#nation

Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention aand innovation. In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power that enables us to empathise with humans whose experiences we have never shared. Unlike any other creature on this planet, humans can learn and understand, without having experienced. They can think themselves into other people's minds, imagine themselves into other people's places. And many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all. They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are. They can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally; they can refuse to know. ↗

— J.K. Rowling

#experience

The whole terrible fight occured in the area of imagination. That is the precise location of our battlefield. It is there, that we experience our victories and defeats. ↗

— Haruki Murakami

#experience

One might trouble one's dainty snout with a whiff of the taleggio displayed in an artisanal cheese shop, or take a saucer of jasmine tea and a knuckle of fennel-scented snuff at a counter of buffed Big Nothing granite. But there was a want in these ladies yet, and it was for the rude life of youth. ↗

— Kevin Barry

#exotic-sensory-experience #flavor #hallucination #odor #perception

It is only when we see the worst that Man can offer, that we begin to see the best that Man still holds. If they are blinded by greed, then it’s time to pick up our virtual stones so we can start knocking sense into ‘em... ↗

— Faith Brashear

#criminal-justice #defrauded-nations #good-and-evil #justice #liberty

Sometimes when you lose your way, you find YOURSELF. ↗

— Mandy Hale

#destination #destiny #faith #faith-in-yourself #find-yourself

Oh! Be men, or be more than men. Be steady to your purposes and firm as a rock. This ice is not made of such stuff as your hearts may be; it is mutable and cannot withstand you if you say that it shall not. Do not return to your families with the stigma of disgrace marked on your brows. Return as heroes who have fought and conquered, and who know not what it is to turn their backs on the foe. ↗

— Mary Shelley

#determination #frankenstein #men #family

A person could stop a specific thing, but they couldn’t stop change in general. Rivers can’t run backward. Yet, he felt there must be an alternative, neither willfulness nor resignation. He couldn’t put words to it. All he knew was, neither of them had changed their minds and neither of them could find anything more to say. (229) ↗

— David Wroblewski

#resignation #rivers #struggle #willfullness #change

A lot of things should have been, Zigmund, but they aren’t. Are you going to be miserable about the things you cannot change, or do something about the things you can? ↗

— Melika Dannese Lux

#corcitura #decisions #determination #either-or #fate

As for us, we respect the past here and there, and we spare it, above all, provided that it consents to be dead. If it insists on being alive, we attack it, and we try to kill it. ↗

— Victor Hugo

#past #stagnation #change

Don't change your mind just because people are offended; change your mind if you're wrong. ↗

— Criss Jami

#argument #challenge #changing #changing-your-mind #controversial