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Atrona Grizel (Sov8840)
https://www.goodreads.com/sov8840
“In a literature exam, one may be asked to identify the movement to which an artist belongs. Yet a person’s own mind may perceive that artist from a completely different perspective—entirely outside of the accepted terms. They may describe that artist with words entirely unique to themselves, if they choose to describe at all. But society offers only one narrow, limited answer, and if one does not mark “romantic” or “modernist,” they cannot pass. Likewise, someone who does not conform to the commonly accepted rules of a language is not regarded as competent in that field. Accordingly, they are not even considered to “know” the language. Why? Not because they do not understand its workings, but because they dared to use the language in a way separate from the majority—in a way unique to themselves. They are speaking a different language, and even attempting such a thing is considered dangerous and results in punishment. That is why every question that is not open-ended is, in essence, not knowledge but indoctrination. Through such countless examinations, sluggish minds internalize these mechanisms and turn into automations, while those who remain aware mark their choices without sincerity, for they see through the machinery.
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The modern human lives so bound to the clock that if one were to secretly set their watch forward, their sleepiness would arrive earlier, as if it truly were midnight. On holidays, people usually go to bed late, because the thinking goes exactly like this: “I’m not going to work tomorrow, so I can stay up a bit later.” As a result, some people even end up staying awake all night. This simply shows that even sleep itself is determined by working hours. Even fatigue is not a biological rhythm anymore, but rather a psychological conditioning.
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I have never seen, nor will I ever see, an interesting mind be seduced by phrases like, “We are epic. So what are you waiting for? Come join us!”
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Every minute I spend among people infects my mind with societality. Since I spend my entire day among them from morning till night, I suspend myself for long hours and offer no resistance—it’s as if I say “come” to these toxic particles. I quietly accumulate them within me throughout the day by shutting myself, and finally, when I am in my solitude, I open myself and I perform an inner cleansing, erasing them and wiping out their traces as if they never existed. Then the next morning, it’s the same forced labor all over again.
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There is a difference between being sensitive and being intense.
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From games to exams, from friendships to marriages, from childhood classrooms to corporate offices, from social media to political campaigns, from relationships to careers, it is expected to crush someone else and get ahead—not to cooperate, but to compete till death.
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After the Eastern Bloc passed away, the world came to be dominated by a single liberal society: pleasure-addicted, appearance-obsessed, money-loving, social media slaves, and “democratic” to the point of fragmentation—fluid people, constantly exchanging identities through endless expression and performativity, thereby remaining identity-less. Capitalism triumphed by exploiting the ultimate weakness of the average person, who is governed by their instincts: pleasure. A lasting pleasure was never offered. And thus, not reflective but reactive masses, addicted to temporary pleasures, were formed. The type of restless, hedonistic, and rebellious Western youth who smoked weed, obsessed over fitness, wandered around brothels, swore at everything, and got into street fights—which the Soviets in the 1980s described as “degenerate youth”—has now become the sole norm of adolescence all over the world. What does that create? A population that is endlessly mutable, constantly changing outward signs—style, language, gender roles, political slogans—but never touching an inner core.”
―
-
The modern human lives so bound to the clock that if one were to secretly set their watch forward, their sleepiness would arrive earlier, as if it truly were midnight. On holidays, people usually go to bed late, because the thinking goes exactly like this: “I’m not going to work tomorrow, so I can stay up a bit later.” As a result, some people even end up staying awake all night. This simply shows that even sleep itself is determined by working hours. Even fatigue is not a biological rhythm anymore, but rather a psychological conditioning.
-
I have never seen, nor will I ever see, an interesting mind be seduced by phrases like, “We are epic. So what are you waiting for? Come join us!”
-
Every minute I spend among people infects my mind with societality. Since I spend my entire day among them from morning till night, I suspend myself for long hours and offer no resistance—it’s as if I say “come” to these toxic particles. I quietly accumulate them within me throughout the day by shutting myself, and finally, when I am in my solitude, I open myself and I perform an inner cleansing, erasing them and wiping out their traces as if they never existed. Then the next morning, it’s the same forced labor all over again.
