A Quote by Alexander Chee

The myth works to make the very real things people don't want to look at visible for them. — © Alexander Chee
The myth works to make the very real things people don't want to look at visible for them.
I make my share of mistakes, but one I never make is to underestimate the power of things. People imbued from childhood with the myth of the primacy of feeling seldom like to admit they really want things as much as they might want love, but my career has convinced me that plenty of them do. And some want things a lot worse than they want love.
One of my struggles is that I'm a glutton. There's always those very simple, long, old-ass things, but they're very real to me, and I'm sitting in them, and they're swirling in my mind all the time. I tell people about it and they think, "Why don't you just go and make some money, go get a big-screen TV, or look at the Internet." Or they say, "Go create some introspective art." I just want to explode. I don't know how everybody else is able to walk around so calm. It's amazing to me when I see people walking so calmly down the street. I envy them, but I also kind of hate them.
Tonally, there was no discussion; I just don’t know any other way to do it. I don’t want to make people feel bad, and I don’t want to make their problems into a joke. I do love telling people when they’re right and wrong, but for the most part, it was always going to be about real fights where people have a real difference of opinion and a real dispute. I want to make jokes, but I also want to make a decision that is fair.
When we think of the myth of the settling of the West, this is our creation myth. But because we think of it as mythology, not as real people interacting with other real people, we ignore the cost of human lives and blood.
People think they want to know how magic works, but really they don't. How it works is never as amazing as what the trick was in the first place, so it's never going to make you feel good. Somebody just wanting to know how a trick works is never enough to make me want to tell them.
People want black and white answers, but it's not one thing or another. I think the only way we're going to make good things is to inspire people and make them feel as though what they're watching is real.
Visible things can be invisible. However, our powers of thought grasp both the visible and the invisible – and I make use of painting to render thoughts visible.
If I've learnt one thing, it's that I need to surround myself with people who want to know the real Pete Wentz, not some myth they've concocted from a bunch of press clippings. I can open the door a centimetre wide, and some people think I'm showing them the whole room. But all they're getting is a glimpse. That's all I want to show most people.
When myth meets myth, the collision is very real.
You look up to your parents and you want them to accept you, and you don't want them to look at you in a negative light. So you do things to make them proud and accept you.
Most people want nothing to happen. That is the problem with governments these days. They want to do things all the time; they are always very busy thinking of what things they can do next. That is not what people want. People want to be left alone to look after their cattle.
If I can make an economic deal with Amazon that works for them and works for me, OK - I'll make it available. But I don't want to be part of restrictions that make life difficult for my guests.
Recognize that being one of the only black people in an organization, or just in a meeting, automatically makes you very visible. Use this to help yourself. Look at it as an opportunity, and leverage that opportunity by making a visible contribution.
Imaginary evils soon become real ones by indulging our reflections on them; as he who in a melancholy fancy sees something like a face on the wall or the wainscot can, by two or three touches with a lead pencil, make it look visible, and agreeing with what he fancied.
You haven't learned life's lesson very well if you haven't noticed that you can give the tone or colour, or decide the reaction you want of people in advance. It's unbelievable simply. If you want them to take an interest in you, take an interest in them first. If you want to make them nervous, become nervous yourself...It's as simple as that. People will treat you as you treat them. It's no secret. Look about you. You can prove it with the next person you meet.
If you want to be a real human being - a real woman, a real man - you cannot tolerate things which put you to indignation, to outrage. You must stand up. I always say to people, 'Look around; look at what makes you unhappy, what makes you furious, and then engage yourself in some action.'
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