21 Quotes by John Kaag

Falling in love and believing in free will are not all that different. Both are radical, life-altering, working hypotheses, verified or disproved in experience. Both involve the type of belief that one must assent to in an initial act of (basically blind) faith.

Acting as if the world is a welcoming and tender place occasionally has the effect of making it more so.

As it turns out, to ‘become who you are’ is not about finding a ‘who’ you have always been looking for. It is not about separating ‘you’ off from everything else. And it is not about existing as you truly ‘are’ for all time. The self does not lie passively in wait for us to discover it. Selfhood is made in the active, ongoing process, in the German verb werden, 'to become'.

When one spends time reading – and falls in love with – a particular philosopher, he gradually begins to confuse the world of objective fact with an imagined one of ideals and beliefs.

We don’t laugh because we’re happy, we’re happy because we laugh.”17 The action itself is enough to bring about a particular affective state.

As it turns out, to ‘become who you are’ is not about finding a ‘who’ you have always been looking for. It is not about separating ‘you’ off from everything else. And it is not about existing as you truly ‘are’ for all time. The self does not lie passively in wait for us to discover it. Selfhood is made in the active, ongoing process, in the German verb werden, ‘to become’.

Become what you are”:.

Genius, in truth, means little more than the faculty of perceiving in an unhabitual way.

Marrying,” Schopenhauer tells us, “means to grasp blindfolded into a sack hoping to find an eel amongst an assembly of snakes.