The 1970s was the decade of liberation, of anger at injustice and demands for recognition and rights. But … - Michael Foley

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In the morning, you tear up the pages of your fever, but every word naturally leads you back to its color, its night.

Michael Foley

The 1970s was the decade of liberation, of anger at injustice and demands for recognition and rights. But over time, the demand for specific rights degraded into a generalized sense of entitlement, the demand for specific recognition into a generalized demand for attention and the anger at specific injustice into a generalized feeling of grievance and resentment. The result is a culture of entitlement, attention-seeking and complaint.

1970S, Culture, Demand, Feelings, Generalized, Rights

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Day offers two equally necessary sacraments - the benediction of morning and the absolution of dusk. In the morning coffee blesses and in the evening wine absolves.

Morning, Coffee, Wine, Sacraments, Necessary, Offers

But there is a compelling reason to develop a personal strategy for living. Rejecting issues, which often feels liberating, is actually enslavement. Those who do not produce their own solutions must be using someone else's. As Nietzsche warned 'he who cannot obey himself will be commanded'.

Compelling Reason, Enslavement, Issues, Living, Strategy

So the absurdity of happiness is that it is embarrassing to discuss or even mention, impossible to define or measure, may not be achievable at all - or, at best, only intermittently and unconsciously - and may even turn into its opposite if directly pursued, but that it frequently turns up unexpectedly in the course of pursuing something else. There is no tease more infuriating. . . It is tempting to forget the whole thing and simply fall back on the couch with a remote control in one hand and a beer in the other.

Achievable, Beer, Couch, Fall, Opposites, Unexpectedly

But who, in the Western world, has not been deranged by a toxic cocktail of dissatisfaction, restlessness, desire and resentment? Who has not yearned to be younger, richer, more talented, more respected, more celebrated, and, above all, more sexually attractive? Who has not felt entitled to more and aggrieved when more was not forthcoming? It is possible that a starving African farmer has less sense of injustice than a middle-aged Western male who has never been fellated.

Celebrated, Cocktails, Desire, Male, Males

The happiness state, when examined more closely, turns out not to be a point but a range, with contentment at the bottom and exaltation at the top. . . there are probably as many forms of happiness as there are of depression.

Contentment, Exaltation, Happiness, Range, States, Turns