#psych

I hold the hands of people I never touch. I provide comfort to people I never embrace. I watch people walk into brick walls, the same ones over and over again, and I coax them to turn around and try to walk in a different direction. People rarely see me gladly. As a rule, I catch the residue of their despair. I see people who are broken, and people who only think they are broken. I see people who have had their faces rubbed in their failures. I see weak people wanting anesthesia and strong people who wonder what they have done to make such an enemy of fate. I am often the final pit stop people take before they crawl across the finish line that is marked: I give up. Some people beg me to help. Some people dare me to help. Sometimes the beggars and the dare-ers look the same. Absolutely the same. I'm supposed to know how to tell them apart. Some people who visit me need scar tissue to cover their wounds. Some people who visit me need their wounds opened further, explored for signs of infection and contamination. I make those calls, too. Some days I'm invigorated by it all. Some days I'm numbed. Always, I'm humbled by the role of helper. And, occasionally, I'm ambushed. ~ Stephen White "Critical Conditions ↗

— Stephen White

#life #psychology #traumatic-experiences #understanding #wisdom

Standing at the window, reading the menu of Obediah's services, the Minotaur wishes he could believe in what she has to offer: a promise woven into deep lines of his palm, some turn of fate told by a card. But faith is a nebulous thing and charlatans a dime a dozen; it's always been that way. The Minotaur both envies and pities the devout. ↗

— Steven Sherrill

#psychics #superstition #faith

I don't correct her to let her know her backdoor wisdom yanks me deep into another country, where water runs uphill. ↗

— Justin Bog

#literary-fiction #mystery #psychological-suspense #suspense #family

Human beings can withstand a week without water, two weeks without food, many years of homelessness, but not loneliness. It is the worst of all tortures, the worst of all sufferings. ↗

— Paulo Coelho

#psyche #food

Once you've been backstage at a theater, the theater is never the same for you. Once you've noticed the crack in the vase, the vase is never the same for. Once you've seen a friend do something appalling, the friendship is never the same. That does not mean you won't go to the theater, or keep the vase or the friend. You can choose. ↗

— Tibor Fischer

#human-psychology #theater #friendship

Monotony collapses time; novelty unfolds it. You can exercise daily and eat healthily and live a long life, while experiencing a short one. If you spend your life sitting in a cubicle and passing papers, one day is bound to blend unmemorably into the next - and disappear. That's why it's so important to change routines regularly, and take vacations to exotic locales, and have as many new experiences as possible that can serve to anchor our memories. Creating new memories stretches out psychological time, and lengthens our perception of our lives. ↗

— Joshua Foer

#psychology #science #art

We do not escape into philosophy, psychology, and art--we go there to restore our shattered selves into whole ones. ↗

— Anaïs Nin

#philosophy #psychology #art

I can't go back to yesterday because I was a different person then. ↗

— Lewis Carroll

#humor #inspirational #philosophy-of-life #psychological #humor

Oh, you know what bloggers are like, they write and write and write. I don't know why, because they're not being paid. ↗

— Jon Ronson

#psychology #psycopaths #humor

There is something about the Australian psyche that seems to like films that are slightly offbeat. ↗