Elizabeth Theiss Smith

“Rome remained great as long as she had enemies who forced her to unity, vision, and heroism. When she had overcome them all she flourished for a moment and then began to die.”
― Will Durant, Caesar and Christ

“Who will wake up at the end of my dream?”
― Jacques Roubaud

“I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is: I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat.”
― Rebecca West

“Research made famous by Kent Berridge at the University of Michigan shows that dopamine is released when something new and potentially useful triggers the brain. We often think dopamine is the stuff of pleasure, but Berridge’s research shows that dopamine is related to pleasure, but not pleasure itself. It’s a chemical message that says, “Give me more!” And it’s activated by sex, many drugs, chocolate, and novelty. The buzz of the phone in your pocket, wondering if it’s good news or bad, the endless potential of what you could learn from the next Instagram story you swipe through, triggers dopamine release in a way similar to methamphetamine and lust. This, as I’m sure you have noticed, is very distracting.”
― Jedidiah Jenkins, Like Streams to the Ocean: Notes on Ego, Love, and the Things That Make Us Who We Are: Essaysc