P 70 (very motivating to work) But couldnt I just to free my conscience from these feelings of guilt, couldnt I write atleast for half an hour?
P 71 They (notes about ideas on writing) serve only to empty my mind so that sleep can come.
I am gripped by the feeling of emptiness, the feeling of someone who has set down in words things he should have kept to himself.
P 75 Struggling to understand why I have invited to supper someone whom I should by rights hate.
I had imagined scenes of aggression or feigned indifference or public scandal, but the words, "I'd like you to invite this young man to supper' had never once entered my head.
P 77 Blessed are those who are not afraid to admit that they dont know something.
P 80 He gives me a hug, not because he feels a particular affection for me, but so that he can whisper.
P 81 Dont you love me? -- More than yesterday, less than tomorrow.
P 82 So why did you help? (finding Esther the Zahir) Because I cant live forever with the ghost of a woman who left without a word of explanation. I have read your books. I believe that only by finding her and resolving the matter with your heart ever truly be mine.
P 83 When I had nothing more to lose, I was given everything. When I ceased to be who I am, I found myself. I love you more than I love myself.
P 85 The very person who had helped me build my life had very nearly destroyed me.
P 88 France normally so liberal was slightly paranoid about the subject. There had been a long report about the brainwashing practised on certain unwary people. As if those same people were able to make all kinds of other choices about school, university, toothpaste, cars, films, husbands, wives, lovers but when it came to matters of faith were easily manipulated.
P 89 She doesnt seem to have patience to respond. She looks at me as if I were a novice, a person who needs to be educated in the mysteries of life.
P 91 Mongolian Creation Myth: out of two different natures love is born. In contradiction love grows in strength. In confrontation and transformation, love is preserved.
Dante wrote in the Divine Comedy. The day that man allows true love to appear, those things which are well made will fall into confusion and will overturn everything we believe to be right and true.
The world will become real when man learns how to love, until then we will live in the belief that we know what love is, but we will always lack the courage to confront as it truly is. Love is an untamed force. When we try to control it, it destroys us. When we try to imprison it, it enslaves us. When we try to understand it, it leaves us feeling lost and confused.
P 93 But the story we are told is that all men can always get an erection. When he can't, the man feels useless, and the woman is convinced that she isn't attractive enough. since it's a taboo subject, he can't talk to his friends about it. He tells the woman the old lie, "It's never happened to me before". He feels ashamed of himself and often runs away from someone with whom he could have had a really good relationship, if only he had allowed himself a second, third or fourth chance. If he had trusted more in the love of his friends, if he had told the truth, he would have found out that he wasn't the only one. If he had trusted more in the love of the woman, he would not have felt humiliated.
