If everyone lives roughly the same lies about the same thing, there is no one to call them … - Ernest Becker

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He understood then that neither time nor distance had lessened his love for her. But was love that made him ache with suffering truly worth fighting for?

Ernest Becker

If everyone lives roughly the same lies about the same thing, there is no one to call them liars. They jointly establish their own sanity and themselves normal.

Jointly, Liars, Lies, Lying, Normal, Roughly

Same Author Quotes

Man cannot endure his own littleness unless he can translate it into meaningfulness on the largest possible level.

Endure, Existentialism, Levels, Meaningfulness, Men, Possible

Why would a person prefer the accusations of guilt, unworthiness, ineptitude - even dishonor and betrayal- to real possibility? This may not seem to be the choice, but it is: complete self effacement, surrender to the "others", disavowal of any personal dignity and freedom-on the one hand; and freedom and independence, movement away from the others, extrication of oneself from the binding links of family and social duties-on the other hand. This is the choice that the depressed person actually faces.

Betrayal, Depressed Person, Oneself, Personal, Real, Surrender

Love is the problem of an animal.

Animal, Love, Love Is, Problem

What does it mean to be a self-conscious animal? The idea is ludicrous, if it is not monstrous. It means to know that one is food for worms.

Animal, Idea, Know, Mean, Self, Worms

If the love object is divine perfection, then one's own self is elevated by joining one's destiny to it. . . All our guilt, fear, and even our mortality itself can be purged in a perfect consummation with perfection itself.

Destiny, Love, Perfect, Self