Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Kilroy J. Oldster

Quote by Kilroy J. Oldster

“The author explores the contours of a restless mind racked with fear and doubt and questions the origins of his personal disenchantment and cynical bitterness. Do other people share similar feelings of disquiet and despair, and how does a person escape a vortex of suffering? Perchance he can marshal human beings’ innate gifts of memory, language, and consciousness to transform his vile existence. Perhaps by studiously examining the self and seeking to unite all disparate parts of a fragmented psyche, he will become a thoughtful, considerate, and affectionate man who lives joyfully without pangs of pain, shame, and misgivings. The goal of this vision quest is to attain personal harmony with the world and enjoy an admirable state of attentive mindfulness after investigating and expressing all that is sayable pertaining the meaning of existence and the unique features of being human. The author aspires to discard frivolous attachments, pierce mental delusions, and attain a peaceful state of serenity by accepting reality and appreciating the incomparable beauty of this magnificent world and the little pleasures that each unfolding day affords. Perhaps writing of his struggles to transcend his own pain and develop the wisdom and serenity of the mind that comes from living an examined life might even provide a template for other people explore their own life story.”

Quote by Kilroy J. Oldster

Work

Dead Toad Scrolls

Browse quotes and source details for this work. more

Author

Kilroy J. Oldster

Browse famous quotes and profile details for Kilroy J. Oldster. more

You May Also Like

“He did not want to be young again -- that time had had particular and transcendent horrors -- but the thought of being any older filled him with panic. He could not imagine finding tranquility of soul in old age; if he could only be allowed to mark time for a while all might yet be well, one might suddenly achieve equilibrium, certainty, serenity. There would still be possibilities. Hopes.”

“They swept down into a great V, sentinels at watch withdrawing, gray swirls and curves of mountains reaching upwards in carefully-shaded lines of chalk and silhouette that overlooked the enormity of a sun-kissed world dreamt in glass-blown shapes. There was a deep, pervading serenity, quiet and solitary, in this sanctuary of branch and water, drifting across in far-reaching swells, and I breathed it in—breathed it in as if it could purge any poison from my heart.”

“Isolation, I was reminded again and again, is a danger. But what if one's real context is in books? Some days, going from one book to another, preoccupied with thoughts that were of no importance, I would feel a rare moment of serenity: all that could not be solved in my life was merely a trifle as long as I kept it at a distance. Between that suspended life and myself were these dead people and imagined characters. One could spend one's days among them as a child arranges a circle of stuffed animals when the darkness of night closes in.”