And this is the simple truth - that to live is to feel oneself lost. He who accepts it has already begun to find himself, to be on firm ground. Instinctively, as do the shipwrecked, he will look around for something to which to cling, and that tragic, ruthless glance, absolutely sincere, because it is a question of his salvation, will cause him to bring order into the chaos of his life. These are the only genuine ideas; the ideas of the shipwrecked. All the rest is rhetoric, posturing, farce.
Soren KierkegaardGod creates everything out of nothing. And everything which God is to use, he first reduces to nothing
Soren KierkegaardIt is not the path which is the difficulty; rather, it is the difficulty which is the path.
Soren KierkegaardThere are men who are wanting in the comparative, they as a rule are the most interesting.
Soren KierkegaardIn order to learn true humility (I use this expression to describe the state of mind under discussion), it is good for a person to withdraw from the turmoil of the world (we see that Christ withdrew when the people wanted to proclaim him king as well as when he had to walk the thorny path), for in life either the depressing or the elevating impression is too dominant for a true balance to come about. Here, of course, individuality is very decisive.
Soren Kierkegaard