Quotes from Eric G. Wilson

American seekers of happiness are in danger of deluding themselves into believing that only one part of the world exists, the part that gladdens their egos.

Creating doesn't make us unhappy, unhappiness makes us creative. To create is to live, and in living, we want only to creat more, to set our foundations depper and reach higher toward the sky. If sadness is what makes us creative, then sadness is nothing else but life.

To desire only happiness in a world undoubtedly tragic is to become inauthentic.

The porcelain rose is not as pretty as the one that decays.

Do not perceive through overly judgmental eyes, prone to damnation. If you do, you are constrained to witness nothing but your notion of perfection, either fulfilled or violated. Gaze at life rather as though you were always blessing it, consecrating it, humbly, as holy, and then your biases will be relaxed and your curiosity will be aroused and surprise; there, in your peripheral, a glimmer after which you go, and it is gone, but its absence gleams.

To be fake in this dreamy universe is to believe in actual authenticity and behave accordingly, and to be in tune with the real is to know it's all phony and to create, with a generous heart, your own sweet ruse.