“For if there is ever a moment when we are most vulnerable, it’s when we’re closest to the idea of the attained desire, and thus farthest from ourselves, which is when we’ll tread through any flame.”

“When a specific desired end is attained we shall say that the action is "effective." When the unsought consequences of the action are more important than the attainment of the desired end and are dissatisfactory, effective action, we shall say, is "inefficient." When the unsought consequences are unimportant or trivial, the action is "efficient.”

“There was a brief moment after 9/11 when Colin Powell said “we should not rush to satisfy the desire for revenge.” It was a great moment, an extraordinary moment, because what he was actually asking people to do was to stay with a sense of grief, mournfulness, and vulnerability.”

“On its pass through finitude, the being-for-itself of the counter-image expresses itself most potently as “”I-ness”, as self-identical individuality. Just as a planet in its orbit no sooner reaches its farthest distance from the center than it returns to its closest proximity, so the point of the farthest distance from God, the I-ness, is also the moment of its return to the Absolute, of the re-absorption into the ideal. P. 30”

“And the wicked thing is, that when we're really upset, we always take it out on the people who are closest and whom we love the most.”

“The most doubtful reasoning appears to us clear and conclusive, when we can, in any way, twist it to an accordance with what we desire.”

“When we have no further desire to show ourselves, we take refuge in music, the Providence of the abulic.”

“What sustains us in any competition are the moments of interiority when the competition vanishes; what sustains us in any struggle are the moments when we forget the struggle.”

“Just as soon as any conviction of important truth becomes central and vital, there comes the desire to utter it—a desire which is immediate and irresistible. Sacrifice is gladness, service is joy, when such an idea becomes a commanding power.”

“As if when someone close to us dies, we momentarily trade places with them, in the moment right before. And as we get over it, we’re really living their life in reverse, from death to life, from sickness to health.”