temadoinspace’s Reviews > Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism > Status Update

‘All human beings are lost to some degree. Life is disorder and confusing for absolutely everyone.’

‘about a dozen proverbial red flags erect in my frontal cortex’

FIND YOUR VOICE!!

‘shit, is this what conversion feels like?’

‘when you’re experimenting with faith and belief, there has to be room to ask questions, express your misgivings and seek outside information, both early on and deep in your membership’

but there is always a story,
as soon as you get your language back, you can tell it mill

‘language is the beginning and end of everything.’

"a good coach is one who does not guide, but shines light on a person's deepest desires and blocks." Not a guide, not a prophet, not a guru telling you just what to say. But a candle in the dimly lit library of existence. The only dictionary you need is already open.

‘The deeper we go into darkness, the higher we go back into the light like a slingshot’

Thought-terminating clichés :
'Expressions like "it is what it is", "boys will be boys", "everything happens for a reason" → Semantic stop signs
- they alleviate cognitive dissonance
'suddenly hyper aware of the fact that life fundamentally bends towards entropy'
'it's work to think, especially with things you don't want to think about'

‘the words were smooth, as they always had been, but surrounded by armed guards, residents were presented with two options : die by poision or be shot trying to escape’

‘the death tape is a poem, curse, a mantra, a betrayal, a haunting. And proof of languages lethal power’

‘Creating special language to influence people's behavior and beliefs is so effective in part simply because speech is the first thing we're willing to change about ourselves ... and also the last thing we let go.’

‘with words, we breathe reality into being’

‘language does not simply describe or reflect who we are, it creates who we are’
^ ‘speech itself has the capacity to consummate actions, thus exhibiting a level of intrinsic power)