Quote

It's interesting that the worse things get, the more we believe the next technological fix is going to get us out of it. But it's like being in quicksand: the more you struggle the deeper you sink.

Sam Keen

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Sam Keen
Age: 55
Author
Philosopher
Writer
Like
Deeper
Worse
Struggle
Interesting
Next
Going
Quicksand
Believe
Sink
Things
Technological

More quotes by Sam Keen

Image
Neurotic identity crises come when our defense mechanisms have been too successful and we're encapsulated in the fortress we have constructed with nothing to refresh us in our solitary confinement. So we play the old movies with their stale fears and their unrealistic hopes until we become bored enough to risk disarmament and engagement.
Sam Keen
Image
Without reverence we [people] will gradually descend into ecocide. In the degree that the imperatives of the market - the temple of the Mall - govern our lives, we are in escalating danger of destroying the commonwealth of all sentient beings - bugs and bees and buntings - on which we depend for a luxurious life on planet earth.
Sam Keen
Image
A man must go on a quest / to discover the sacred fire / in the sanctuary of his own belly / to ignite the flame in his heart / to fuel the blaze in the hearth / to rekindle his ardor for the earth
Sam Keen
Image
Being pretty successful, I can, of course, afford some luxuries. But I realize again and again how we have to disillusion ourselves of the idea that these things are going to give us real satisfaction.
Sam Keen
Image
The more we chase away the false mysteries - those things we think we know about ourselves and others - the more mysterious our existence becomes.
Sam Keen
Image
I think we have to trust ourselves in the darkness of not knowing. The God out of which we came and into which we go is an unknown God. It's the luminosity of that darkness and that unknowing that is, I think, the most human - and the most sacred - place of all.
Sam Keen
Image
Burnout is nature's way of telling you, you've been going through the motions your soul has departed you're a zombie, a member of the walking dead, a sleepwalker. False optimism is like administrating stimulants to an exhausted nervous system.
Sam Keen
Image
Our society has been eaten up by the economic view of things, which routinely forces us to work at jobs that don't mean anything.
Sam Keen
Image
If we come from good families where we have been supported well, there is a disillusionment we have to undergo in terms of the culture's values. We have to get beyond our cultural mythology to find out who we are.
Sam Keen
Image
The telling of your stories is a revolutionary act.
Sam Keen
Image
Our minds, bodies, feelings, relationships are all informed by our questions. What you ask is who you are. What you find depends on what you search for. And what shapes our lives are the questions we ask, refuse to ask, or never think of asking.
Sam Keen
Image
Down to earth advice about the path that leads away from the kingdom of the hollow men.
Sam Keen
Image
A society in which vocation and job are separated for most people gradually creates an economy that is often devoid of spirit, one that frequently fills our pocketbooks at the cost of emptying our souls.
Sam Keen
Image
Mystical experiences (unlike scientific conclusions) cannot be communicated from one person to another. Philosophers and little children are continually amazed that we, unaccountably, find ourselves in a somewhat intelligible world.
Sam Keen
Image
The sacred is discovered in what moves and touches us, in what makes us tremble.
Sam Keen
Image
The more you become a connoisseur of gratitude, the less you are a victim of resentment, depression, and despair.
Sam Keen
Image
Soul grows in communion. Word by word, story by story, for better or worse, we build our world. From true conversation - speaking and listening - communication deepens into compassion and creates community.
Sam Keen
Image
Chronological time is what we measure by clocks and calendars it is always linear, orderly, quantifiable, and mechanical. Kairotic time is organic, rhythmic, bodily, leisurely, and aperiodic it is the inner cadence that brings fruit to ripeness, a woman to childbirth, a man to change the direction of his life.
Sam Keen
Image
Enter each day with the expectation that the happenings of the day may contain a clandestine message addressed to you personally. Expect omens, epiphanies, casual blessings and teachers who unknowingly speak to your condition.
Sam Keen
Image
The first part of the spiritual journey should properly be called psychological rather than spiritual because it involves peeling away the myths and illusions that have misinformed us.
Sam Keen