To love somebody is not just a strong feeling - it is a decision, it is a judgment, it is a promise.

Optimism is an alienated form of faith, pessimism an alienated form of despair.

Man is the only animal that can be bored.

Basically, there can only be two answers. One is to overcome separateness and find unity by regression to the state of unity which existed before awareness ever arose, that is, before man was born. The other answer is to be fully born, to develop one's awareness, one's reason, one's capacity to love to such a point that one transcends one's own egocentric involvement, and arrives at a new harmony, at a new oneness with the world.

Modern capitalism needs men who cooperate smoothly and in large numbers; who want to consume more and more; and whose tastes are standardized and can be easily influenced and anticipated. It needs men who feel free and independent, not subject to any authority or principle or conscience-- yet willing to be commanded, to do what is expected of them, to fit into the social machine without friction; who can be guided without force, led without leaders, prompted without aim-- except the one to make good, to be on the move, to function, to go ahead.

Modern man lives under the illusion that he knows what he wants, while he actually wants what he is supposed to want.

Exclusive love is a contradiction in itself.