“Think of the power we could have if all the energy and effort in the world – or maybe even just your energy and effort? – that goes into drinking were put into resisting, building, creating. Try adding up all the money anarchists in your community have spent on corporate libations, and picture how much musical equipment or bail money or food it could have paid for – instead of funding their war against all of us.”
“All of our time, energy, and money go into keeping people away from us, into building up walls. What if we didn't do that? What if we became part of the world around us? What if we used all of that time, energy, and money for something else? For a greater good? We would no longer be people who were only worth a trash bag full of ransom money. We would be people who were worth something real.”
“And we mean to treat you all,' added Lydia, 'but you must lend us the money, for we have just spent ours at the shop out there.”
“Too many of us are hung up on what we don't have, can't have, or won't ever have. We spend too much energy being down, when we could use that same energy – if not less of it – doing, or at least trying to do, some of the things we really want to do.”
“In spite of the deep-seated craving for love, almost everything else is considered to be more important than love: success, prestige, money, power-almost all our energy is used for the learning of how to achieve these aims, and almost none to learn the art of loving. Could it be that only those things are considered worthy of being learned with which one can earn money or prestige, and that love, which "only" profits the soul, but is profitless in the modern sense, is a luxury we have no right to spend energy on?”
“Pain will never leave us. Instead of putting energy into destroying pain, we need to put energy into creating pleasure.”