Life Choices

In the university program where I was supposed to be emancipating myself from the kitchen, preparing myself to go back to New York having at least answered the question of my own potential, the novelty and thrill had thoroughly worn off. I could not find the fun or the urgency in the eventless and physically idle academic life. It was so lethargic

... See more

Conformism is the force that translates our own desires through others' desires. We learn to play a role. We become so good at playing the role that we become 'inaccessible' to ourselves; our own desires and truth are 'impenetrable.'

What does it mean to be a parent ? An entrepreneur ? An early adopter of the latest technology? Our roles are bound... See more

By looking around himself a man can find out how to use the little virtues—moderately and when they are necessary—he can drink them in from the air, because the little virtues are of a kind that is common among men. But one cannot breathe in the great virtues from the surrounding air,

So my children live with my mother, and so far they do not have worn-out shoes. But what kind of men will they be? I mean, what kind of shoes will they have when they are men? What road will they choose to walk down? Will they decide to give up everything that is pleasant but not necessary, or will they affirm that everything is necessary and that... See more

Rarely in our life is money a place of genuine freedom, joy, or clarity, yet we routinely allow it to dictate the terms of our lives and often to be the single most important factor in the decisions we make about work, love, family, and friendship.

“Don’t run away from what you don’t want; run toward what you do.”

As far as the education of children is concerned I think they should be taught not the little virtues but the great ones. Not thrift but generosity and an indifference to money; not caution but courage and a contempt for danger; nor shrewdness but frankness and a love of truth; not tact but love for one’s neighbour and self-denial; not a desire for... See more

she had “wanted to lead what I thought of as a ‘normal’ existence, but I soon found I wasn’t as normal away from the theater as in it.”

She concluded, “Acting is my highest form of intelligence, the time when I use the best part of my brain.”