“The roots of any evil deed can be traced to the perpetrator's refusal to experience pain.”

“The distortion of a text resembles a murder: the difficulty is not in perpetrating the deed, but in getting rid of its traces.”

“the greatest evil perpetrated is the evil committed by nobodies, that is, by human beings who refuse to be persons”

“Boredom is the root of all evil - the despairing refusal to be oneself.”

“This is the treason of the artist: a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain.”

“Not all addictions are rooted in abuse or trauma, but I do believe they can all be traced to painful experience. A hurt is at the centre of all addictive behaviours. It is present in the gambler, the Internet addict, the compulsive shopper and the workaholic. The wound may not be as deep and the ache not as excruciating, and it may even be entirely hidden—but it’s there. As we’ll see, the effects of early stress or adverse experiences directly shape both the psychology and the neurobiology of addiction in the brain.”