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Complicated Quotes

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Complicated Quotes

“A seemingly simple task like taking a bath or wearing a condom feels like multitasking to someone who suffers from hemiplegia or has only one hand.”

“Simplicity saves strength.”

“Certainly we can say that the pace of modern life, increased and supported by our technology in general and our personal electronics in particular, has resulted in a short attention span and an addiction to the influx of information. A mind so conditioned has little opportunity to think critically, and even less chance to experience life deeply by being in the present moment. A complex life with complicated activities, relationships and commitments implies a reflexive busy-ness that supplants true thinking and feeling with knee-jerk reactions. It is a life high in stress and light on substance, at least in the spiritually meaningful dimensions of being.”

“I'm not difficult," Violet said. "I'm simple. I like good books and clever conversation and being left alone much of the time. How does that make me difficult? I make sense? I don't talk about my feelings, of course, but then, I don't want to." She shrugged. "So that's reasonable." Sebastian smiled despite himself, a smile that felt bitter even to him. "God, no. Not feelings. Heaven forbid that you have anything so messy." "I have feelings." She spoke stiffly. "I just don't talk about them. What's the point? Talking never changes them.”

“I keep everything hidden because there's nothing about my true self that anyone likes. I'm not difficult, Sebastian. I'm the easiest person around. I don't belong, and I spend all my time pretending I do. Sometimes I get weary of it, and that makes me angry. It's not fair to the people around me when I lose my temper. I say awful things when I'm angry. But it's not fair to me, either, that I was made this way.”

“Being a 'potential mate' was something rather different and much more complicated. It was when two people had the potential to become like one person, knowing each other's moods and feelings in a way no one else could. Being aware of their presence in a crowded room was just one example. If they were sad or angry, their mate would sense it to a point of feeling the emotion themselves.”

“In spite of being complicated people choose superstitions over common sense.”

“But I stopped believing there was a power of good and a power of evil that were outside us. And I came to believe that good and evil are names for what people do, not for what they are. All we can say is that this is a good deed, because it helps someone, or that's an evil one, because it hurts them. People are too complicated to have simple labels.”

“Oppenheimer, haunted by his leading role in the first use of atomic weapons, understood only one aspect of prudence. His longing not to do evil himself blinded him to the need to ward off the evil of others. This painfully knotted man hoped with one swipe of his moral sword to rid himself of the impossible tangle and to be clear and simple for once in his life. But being Oppenheimer could never be as easy as that. For Oppenheimer embodied two of the highest human types, the theoretical man described by Aristotle as god-like for living in the mind, among changeless truths, and the paragon of Machiavellian virtue, god-like in commanding the power of life and death over other men. No theoretical man before Oppenheimer had known such lordly power. In certain high moments he approached that Aristotelian theoretical purity which lives for the joys of knowing the world, whatever it might prove to be; in another light he thrilled at that Machiavellian power and its attendant renown; in contrary moods he reviled himself for the suffering he brought into the world, and ached to renounce his distinction and to be merely another man among men. Perhaps no theoretical man can be equal to such a burden: to feel knowledge as power when one’s mind reshapes the world irrevocably, to see the light of truth as the agent of some dark majesty, is not grace but ordeal. Oppenheimer’s agony tore him open from top to bottom.”

“Half of me is filled with bursting words and half of me is painfully shy. I crave solitude yet also crave people. I want to pour life and love into everything yet also nurture my self-care and go gently. I want to live within the rush of primal, intuitive decision, yet also wish to sit and contemplate. This is the messiness of life - that we all carry multitudes, so must sit with the shifts. We are complicated creatures, and ultimately, the balance comes from this understanding. Be water. Flowing, flexible and soft. Subtly powerful and open. Wild and serene. Able to accept all changes, yet still led by the pull of steady tides. It is enough.”

“Not every person wants the prettiest, smartest, talented or spiritually uplifting person to build a life with. Sometimes we just want that special someone that makes sense, puts up with us, has patience, comes without drama, gives us focus and is willing to run with our half-baked ideas.”