-
There is a difference between being sensitive and being intense.
-
From games to exams, from friendships to marriages, from childhood classrooms to corporate offices, from social media to political campaigns, from relationships to careers, it is expected to crush someone else and get ahead—not to cooperate, but to compete till death.
-
After the Eastern Bloc passed away, the world came to be dominated by a single liberal society: pleasure-addicted, appearance-obsessed, money-loving, social media slaves, and “democratic” to the point of fragmentation—fluid people, constantly exchanging identities through endless expression and performativity, thereby remaining identity-less. Capitalism triumphed by exploiting the ultimate weakness of the average person, who is governed by their instincts: pleasure. A lasting pleasure was never offered. And thus, not reflective but reactive masses, addicted to temporary pleasures, were formed. The type of restless, hedonistic, and rebellious Western youth who smoked weed, obsessed over fitness, wandered around brothels, swore at everything, and got into street fights—which the Soviets in the 1980s described as “degenerate youth”—has now become the sole norm of adolescence all over the world. What does that create? A population that is endlessly mutable, constantly changing outward signs—style, language, gender roles, political slogans—but never touching an inner core.”
―
“Ten days I spend in solitude are worth a hundred days I spend among people.
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Those who are too vast for the world never fit into its narrowness.
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I do not want freedom but a different kind of captivity…
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Rather than defending one’s right, a person should uproot the need for that right—however “cool” the former may seem.
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“Human nature” defines the traits of the ordinary person who has never re-evaluated values.
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The transformation of passion into productivity is like the industrial exploitation of a hidden gold mine that has been discovered. The source of pleasure for the one who does this is no longer the gold itself, but how “valuable” it is—that is, how lovable or purchaseable it is in the eyes of others. In short, what was once a vigorous and lively untouched tree is cut down through societalization and turned into timber and paper for narrow human purposes.
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Everyone is laughing. From day to night. That means there is no laughter at all.
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To hope is to give a dagger to the enemy and wait thinking, “Will they kill me?”
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The only thing I need is perhaps someone who will witness me needing nothing at all.
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If someone sees silence as truer than speech or solitude as richer than community, that threatens the social machinery; a silent person is not “useful,” a solitary person is not “networking,” a melancholic person is not “optimistic” about the system’s promises. But instead of asking “what is this silence telling?” “what lies beneath this solitude?” or “what insight does this melancholy reveal about the existence?” society flips the script: it is not the world that is sick but the person. Call it “just having depression,” and suddenly the entire worldview of a person becomes “sickness.” Once it is framed this way, it is no longer a revelation about the world but only a “malfunction” inside someone’s brain. Anything that does not shine, smile, or flatter is cast into the shadow of “mental illness” and thus, reduced to a mere symptom instead of a philosophy. And in doing so, society neutralizes the dissent by medicalizing them.
-
For people with numerous relationships, others are a kind of background decoration—something they can change with just a few keystrokes, replace with their already existing relationships, and prefer as if it were a capitalist product because of the features it offers—whereas for the solitary person, a single human being is an architect of reality.
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For some, the only life that can be lived is the dream of a different life.
-
People perceive being on autopilot as “personality.”
-
When people whom someone hated take their own lives—for example, when parents who never showed love to their child find the child’s body—their crying resembles the sorrow of a robot; it’s not so much an emotion as it is an automatic reflex.
-
People mistake cultivating culture with acquiring depth and knowledge.
-
Happiness occurs only when the happiness is forgotten.
-
Those tainted by too much civilization cleanse themselves in nature.
-
To realize dreams means to betray them.
-
In the late hours of the night, the self drifts into another dimension. Having watched the day unfold from behind the scenes, the soul finally proclaims its existence. It takes the stage. It begins, at last, to breathe freely—whether the breath be sweet or bitter.
