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Satisfaction lies in the effort, not in the attainment. Full effort is full victory.
Not a shred of evidence exists in favor of the idea that life is serious.
The problem with the global village is all the global village idiots.
"Any man who goes to a psychiatrist ought to have his head examined."
Love is a perky elf dancing a merry little jig and then suddenly he turns on you with a miniature machine gun.
What is a committee? A group of the unwilling, picked from the unfit, to do the unnecessary.
The truth is that there is only one terminal dignity - love. And the story of a love is not important - what is important is that one is capable of love. It is perhaps the only glimpse we are permitted of eternity.
"Theology is never any help; it is searching in a dark cellar at midnight for a black cat that isn't there. Theologians can persuade themselves of anything."
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balanceaccounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, giveorders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, and die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
There was only one catch and that was Catch22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Or was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask, and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to.
"And don't tell me God works in mysterious ways", Yossarian continued "There's nothing mysterious about it, He's not working at all. He's playing. Or else He's forgotten all about us. That's the kind of God you people talk about, a country bumpkin, a clumsy, bungling, brainless, conceited, uncouth hayseed. Good God, how much reverence can you have for a Supreme Being who finds it necessary to include such phenomena as phlegm and tooth decay in His divine system of Creation? What in the world was running through that warped, evil, scatalogical mind of His when He robbed old people of the power to control their bowel movements? Why in the world did He ever create pain?"
Never mistake motion for action.
The first draft of anything is shit.
Man is most nearly himself when he achieves the seriousness of a child at play.
. . is to attempt seeing Truth without knowing Falsehood. It is the attempt to see the Light without knowing Darkness. It cannot be.
People need hard times and oppression to develop psychic muscles.
Beyond a critical point within a finite space, freedom diminishes as numbers increase. . . . the human question is not how many can possibly survive within the system, but what kind of existence is possible for those who do survive.
Character is destiny.
There is nothing permanent except change.
You must get involved to have an impact. No one is impressed with the won-lost record of the referee.
To avoid criticism, do nothing, say nothing, be nothing.
The greatest happiness of life it the conviction that we are loved - loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves.
. . He had by now divested himself of schoolboy attitudes. He was unburdened by the desire to be a martyr or a hero. Any thoughts in that direction, Belgica effectively had quashed. Heroism in the corrupt sense of the age almost by definition, meant wanton self-sacrifice and bungling. For neither had he any taste. He wanted rational attainment; victory, but not at any price. No point upon the globe was worth the cost of a single life.
There are things known and there are things unknown, and in between are the doors of perception.
When the game is over, the king and the pawn go into the same box.
To change one's life: 1. Start immediately, 2. Do it flamboyantly, 3. No exceptions.
The best use of life is to spend it for something that outlasts life.
A great many people think they are thinking when they are merelyrearranging their prejudices.
Happiness comes of the capacity to feel deeply, to enjoy simply, to think freely, to risk life, to be needed.
Yesterday is not ours to recover, but tomorrow is ours to win or lose.
Heaven is where the police are British, the cooks are French, the mechanics German, the lovers Italian and it's all organised by the Swiss. Hell is where the chefs are British, the mechanics French, the lover's Swiss, the police German and it's all organised by the Italians.
The trouble with being punctual is that nobody's there to appreciate it.
Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to follow that talent to the dark place where it leads.
Advice is what we ask for when we already know the answer but wish we didn't.
Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it's cracked up to be. That's why people are so cynical about it.. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don't risk everything, you risk even more.
"The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances. If there is any reaction, both are transformed."
Forgive your enemies, but never forget their names.
Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.
People demand freedom of speech to make up for the freedom of thought which they avoid.
Men are condemned to be free, freedom brings us uncertainty, uncertainty brings us hope, and hope brings us happiness."
"Even a paranoid has some real enemies."
Democracy does not guarantee equality of conditions - it only guarantees equality of opportunity.
In a mad world, only the mad are sane.
Up to a point a man's life is shaped by environment, heredity, and movements and changes in the world about him. Then there comes a time when it lies within his grasp to shape the clay of his life into the sort of thing he wishes to be. Only the weak blame parents, their race, their times, lack of good fortune, or the quirks of fate. Everyone has it within his power to say, "This I am today; that I will be tomorrow."
True love is like ghosts, which everybody talks about and few have seen. If one judges love by the majority of its effects, it is more like hatred than friendship. There is no disguise which can hide love for long where it exists or simulate it where it does not.
If you do not contend with anyone, no one can contend with you.
The more laws and order are made prominent, the more thieves and robbers there will be.
It did not matter, after all. He was only one man. One man's fate is not important. "If it is not, what is?" He could not endure those remembered words.
Life is what happens while you are making other plans.
Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket - safe, dark, motionless, airless - it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.
A person who wraps into himself makes a small package
To fly, we have to have resistance.
While one person hesitates because he feels inferior, the other is busy making mistakes and becoming superior.
The secret of eternal youth is arrested development.
"Boldness is a mask of fear, however great."
Age wrinkles the body. Quitting wrinkles the soul.
Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.
"I can't live with you, or without you."
Outside of a dog, a book is Man's best friend. And inside of a dog, it's too dark to read.
"Don't dwell on reality; it will only keep you from greatness."
Better to rule in Hell than to serve in Heaven.
What you've done becomes the judge of what you're going to do especially in other people's minds. When you're traveling, you are what you are right there and then. People don't have your past to hold against you. No yesterdays on the road.
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