Quotes from Sarah Wilson

Sugar is a drug. We know that sugar interacts with reward systems in the brain in much the same way as addictive drugs. Studies have found rats fed sugar not only became addicted, but when they were denied it for a short period then later exposed to it, they binged on larger quantities of sugar—and other substances like alcohol.

Sister Joan explained that this can mean having to shut down everything that has previously formed you, if required. To be a prophet is not self-serving and often means working in isolation with little recognition. "You're an agitator in a time of complacency." You do what has to be done precisely because no one else is doing it.

Capitalism is a cult. We've become so ensconced in it, however, so blind to its power, that it's hard to see it as such. Which is how a cult is imposed on people. I mean, we can't fathom that there could be any other way of existing and we defend it even when we can see it is no longer working for us.

Play with "and." We can contain multitudes, as Walt Whitman said. Play with being spiritual and political, peaceful and outraged, calm and alarmed. This is definitely what our hyperobjectified life is demanding of us.

My self-destructive inclination when anxious has been to distance myself from the world. I'm really very good at extracting myself from those around me and hiding out until I think I'm a more bearable person to be around.

Jamison's An Unquiet Mind, which details her own struggle with bipolar disorder. A passage stood out for me: "The Chinese believe that before you can conquer a beast you first must make it beautiful." The Chinese proverb puts things in the imperative. I prefer to phrase it as a gentle invitation: Let's make our beast beautiful.

Along with taxes and death, the only certainty in life is that we just don't know. So we might as well join this inevitability.

It can be a good thing, too, to learn to sit in your own weirdness.

I said earlier that making decisions is a key anxiety trigger, If we drill down a bit we can see that this happens because we work to the belief there's a perfect decision out there to be made. But such a thing doesn't exist. And clutching at something that doesn't exist is enough to send anyone into a drowning panic.

The more anxious we are, the more high-functioning we will make ourselves appear, which just encourages the world to lean on us more.

You want to find something, but you don't know what to search for. In everyone there's a continuous desire and expectation; deep inside, you still expect something better to happen. That is why you check your email many times a day.

Studies show any movement, but particularly walking, will ease anxiety when we're in the middle of a stress hormone surge. Indeed, the studies show that a mere 20–30 minute walk, five times a week, will make people less anxious, as effectively as antidepressants. Even better, the effect is immediate—serotonin, dopamine and endorphins all increase as soon as you start moving.

I believe with all my heart that just understanding the metapurpose of the anxious struggle helps to make it beautiful. Purposeful, creative, bold, rich, deep things are always beautiful.

We rush to escape what makes us anxious, which makes us anxious, and so we rush some more.

Alex Korb writes in "The Grateful Brain," "Gratitude can have such a powerful impact on your life because it engages your brain in a virtuous cycle. Your brain only has so much power to focus its attention. It cannot easily focus on both positive and negative stimuli." Literally, you can't be grateful and anxious at the same time. Once again, the threat system in our amygdala is overridden.

In it she wrote, of her depression, "That is all I want in life: for this pain to seem purposeful.

This is the hoary deal-when you have got a mood disorder, few people are heavy enough and patient enough to anchor your ups and downs. And if you're high functioning in your anxiety, there are not many men (or women) out there who will actually take the kite string off you in the first place. And I do wonder if it's grossly unfair to ever expect them to be able to. I've often expected this of my partners. The expectation was too high for both of us, with all of them.

Hiking connects us to ourselves. A University of Michigan study found that because our senses evolved in nature, by getting back to it we connect more honestly with our sensory reactions. Which connects us with our true selves, and enhances a feeling of "oneness." Or perhaps we could say, a Something Else.

Awe is quite a specific experience. It happens when we view beauty amid vastness, predominantly in nature, triggering a deep sense of belonging. Our smallness against a backdrop of immensity reminds us of our insignificance and interconnectedness, which brings about a profound, yet elated, peace.

You choose. You might not even know why, but you do. You commit. Then you do the work. Oh, yeah. Then you falter. And fuck up. And go back to the beginning.

It's easier to do something every day, without exception, than to do something "most days",' she said. 'When you say "I'll walk four days a week", you debate which four days, and wake up debating whether you can skip Tuesday.

It's a gorgeous oddity of our existence – our loneliness is not caused by being on our own. Indeed, loneliness is best cured with aloneness, which is to say, a meaningful connection to ourselves.