloaks. How am I supposed to find myself as a person if I can’t even find my clones? ↗

— Jarod Kintz

#identity #invisibility #invisible #person #change

Before Van realized it, he was walking her back toward her stairs. He didn't stop kissing her, he wouldn't. The last thing he wanted was for her to change her mind. He managed to get her to the upstairs hallway before she pulled her mouth away. "What are you doing?" she panted out. "Taking you to your bed." "Forget it." And Van, if he were a crying man, would be sobbing. Until uptight Irene Conridge added, "The wall. Use the Wall. ↗

— Shelly Laurenston

#shelly-laurenston #change