“I Like People Whose Beauty Entails Something Individually Captivating; People Whose Beauty Is As Pure

She had created a dream world for herself. If the slightest thing happened in the normal world which did not conform to the laws of her dream world, her heart rose up in outrage and she was in pain.

Ivan Goncharov, The Same Old Story (1847)

I am certain of nothing but of the holiness of the hearts affections and the truth of imagination - what the imagination seizes as beauty must be truth - whether it existed before or not.

- John Keats

— Franz Kafka, Letter to his father

Kurt Vonnegut, from Mother Night; "Chapter Six Hundred & Fourty Three,"

It is the phenomenon sometimes called “alienation from self.” In its advanced stages, we no longer answer the telephone, because someone might want something; that we could say no without drowning in self-reproach is an idea alien to this game. Every encounter demands too much, tears the nerves, drains the will, and the specter of something as small as an unanswered letter arouses such disproportionate guilt that answering it becomes out of the question.

Joan Didion, On Self-Respect, 1961.

I just want to create a beautiful life for myself and others. I want peace and quiet in my house in the mountains, a garden filled with blooming flowers and happy cats. Sunkissed mornings on a white porch enjoying a slow morning routine, with a cup of black tea in dainty floral teacups, vintage 50s music drifting from the kitchen along with the scent of pancakes & homemade jam. A house that smells like home, like fresh bread, like serenity. A hall filled with art in beautiful ornate frames. The freedom to create what I love and share it with others. I will create my own kind of happiness and I truly believe everybody deserves to create for themselves whatever life offers them the most happiness.

Anaïs Nin, from the diary of Anais Nin, vol. VI: 1955-1966

Seduction is a skill everybody needs to learn and apply.

Seduction is a high form of power, by making people excited about the idea of you and the reducing the resistance to the things you want.

The more seduced a person is = the higher the chance you are able to get what you desire.

In romance, in business, in life.

Sarah Perry, The Essence of Peopling