"People in happy marriages and people in open systems cheat too. The typical view would be to say that something is missing at home, since they wouldn’t be havi...ng an affair if they had everything they wanted. It’s not that simple...They stand to lose everything, for a glimmer of what? Excitement and titillation doesn’t begin to capture it. These are not frivolous people. They are often very responsible, devoted citizens, parents, and mates" - My interview with Esther Perel about "The State of Affairs: Rethinking Infidelity" for Los Angeles Review of Books (LARB) 💘

"Sartre had huge energy and stamina. He worked hard and played hard. His chief excess was writing, and his other excesses — such as women and drugs — served to ...inspire and drive forward his excessively ambitious project of trying to explain the human condition. His excesses eventually destroyed his health. He was virtually blind for the last seven years of his life and suffered the psychological pain of no longer being able to write because he could not see to revise his work. Cerebral hypoxia also meant that he found it increasingly difficult to concentrate. In true existentialist style, he did not regret how he had lived. Given his excesses, it is amazing he lasted 74 years."

"The disposable nature of relationships is a major curse. To be brutally honest, the issue is less about the other person than it is about ourselves. That issue... we had with the person we disposed of is, in all likelihood, going to recur in the next relationship. So few of us are trained in the skills to build healthy, successful, and satisfying relationships. Meanwhile, loneliness is becoming a top public health threat. It’s twice as damaging as obesity and a serious problem for our mental, emotional, and physical health."

🔊 "Since we’re all affected by politics, if we choose not to be involved in creating the conditions of our own lives this reduces us to what de Beauvoir called ...‘absurd vegetation’. It’s tantamount to rejecting existence. We must take a side."