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"Nobody sees anybody truly but all through the flaws of their own egos. That is the way we all see ...each other in life. Vanity, fear, desire, competition-- all such distortions within our own egos-- condition our vision of those in relation to us. Add to those distortions to our own egos the corresponding distortions in the egos of others, and you see how cloudy the glass must become through which we look at each other. That's how it is in all living relationships except when there is that rare case of two people who love intensely enough to burn through all those layers of opacity and see each other's naked hearts."
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"How we choose to perceive affects how we partake of reality, narrowly or completely."

"We often focus on what is wrong and complain that nothing is beautiful."

"The mind can fool the heart, as the heart can fool the mind."

"The feeling that the world is full of people who think different is synonymous with wrong."

"People see what they expect to see."

"The devil was always in the detail. And here the detail was certainly devilish."

"I saw the world in black and white instead of the vibrant colours and shades I knew existed."

"Life is an illusion which wisely prevents you from seeing yourself fully."

"When I deeply look at a pious, I see no affection but fear; and when I look at an atheist, I see no fear but conceit!"

"It is always easier to find fault and criticize than it is to find beauty and appreciation."
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"The future is called 'perhaps,' which is the only possible thing to call the future. And the important thing is not to allow that to scare you."


"I am the opposite of a stage magician. He gives you illusion that has the appearance of truth. I give you truth in the pleasant disguise of illusion."


"I think that [William] Faulkner and I each had to escape certain particulars of our lives, and we found salvation through words. I understand the Bible story of Babel so much better now. I think that moments of extremity, desires of escape, lead us to foreign languages--not those learned in schools, but those plucked from the human heart, the searing conditions of isolation. I did not have to be limited to my biography because of words, and I shared this with Faulkner, who invented new words and punctuation and expression and worlds. He utterly reshaped the world."


"When things don't change, their sameness becomes an accretion. That is why all society puts on flesh. Succumbs to the cubicles and begins to fill them."


"Once you fully apprehend the vacuity of a life without struggle, you are equipped with the basic means of salvation."


"I have always been pushed by the negative. The apparent failure of a play sends me back to my typewriter that very night, before the reviews are out. I am more compelled to get back to work than if I had a success."


"Somebody said once or wrote, once: 'We're all of us children in a vast kindergarten trying to spell God's name with the wrong alphabet blocks!"
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