What is a poet? A poet is an unhappy being whose heart is torn by secret sufferings, but whose lips are so strangely formed that when the sighs and the cries escape them, they sound like beautiful music. . . . And men crowd about the poet and say to him, “Sing for us again;” that is as much to say, “May new sufferings torment your soul, but may your lips be formed as before; for the cries would only frighten us but the music is delicious.”
There’s no such thing as a glass ceiling. It’s just a thick layer of men.
— Laura Liswood, Secretary-General Council of Women World Leaders
There are many people who reach their conclusions about life like schoolboys: they cheat their master by copying the answer out of a book without having worked the sum out for themselves.
— Søren Kierkegaard
Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?
— Epicurus, philosopher (c. 341-270 BCE)
Years ago I struggled deeply with the Problem of Evil, i.e. the reconciliation of the existence of evil and suffering with the existence of a benevolent and omnipotent God. At the time, I found Dostoyevski’s novel The Brother’s Karamozov to be a great comfort and insight on the dilemma. I wish I had found Epicurus’ quote earlier in my life. The logic is compelling and impeccable.
If you cannot win, make the one ahead of you break the record.
— Jan McKeithen
In a recent episode of The Treatment, Elvis Mitchel interviews artist and director Julian Schnable. Elvis is struck by the idea that all of Julian’s movies are about artists whose view of the world is not understood by other people and so they are constantly trying to communicate with the world. Elvis says that the movies are ostensibly about art, but they are also movies about communications. They portray figures, who for some reason, can’t get an essential part of themselves communicated through any other means but their art. Julian replies:
The future is not a result of choices among alternative paths offered by the present, but a place that is created—created first in the mind and will, created next in activity. The future is not some place we are going to, but one we are creating. The paths are not to be found, but made, and the activity of making them, changes both the maker and the destination.