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underscored

@underscored

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We are all serving a life-sentence in the dungeon of self. Blessed are they who have drugged themselves with the opium of a purpose — whether it be poetry or science or politics or the discovery of one's own soul.

— Cyril Connolly, The Unquiet Grave (1944)
1w ago

The mass of men worry themselves into nameless graves, while here and there a great unselfish soul forgets himself into immortality.

1w ago

It is not enough to be industrious; so are the ants. What are you industrious about?

2w ago

To be in hell is to drift; to be in heaven is to steer.

3w ago

A man who has at length found something to do will not need to get a new suit to do it in; for him the old will do, that has lain dusty in the garret for an indeterminate period.

1mo ago

It is not death that a man should fear, but he should fear never beginning to live.

2mo ago
themarginalian.org
How to Keep Life from Becoming a Parody of Itself: Simone de Beauvoir on the Art of Growing Older

There is only one solution if old age is not to be an absurd parody of our former life, and that is to go on pursuing ends that give our existence a meaning — devotion to individuals, to groups or to causes, social, political, intellectual or creative work… In old age we should wish still to have passions strong enough to prevent us turning in on ourselves. One's life has value so long as one attributes value to the life of others, by means of love, friendship, indignation, compassion.

2mo ago

We are always getting ready to live, but never living. The object of living is life itself, and yet we continually sacrifice it to something beyond.

2mo ago

It is not enough to be busy; so are the ants. The question is: what are we busy about?

2mo ago
notboring.co
Riding the Leopard

The greater our means, the harder it might be to find meaning. The more we accomplish, the sooner we ask, "Cool, now what?"

3mo ago
themarginalian.org
The Enemy Outside and the Enemy Within: Audre Lorde’s Antidote to Despair

I do not have to win in order to know my dreams are valid, I only have to believe in a process of which I am a part. My work kept me alive this past year, my work and the love of women. They are inseparable from each other. In the recognition of the existence of love lies the answer to despair. Work is that recognition given voice and name.

3mo ago

The best thing that can happen to a human being is to find a problem that he can spend his life working on.

3mo ago

The true paradox is that we become most fully alive at the moment when we cease to live for ourselves alone. It is in the surrender of self that self is found.

4mo ago

Underscored — save the words that stop you in your tracks.

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