To be human and to be adult means constantly to be in the grip of opposing emotions, to have daily to reconcile apparently conflicting tensions. I want this, but need that. I cherish this, but I adore its opposite too.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the complexity of human emotions and the need to balance conflicting desires in adulthood.
In this quote, Stephen Fry articulates the inherent conflict within human emotions, highlighting that adulthood involves navigating and reconciling contradictory desires and feelings. He suggests that this tension is a fundamental aspect of being human, as we often find ourselves wanting one thing while simultaneously craving its opposite, illustrating the multifaceted nature of human experience.
In practice
In a discussion about emotional intelligence, this quote can illustrate the importance of understanding and embracing conflicting feelings.
I used many times to touch my own chest and feel, under its asthmatic quiver, the engine of the heart and lungs and blood and feel amazed at what I sensed was the enormity of the power I possessed. Not magical power, but real power. The power simply to go on, the power to endure, that is power enough, but I felt I had also the power to create, to add, to delight, to amaze and to transform.
There comes a time when the blankness of the future is just so extreme, it's like such a black wall of nothingness. Not of bad things like a cave full of monsters and so, you're afraid of entering it. It's just nothingness, the void, emptiness and it is just horrible. It's like contemplating a future-less future and so you just want to step out of it. The monstrosity of being alive overwhelms you.
As someone who worked hard for a Labour victory in the 90s, do I regret it? Not really. It was bound to happen. And it'll happen with the next government, and the one after it. Because all governments serve us. They serve the filth.
It's now very common to hear people say 'I'm rather offended by that'.
You can't just say there is a God because well, the world is beautiful. You have to account for bone cancer in children. You have to account for the fact that almost all animals in the wild live under stress with not enough to eat and will die violent and bloody deaths. There is not any way that you can just choose the nice bits and say that means there is a God and ignore the true fact of what nature is.
Money is to Everything as an Aeroplane is to Australia. The aeroplane isn't Australia, but it remains the only practical way we know of reaching it. So perhaps, metonymically, the aeroplane is Australia after all.
All societies wrestle with the scourge of prejudice, but validating that prejudice in statute makes a virtue of oppression.
An eye for an eye only leads to more blindness.
When the belly is empty, the body becomes spirit; and when it is full, the spirit becomes body.
Those who talk about individuality the most are the ones who most object to deviation, and in a few years it may be the other way around. Some day everybody will just think what they want to think, and then everybody will probably be thinking alike; that seems to be what is happening.
Good is something you do, not something you talk about. Some medals are pinned to your soul, not to your jacket.
Jesus was not a white man; He was not a black man. He came from that part of the world that touches Africa and Asia and Europe. Christianity is not a white man's religion and don't let anybody ever tell you that it's white or black. Christ belongs to all people; He belongs to the whole world.
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