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Douglas Coupland

Douglas Coupland Quotes

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Famous Douglas Coupland Quotes

“Sometimes I think the people to feel the saddest for are people who are unable to connect with the profound—people such as my boring brother-in-law, a hearty type so concerned with normality and fitting in that he eliminates any possibility of uniqueness for himself and his own personality. I wonder if some day, when he is older, he will wake up and the deeper part of him will realize that he has never allowed himself to truly exist, and he will cry with regret and shame and grief.”

PeopleIfsThinkingFeelsSometimesLawRealizingGriefWonderCryPossibilityBrotherRegretTypePersonalityConcernedWake UpShameProfoundBoringDeeperUniquenessIn-lawsFittingSaddestNormalityHeartyBrother In Law
Book:Life After God
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“What's clarity like? Try to remember that funny feeling inside your head when you had math problems too difficult to solve: the faint buzzing noise in your ears, a heaviness on both sides of your skull, and the sensation that your brain is twitching inside your cranium like a fish on the beach. This is the opposite sensation of clarity. Yet for many people of my era, as they aged, this sensation became the dominant sensation of their lives. It was as though day-to-day twentieth century living had become an unsolvable algebraic equation.”

PeopleTryingFeelingsProblemRememberDifficultSidesBrainCenturyOppositesEarsFishesSolveMathNoiseClarityErasBeachSensationsDominantDay To DayBoth SidesEquationsTwentieth CenturySkullsHeavinessMath ProblemsTwitching
Author:Douglas Coupland
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“Mom said that people are interested in birds only in as much as they exhibit human behavior - greed and stupidity and anger - and by doing so they free us from the unique sorrow of being human...I told Mom my own theory of why we like birds - of how birds are a miracle because they prove to us there is a finer, simpler state of being which we may strive to attain.”

PeopleHumansMaySaidStatesMy OwnTheoryMomSorrowProveBehaviorUniqueBirdMiracleStriveGreedStupidityBeing HumanHuman BehaviorExhibits
Author:Douglas Coupland
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“...we're told by TV and Reader's Digest that a crisis will trigger massive personal change--and that those big changes will make the pain worthwhile. But from what he could see, big change almost never happens. People simply feel lost. They have no idea what to say or do or feel or think. they become messes and tend to remain messes.”

PeopleThinkingFeelsIdeasBigsHappensPainLostTvsReaderCrisisMessNo IdeaMassiveWorthwhileTriggersBig ChangesPersonal ChangeReader's Digest
Author:Douglas Coupland
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“And then I felt sad because I realized that once people are broken in certain ways, they can't ever be fixed, and this is something nobody ever tells you when you are young and it never fails to surprise you as you grow older as you see the people in your life break one by one. You wonder when your turn is going to be, or if it's already happened.”

PeopleIfsWayLifeYoungCertainTurnsGrowsFeltChallengesWonderBreakFailingHappenedSadnessBrokenDepressionSurpriseI RealizedLovelyFixedLife LessonPeople In Your Life
Book:Life After God
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“I thought about how odd it is for billions of people to be alive, yet not one of them is really quite sure of what makes people people. The only activities I could think of that humans do that have no animal equivalent were smoking, body-building and writing. That's not much, considering how special we seem to think we are.”

PeopleThinkingWritingHumansBodySeemsAnimalAliveSpecialBuildingActivityBillionsOddSmokingConsideringBody Building
Book:Life After God
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“I think if human beings had genuine courage, they'd wear their costumes every day of the year, not just on Halloween. Wouldn't life be more interesting that way? And now that I think about it, why the heck don't they? Who made the rule that everybody has to dress like sheep 364 days of the year? Think of all the people you'd meet if they were in costume every day. People would be so much easier to talk to - like talking to dogs.”

PeopleIfsThinkingWayYearsHumansMadeWould BeLife IsHuman BeingsInterestingTalkingDogEasierDressesGenuineSheepHalloweenCostumesDays Of The YearHalloween Greeting
Author:Douglas Coupland
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“I cry because the future has once again found its sparkle and has grown a million times larger. And I cry because I am ashamed of how badly I have treated the people I love–of how badly I behaved during my own personal Dark Ages–back before I had a future and someone who cared for me from above. It is like today the sky opened up and only now am I allowed to enter”

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Book:Shampoo Planet
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“Post-adolescent Expert Syndrome The tendency of young people around the age of eighteen, males especially, to become altruistic experts on everything, a state of mind required by nature to ensure warriors who are willing to die with pleasure on the battlefield. Also the reason why religions recruit kamikaze pilots and suicide bombers almost exclusively from the 18-21 range. "Kyle, I never would have guessed that when you were up in your bedroom playing World of Warcraft all through your teens, you were, in fact, becoming an expert on the films of Jean-Luc Godard.”

PeopleWorldMindStatesReasonFactsAgeFilmYoungDiesPleasureWillingBecomingSuicideMalesTendenciesWarriorPostsRangeReason WhyExpertsState Of MindPilotsTeensBedroomBattlefieldsEighteenSyndromesRecruitBombersWilling To DieSuicide BombersWorld Of Warcraft
Author:Douglas Coupland
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“You know, I really think that when God puts together families, he sticks his finger into the white pages and selects a group of people at random and then says to them all, 'Hey! You're going to spend the next seventy years together, even though you have nothing in common and don't even like each other. And, should you not feel yourself caring about any of this group of strangers, even for a second, you will just feel dreadful”

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Book:Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture
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“And then sometimes I think the people to feel saddest for are people who once knew what profoundness was, but who lost or became numb to the sensation of wonder – people who closed the doors that leads us into the secret world – or who had the doors closed for them by time and neglect and decisions made in times of weakness.”

PeopleThinkingWorldFeelsMadeSometimesLostDecisionSecretWonderDoorsWeaknessNeglectSensationsNumbSaddestDecisions Made
Book:Life After God
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“If you look at life as a whole, we have to admit life's good where we live. But in an evil Twilight Zone kind of way there's nothing else to choose. In the old days there was always a Bohemia or a creative under-world to join if the mainstream life wasn't your bag - or a life of crime, or even religion.And now there's only the system. All other options have evaporated. For most people it's the System or what... death? There's nothing. There's no way out now.”

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Author:Douglas Coupland
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