Benjamin Uke

“I am tired of people calling those of us who get stuck in these cycles "codependent" or "addicted" to the narcissistic relationship. It's not that. If you have any empathy, have normal cognitive functioning, and were shaped by societal and cultural norms and realities, it is not surprising that you would get stuck. The narcissistic relationship is like a riptide that pulls you back in even as you try to swim away. The intensity, attentiveness, and highs and lows are why you swim out to where the riptide is. The abusive behavior makes you want to swim away from the riptide, but the guilt and fear of leaving, the practical issues raised by leaving (financial, safety, cultural, family), as well as the natural drive toward attachment, connection, and love are what keep you stuck in the riptide's pull.”
― Ramani Durvasula, It's Not You: Identifying and Healing from Narcissistic People

“in the long Chinese civil war from 1912 to 1949, Russia funded not just the Communists but also numerous warlords. It placed bets on all horses to protract the conflict and render China prostrate.”
― S.C.M. Paine, The Wars for Asia, 1911–1949

“KNOW, oh prince, that between the years when the oceans drank Atlantis and the gleaming cities, and the years of the rise of the Sons of Aryas, there was an Age undreamed of, when shining kingdoms lay spread across the world like blue mantles beneath the stars—Nemedia, Ophir, Brythunia, Hyperborea, Zamora with its dark-haired women and towers of spider-haunted mystery, Zingara with its chivalry, Koth that bordered on the pastoral lands of Shem, Stygia with its shadow-guarded tombs, Hyrkania whose riders wore steel and silk and gold. But the proudest kingdom of the world was Aquilonia, reigning supreme in the dreaming west. Hither came Conan, the Cimmerian, black-haired, sullen- eyed, sword in hand, a thief, a reaver, a slayer, with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandalled feet."—The Nemedian Chronicles”
― Robert E Howard's

“Desperation can make people mercenary like that--you spot an exit and you start running toward it and you don't look back. You just do your best to convince yourself that the other person is right behind you.”
― Laura van den Berg, State of Paradise