-
One must not see, but hear.
-
Those raised with American culture are doomed to see everything in terms of profit and loss, labeling events and situations as either “winning” or “losing,” and people as either “winner” or “loser.”
-
No feeling ever disappears; it only transforms.
-
The universe should be the person, not the person the universe.
-
Life is everywhere, yet experience in its true sense is absent. There are billions of bodies, yet not even a single soul.
-
Whoever is to laugh, laughs at everything.”
―
-
Those who are too vast for the world never fit into its narrowness.
-
I do not want freedom but a different kind of captivity…
-
Rather than defending one’s right, a person should uproot the need for that right—however “cool” the former may seem.
-
“Human nature” defines the traits of the ordinary person who has never re-evaluated values.
-
The transformation of passion into productivity is like the industrial exploitation of a hidden gold mine that has been discovered. The source of pleasure for the one who does this is no longer the gold itself, but how “valuable” it is—that is, how lovable or purchaseable it is in the eyes of others. In short, what was once a vigorous and lively untouched tree is cut down through societalization and turned into timber and paper for narrow human purposes.
-
Everyone is laughing. From day to night. That means there is no laughter at all.
-
To hope is to give a dagger to the enemy and wait thinking, “Will they kill me?”
-
The only thing I need is perhaps someone who will witness me needing nothing at all.
-
If someone sees silence as truer than speech or solitude as richer than community, that threatens the social machinery; a silent person is not “useful,” a solitary person is not “networking,” a melancholic person is not “optimistic” about the system’s promises. But instead of asking “what is this silence telling?” “what lies beneath this solitude?” or “what insight does this melancholy reveal about the existence?” society flips the script: it is not the world that is sick but the person. Call it “just having depression,” and suddenly the entire worldview of a person becomes “sickness.” Once it is framed this way, it is no longer a revelation about the world but only a “malfunction” inside someone’s brain. Anything that does not shine, smile, or flatter is cast into the shadow of “mental illness” and thus, reduced to a mere symptom instead of a philosophy. And in doing so, society neutralizes the dissent by medicalizing them.
-
For people with numerous relationships, others are a kind of background decoration—something they can change with just a few keystrokes, replace with their already existing relationships, and prefer as if it were a capitalist product because of the features it offers—whereas for the solitary person, a single human being is an architect of reality.
-
For some, the only life that can be lived is the dream of a different life.
-
People perceive being on autopilot as “personality.”
-
When people whom someone hated take their own lives—for example, when parents who never showed love to their child find the child’s body—their crying resembles the sorrow of a robot; it’s not so much an emotion as it is an automatic reflex.
-
People mistake cultivating culture with acquiring depth and knowledge.
-
Happiness occurs only when the happiness is forgotten.
-
Those tainted by too much civilization cleanse themselves in nature.
-
To realize dreams means to betray them.
-
In the late hours of the night, the self drifts into another dimension. Having watched the day unfold from behind the scenes, the soul finally proclaims its existence. It takes the stage. It begins, at last, to breathe freely—whether the breath be sweet or bitter.
-
One must not see, but hear.
-
Those raised with American culture are doomed to see everything in terms of profit and loss, labeling events and situations as either “winning” or “losing,” and people as either “winner” or “loser.”
-
No feeling ever disappears; it only transforms.
-
The universe should be the person, not the person the universe.
-
Life is everywhere, yet experience in its true sense is absent. There are billions of bodies, yet not even a single soul.
-
Whoever is to laugh, laughs at everything.”
―
Atrona Grizel’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Atrona Grizel’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
Favorite Genres
Art, Classics, Crime, Fantasy, Fiction, Historical fiction, History, Horror, Music, Mystery, Non-fiction, Paranormal, Philosophy, Poetry, Psychology, Religion, Science, Science fiction, and Thriller
Polls voted on by Atrona Grizel
Lists liked by Atrona Grizel