It’s like, everything really is two ways, the way we all pretend it is and the way it really is

For the first time I could remember, I felt weak, woozy and stupid— like a human-being. Like a very small and helpless human-being.

I was good at being charming, one of my very few vanities.

The key to a happy life is to have accomplishments to be proud of and purpose to look forward to, and at the moment I had both. How wonderful it was to be me.

Life teaches us that human thought almost never walks hand in hand with logic, and it is usually counterproductive to raise the point.

They like to tell us that it is important to speak the truth, but it has been my experience that real happiness lies in having people tell you what you want to believe, usually not the same thing at all, and if you have to stub your toe on the truth later, so be it.

Happily for me, ninety-nine percent of all human life is spent simply repeating the same old actions, speaking the same tired clichés, moving like a zombie through the same steps of the dance we plodded through yesterday and the day before and the day before. It seems horribly dull and pointless-but it really makes a great deal of sense. After all, if you only have to follow the same path every day, you don't need to think at all. Considering how good humans are at any mental process more complicated than chewing, isn't that the best for everybody?