Decoding

Suffering is thought-based, a mental activity and therefore unnecessary. I suffer because it placates my anxiety about letting go and moving on. Pain, by contrast, is not optional. The body wants my attention.

And the winner is…

There’s something more important than the work we do, and that is what we do when we’re not working. From holy days to holidays to the Symphony of the Seas cruise ship with its 24-hour buffets. It’s food and sex versus fear and death.

Between the moon and New York City

A few sad-eyed souls derive energy from longing for what they don’t have. Should they get what they want, they suffer a loss of interest. Masochists live in this demimonde. It’s where self-harm happens and eating disorders are spawned.

Hello, goodbye

All sentient beings share a longing for happiness. Some men think the road to happiness leads through pleasure—or at least a mnemonic accumulation of pleasurable experiences. It doesn’t. Pleasure comes and goes.

Plumbing the depths

It helps to abandon notions of good and bad. We don’t really know what is good and what is bad. Former addicts and alcoholics tell me that addiction was the best thing that ever happened to them.