On Life
Misery and suffering can be most pleasurable experiences as long as we believe their causes to lie totally and completely outside ourselves.
The only thing more terrible than the tyranny of consequence that stalks our every deed, is the ubiquity of the inconsequential, which encompasses not only the deed and the doer, but even consequence itself.
A life that is merely happy is a life half-lived.
You don't need a philosophy or a belief to live. All you need to know is what will make you suffer if left undone.
Life is poorly measured by successes and achievements. The mark of a great life is how profoundly and fully you can appreciate living as a mystical experience.
Our quest for accomplishments serves not so much to glorify the future as to alleviate the present and enrich a past yet to come. We look to the future so that we can have the past we’d like to have.
Most of us seek shortcuts to greatness; few of us can put in the hard work, endure the time, and deal with the loneliness and insecurity that must be borne to be truly great.
Questions and answers are the worst way to understand life. In fact, any answer always comes at the expense of at least one question.
If you can think of yourself and humankind as an alien's alien, as yet undiscovered, the world suddenly regains all its wonder and novelty.
Some say “Live every day as if it were the last day of your life.” Wrong. Live every day as if you couldn’t care less if it were the last day of your life.
The most satisfying times in life are the times when the people around you are the right people, when your life is full of fulfilling adventures with them, and when everyone in that circle is excited with each other's presence.
The belief that one can live unconditionally in the present is to overlook the fact that every present includes a future-us we want to be and an already-us we already are.
Our belief in fate serves a dual function: on the one hand it alleviates the vicissitudes of life by leading us to believe that these vicissitudes were inevitable and had their origins beyond our will, while on the other hand it gives us hope that there is a purpose to our lives which has only to be discovered. Either way, fate is an ingenious piece of self-trickery.
Some people believe everything happens for a reason. Whether or not that is the case, there is surely a reason why they believe everything happens for a reason, and the reason is that they are unable to assume the guilt and responsibility of their decisions, along with all that could have been and all that never was following each and every one of those decisions.
If nothing else, we all have at least our mistakes to contribute to this world.
One asks: What would’ve happened if? Another answers: Look what happened despite!
The best way to cure our obsession for something is to own it and possess it completely, so that eventually, just like most of our possessions, we wouldn’t even know it was there.
For the young, ideological conviction is really only moral conviction. As we become older, our convictions become a matter of common sense, or simply a force of habit, and essentially both.
When you invest in yourself, the world tends to invest in you too.
Those truly beloved of nature are not the ones that give it wide-eyed deference and obsequious awe, but rather those that challenge it with arrogant defiance – and even, at times, contempt.
Health is not meant to be preserved, pampered or conserved. Health is a boon that’s meant to be abused, expended and exhausted, and thereby cherished.
For many, the most terrifying thing in the world is neither death nor loneliness, but free time.
When we are bored, we are our truest selves. Boredom is the state in which we are the most unconsciously conscious that life is conscious through us.
It’s a general rule that whereas cerebral inertia is spawned by certainty of belief, physical inertia is spawned by its obverse uncertainty. Those who break this rule against inertia, one way or the other, are those who truly can affirm life.
The last great frontier is also the first great frontier: the human being. We are each of us travelers, regardless of credentials, means or status. But some have trained themselves to discover, conquer and explore, while most merely stumble across.
We would be more successful in life so long as our lives did not depend upon it; thus we would be more successful in living, which is far more important.
The only cure for our loneliness and despair is death or madness. However, a less drastic way does exist: indifference... but a conscious and noble indifference.
For many, routine is as good a cure for the banality of existence as suicide.
Happiness it seems only lasts the day, yet only a fool would leave fortune’s hand at play.
We often rue the fact that things lack permanency in life. And yet if we did not value permanence in the first place, we could not possibly cherish that which is fleeting.
Kafka’s Castle is a book that could conceivably go on to infinity (indeed it never ends), but could never be read twice. This is in direct contrast to our lives, in which we are forever conscious of our mortality, yet often wonder what we would do if we were given another chance.
Those who do unto themselves that which they want others to do unto them will always be happy, regardless of what others do unto them.
An occasional lover, a friend with whom one can talk about everything, a friend with whom one can do everything, and a friend with whom one need neither do nor talk about anything. That’s all one needs. Anything more is a burden which infringes on the most important company of all: ourselves.
We ultimately live in spite of ourselves. Whether we will something or not is insignificant if our Will wills otherwise.
The most difficult obstacle to overcome in life is that of not having any obstacles to overcome.
Suicide is the only crime where the criminal is also the victim and the judge. Yet even this act would be insignificant without a public and a jury.
We can make judgment on suicide, but never the suicide. The former is in fact necessary, the latter is indecent.
It’s strange how people tend to look upon suicides as cowards. What could possibly demand more courage than to face the ultimate pain, endure the ultimate loss, and (conceivably) face an eternity of perdition? If anything, we can only blame suicides with vanity, not cowardice. It’s the ultimate vanity to believe your life is so precious that it must be spared every ounce of pain that life has to offer.
To feel a boundless empathy with mankind while at the same time not being able to connect with anyone: that’s the story of our lives. The thought that nobody will ever know us the way we want to be known, the way we think we know ourselves, the way we’re capable of being known: that’s the source of all our fear and loneliness.
There are only three things in life worth pursuing: art, sex, and laughter. Art gives you mastery, sex gives you strength, and laughter gives you courage. Masterful, strong and courageous… that is the best person.
One has to work hard to avoid the realization that hard work is futile.
It’s such relief to be done with life yet still keep living. It’s the only freedom there is.
If life were not a mystery, it would be unbearable.
Most of us choose not to see what lies beneath, because life when faced without metaphysical protection is a sad and melancholy thing. But life too, like people, only reveals its beauties through its pain.
