“There is nothing more scandalous than a happy marriage”

The child [uses] ‘doubt about food to hide doubt about love.’

Sanity, in other words, becomes a pressing preoccupation as soon as we recognize the importance of recognition.

Lovers, of course, are notoriously frantic epistemologists, second only to paranoiacs (and analysts) as readers of signs and wonders.

Everybody is dealing with how much of their own aliveness they can bear and how much they need to anesthetize themselves.

We are tyrannized by our blind spots, and by whatever it is about ourselves that we find unacceptable.

It is as if to say: if these are not valued – if these forms of wanting and feeling and speaking and doing – are not cultivated and encouraged and rewarded in the child, then the child will be mad.

People change, but there really are limits.

To grow up is to discover what one is unequal to.

The child can find out what the object ..might be only by finding ..obstacles to its access

You write to find out what you believe.

We are children for a very long time.

The vocabulary of one’s self-criticism is so impoverished and clichéd.

we are continually under threat from what we are unwilling and/or unable to see.

When we define ourselves by what we can recognize, by what we can comprehend- rather than, say, by what we can describe

Transgression is a quest for solitude

There is always a ..belief that by destroying the thing that we love we destroy our needs

If happy I can be I will, if suffer I must I can.

What would you be like if you were the only person in the world? If you want to be truly happy you must be that person.

It’s a strange situation, but people will pay your fare to get you to go and tell them how to be happy.

I don’t want people to think I’m not happy when we win – I am. But there’s a difference between being happy for the feeling of accomplishing something and being overjoyed and feeling, ‘This is it – we conquered the world.’ We didn’t. We just won a game.

Having a great intellect is no path to being happy.

The child who concentrates is immensely happy.

Because I’m small, I’ve been called things from ‘Happy Feet’ to ‘Little Face.’

I’m happy about working; I’m happy about gracing the stage and coming out and making people laugh.