Conflicted Quotes

“I loved her as much as ever and I still did not know how much that was.”
― James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

“All you care about is the control and power you have over me and I hate myself for giving that to you!”
― Lydia Kelly, Screaming in the Silence

“Did I ever tell you about Asin? She is the wild woman of the woods. It's an old story of the People. My mom used to tell me about Asin. Asin couldn't bear being married or having children or having friends. She always wanted to run wild. She ran wild through the woods. If you saw her running you had to run to water as fast as you could and drink or her restlessness would come into you like a thirst that could never be quenched. She was happy and unhappy. She had wild long hair and she was very tall and she ran like the wind. When you saw dunegrass rippling in a line she was running through it. When the wind changed direction suddenly that was Asin. She was never satisfied or content and so she ran and ran and ran. She would grab men who were fishing alone and make love to them and then throw them down on the ground and run away weeping. She would grab children who wandered too far alone in the woods but she would return them to the same spot after three days and run away again. She would listen to women talking by the fire or working in the village or gathering berries but if they invited her to join them she ran away. You could hear her crying sometimes when the sun went down. She wanted something but she never knew what it was so she had nothing. She was as free as anyone ever could be and she was trapped. When I was young I wanted to be Asin. Many times I wanted to be Asin. So do you, Nora. I know. It's okay. It's alright. My sweet love. Poor Asin. Sometimes I think to be Asin would be the saddest thing in the world. Poor thing.”
― Brian Doyle, Mink River

“How could he say, look, I've tried not to fancy you since you first took your coat off in this office. I try not to give names to what I feel for you, because I already know it's too much, and I want peace from the shit that love brings in its wake. I want to be alone, and unburdened, and free.

But I don't want you to be with anyone else. I don't want some other bastard to persuade you into a second marriage. I like knowing the possibility's there, for us to, maybe...

Except, it'll go wrong, of course, because it always goes wrong, because if I were the type for permanence, I'd already be married. And when it goes wrong, I'll lose you for good, and this thing we've built together, which is literally the only good part of my life, my vocation, my pride, my greatest achievement, will be forever fucked, because I won't find anyone I enjoy running things with, the way I enjoy running them with you, and everything afterward will be tainted by the memory of you.

If only she could come inside his head and see what was there, Strike thought, she'd understand that she occupied a unique place in his thoughts and in his affections. He felt he owed her that information, but was afraid that saying it might move this conversation into territory from which it would be difficult to retreat.

But from second to second, sitting here, now with more than half a bottle of neat whisky inside him, a different spirit seemed to move inside him, asking himself for the first time whether determined solitude was what he really wanted, for evermore.”
― Robert Galbraith, Troubled Blood

“Yes, overcomplexity can be used to obfuscate,
but oversimplicity makes it impossible to find commonalities,
shared points of entry, experiences,
values, meaning.”
― Shellen Lubin

“We don't always think about how
oversimplification leads to greater conflict,
but it does...
keeping it simple also leads to
ignoring what doesn't fit the picture
until it becomes a throbbing wound.
Keeping it simple leads to things being missed
and so not getting things completely right,
which, in the world of over-simplification, means
getting them wrong.”
― Shellen Lubin

“We are all human, with evolving, never completely predictable
thoughts and feelings.
We are all complex, however much we do or don't
acknowledge and express it.

We are all human.
We are all complex.”
― Shellen Lubin

“How can I bless you when you are cursed in your choice?”
― Philippa Gregory, The Red Queen

“Who are you Jared? The man who wants to fuck me and own me, or the man who held me when I had a nightmare?”
― Mercy Cortez (LiveForeverAnon), Jagged Edge

“On a fulcrum in my chest, grief and relief are balanced in equal measure.”
― Nayomi Munaweera, What Lies Between Us

“Run, a voice inside me whispered.

Stay another begged.”
― Carissa Broadbent, Six Scorched Roses