On Adversity & Resilience
- “What matters most is how well you walk through the fire”.
- “Things get bad for all of us, almost continually, and what we do under the constant stress reveals who/what we are”.
- “Nobody can save you but yourself, and you’re worth saving”.
- “Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must lead”.
On Authenticity & Simplicity
- “An intellectual says a simple thing in a hard way. An artist says a hard thing in a simple way”.
- “If you’re going to try, go all the way. Otherwise, don’t even start”.
- “Find what you love and let it kill you”.
On Loneliness & Human Connection
- “There is a loneliness in this world so great that you can see it in the slow movement of the hands of a clock”.
- “We are terrorized and flattened by trivialities; we are eaten up by nothing”.
- “Beware of those who seek constant crowds; they are nothing alone”.
On the Futility of Ambition & Societal Norms
- “My ambition is handicapped by laziness”.
- “Qualifications are hilarious to me. What matters isn’t whether you can memorize what books and lecturers say. What matters is whether you can think for yourself, assess the world, and execute despite the fear we all feel every day”.
- “I don’t like the clean-shaven boy with the necktie and the good job. I like desperate men, men with broken teeth and broken minds and broken ways. They interest me. They are full of surprises and explosions”.
a wayfarer’s notes 