Life is an experimental journey undertaken involuntarily. It is a journey of the spirit through the material world and, since it is the spirit that travels, it is the spirit that is experienced. That is why there exist contemplative souls who have lived more intensely, more widely, more tumultuously than others who have lived their lives purely externally. The end result is what matters. What one felt was what one experienced. One retires to bed as wearily from having dreamed as from having done hard physical labor. One never lives so intensely as when one has been thinking hard.
Fernando PessoaIโve always wanted to be liked. It grieved me that I was treated with indifference. Left an orphan by Fortune, I wantedโlike all orphansโto be the object of someoneโs affection. This need has always been a hunger that went unsatisfied, and so thoroughly have I adapted to this inevitable hunger that I sometimes wonder if I really feel the need to eat. Whatever be the case, life pains me.
Fernando PessoaWalking on these streets, until the night falls, my life feels to me like the life they have. By day theyโre full of meaningless activity; by night, theyโre full of meaningless lack of it. By day I am nothing, and by night I am I. There is no difference between me and these streets, save they being streets and I a soul, which perhaps is irrelevant when we consider the essence of things
Fernando Pessoa