Category Archives: Quotes

Quote of the Day: Steinbeck

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"And this I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. And this I would fight for: the freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected. And this I must fight against: any idea, religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual. This is what I am and what I am about. I can understand why a system built on a pattern must try to destroy the free mind, for that is the one thing which by inspection destroys such a system. Surely I can understand this, and I hate it, and I will fight against it to preserve the one thing that separates us from the uncreative beasts. If that glory can be killed, we are lost."

–Steinbeck, East of Eden, 131.

This reminds me of Andrew Sullivan's "This I Believe" segment, which still gives me goosebumps, as he talks about the individual and liberty.

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Quote of the Day About the Interior Life

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The interior life is often stupid. Its egoism blinds it and deafens it; its imagination spins out ignorant tales, fascinated. It fancies that the western wind blows on the Self, and leaves fall at the feet of the Self for a reason, and people are watching. A mind risks real ignorance for the sometimes paltry prize of an imagination enriched. The trick of reason is to get the imagination to seize the actual world — if only from time to time.

– Anne Dillard, from her memoir An American Childhood

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Quote of the Day – Vulnerability

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“Those who are willing to be vulnerable move among mysteries,” said the poet Theodore Roethke. To be vulnerable to the mystery of our life as it presents itself requires forgoing our hopes and fears for the future and being willing to taste what is here before us, in all its poignant bittersweetness. For the only richness that leaves a trace, the only happiness worth living for, is the full-bodied sensuous and sensual experience that is possible now, right now. When we can let down the barricades and allow that we are not built to last, this moment will shine as sweetly as the moon, and we shall feast on our life.

– Roger Housden (via Gayle Margolis)

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Quote of the Day – Americans and Their Burgers

Posted inHealth / Fitness, Quotes5 Comments on Quote of the Day – Americans and Their Burgers

“My opinion is that the media is the main supporter of healthy eating. We’re certainly not hearing it from our customers. And [surveys] show that while consumers say they want to eat healthier, what they actually want is a big juicy burger.”

— Andrew Puzder, who is the CEO of CKE Restaurants, the parent company of Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s.

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Quote of the Day

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“Anyone here been raped and speaks English?”

– Unnamed British TV reporter in the 1960s among a crowd of terrified Belgian colonials who were evacuating from the Congo.

From Jack Shafer’s smart piece (no surprise there) about why journalists need to constantly press ahead in emotionally turbulent times (such as the scene at Virginia Tech right now).

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