Don't take shadows too seriously. Reality is your only safety. Continue to reject illusion.
Wole SoyinkaRead
I ceased using words like optimism and pessimism a long time ago.
Interpretation
The speaker has moved beyond simplistic labels that define attitudes towards life.
In this quote, Wole Soyinka expresses a rejection of binary thinking, specifically the labels of optimism and pessimism, suggesting that such terms are inadequate to capture the complexity of human experience. By ceasing to use these words, he implies a more nuanced approach to life, one that recognizes a spectrum of emotions and responses rather than confining oneself to extreme viewpoints.
In practice
During a discussion on mental health, this quote can highlight the complexity of human emotions.
Don't take shadows too seriously. Reality is your only safety. Continue to reject illusion.
Trading and religion have always been aligned together in the history of the world, and especially on the African continent.
A war, with its attendant human suffering, must, when that evil is unavoidable, be made to fragment more than buildings: It must shatter the foundations of thought and re-create. Only in this way does every individual share in the cataclysm and understand the purpose of sacrifice.
Rwanda, which is one of the younger independent states in Africa, must be regarded as a model of how great human trauma can be transformed to commence true reconstruction of people. Human trauma can lead to stunted growth and mass withdrawal.
I have a kind of magnetic attraction to situations of violence.
Art is solace; art is vision, and when I pick up a literary work, I am a consumer of literature for its own sake.
Making matters worse is people's natural inclination to be easy on themselves, judging themselves according to their good intentions-while holding others to a higher standard and judging them by their worst actions.
Try as you may, you cannot put the Lord in your debt. For every time you try to do His will, He simply pours out more blessings upon you.
The Darwinian movement has made no difference to mankind, except that, instead of talking unphilosophically about philosophy, they now talk unscientifically about science.
There are people who are suffering beyond description. They are innocent people, they didn't bring this upon themselves. They are the victims of the sins of other people. And while it's hard to see, it's important to understand that these people exist.
I prefer a church which is bruised, hurting and dirty because it has been out on the streets, rather than a church which is unhealthy from being confined and from clinging to its own security.
War is in fact the true nurse of executive aggrandizement
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