Taha

“At the beginning of any path, we’re excited and nervous. So we seek to comfort ourselves externally instead of inwardly. There’s a weak side to each of us, that—like a trade union—isn’t exactly malicious but at the end of the day still wants to get as much public credit and attention as it can for doing the least. That side we call ego.”
― Ryan Holiday, Ego Is the Enemy

“A poet’s function . . . is not to experience the poetic state: that is a private affair. His function is to create it in others.”
― Ryan Holiday, Ego Is the Enemy

“Most people don’t actually want to face the flinch; they just want to be in a movie about
it. They want the glory, not the suffering. They don’t want scars because they like being
soft. They don’t want to be humiliated; they want respect—they just don’t want to earn it.
They want the keys handed to them. But it doesn’t work that way.”
― Julien Smith, The Flinch

“Those who face the flinch make a difference. The rest do not.”
― Julien Smith, The Flinch