Rachel

“The mind wants to live forever, or to learn a very good reason why not. The mind wants the world to return its love, or its awareness; the mind wants to know all the world, and all eternity, and God. The mind's sidekick, however, will settle for two eggs over easy.”
― Annie Dillard, Teaching a Stone to Talk: Expeditions and Encounters

“Enthusiasm makes up for a host of deficiencies.”
― Barack Obama, A Promised Land

“The mind—the culture—has two little tools, grammar and lexicon: a decorated sand bucket and a matching shovel. With these we bluster about the continents and do all the world's work. With these we try to save our very lives.”
― Annie Dillard, Teaching a Stone to Talk: Expeditions and Encounters

“Though it may seem a remote possibility to us now, during the formation of the human brain the fear of being grabbed by sharp claws, dragged into a dark hole, and eaten alive was not an abstraction.”
― Stephen T. Asma, On Monsters: An Unnatural History of Our Worst Fears