#hers

It is a self-deception of philosophers and moralists to imagine that they escape decadence by opposing it. That is beyond their will; and, however little they acknowledge it, one later discovers that they were among the most powerful promoters of decadence. ↗

— Friedrich Nietzsche

#ethics #morality #nihilism #philosohers #philosophy

When it comes to understanding others, we rarely tax our imaginations. ↗

— Lawrence Hill

#imagination

To be the father of growing daughters is to understand something of what Yeats evokes with his imperishable phrase 'terrible beauty.' Nothing can make one so happily exhilarated or so frightened: it's a solid lesson in the limitations of self to realize that your heart is running around inside someone else's body. It also makes me quite astonishingly calm at the thought of death: I know whom I would die to protect and I also understand that nobody but a lugubrious serf can possibly wish for a father who never goes away. ↗

— Christopher Hitchens

#daughters #death #fatherhood #fathers #god

Isobel’s face burned. Her skin tingled where he’d touched her, with an almost imperceptible electricity that she couldn’t be sure if she was imagining. Like the tips of her fingers had somehow fallen asleep. ↗

— Kelly Creagh

#nevermore #varen-nethers #imagination

Knowing how to be solitary is central to the art of loving. When we can be alone, we can be with others without using them as a means of escape. ↗

— Bell Hooks

#giving-others-space #love #manners #self-care #self-confidence

If the bishops had not called vain imaginings religion, philosophers would not regard religion as vain imaginings. ↗

— Mirzá Azizu llah-i-Misbáh

#imaginings #philosphers #religion #imagination

When I was five and Sarah seven, my mother went on a trip. She was gone from our home in Rochester, New York, for several days. But she was often gone — not always from the house but missing from our lives nonetheless. Then one day Sarah and I returned from school to find her standing at the door, a piñata in her hand, smiling her spellbinding, I-am-overjoyed-at-the-sight-of-you smile. Now when I imagine that scene, my mind’s eye puts a sombrero on her head, but I doubt she was wearing one. She had just come home from a trip to Juarez, Mexico, where she had obtained a quickie divorce. She told us she was taking us to live in Florida. We had no idea where – or what – Florida was. “There will be oranges there,” she said. “They’re everywhere. You can reach up and pull them off the trees. ↗

— Katie Hafner

#memoir #mothers-and-daughters #home

The more people have studied different methods of bringing up children the more they have come to the conclusion that what good mothers and fathers instinctively feel like doing for their babies is the best after all. ↗

— Benjamin Spock

#babies #best #bringing #children #come

We judge ourselves by what we feel capable of doing, while others judge us by what we have already done. ↗

— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

#capable #doing #done #feel #judge

She's a woman, you're a dude. You're not supposed to understand her. That's not what she's after.... She doesn't want you to understand her. She knows that's impossible. She just wants you to understand yourself. Everything else is negotiable. ↗

— Neal Stephenson

#inspirational #men-and-women #understanding #understanding-oneself-and-others #inspirational