Pleasure and pain are on the same side of the coin of human experience. The opposite is indifference or numbness.

once upon a time I would’ve killed to feel numb, like I do now. I would have reveled in the abyss of emptiness that fills my heart. the fear of the unknown would’ve made me...

The first time it was reported that our friends were being butchered there was a cry of horror. Then a hundred were butchered. But when a thousand were butchered and there was no end to...

At the time, I remained relatively calm before that spectacle of horrors, which is perhaps the most telling indication of just how desensitized I had become. The more I witnessed such atrocities and rubbed shoulders...

For us, fear comes where terror comes to others because we are anesthetized to the guns constantly pointed at us. And the terror we have known is something few Westerners ever will. Israeli occupation exposes...

Traumatized people chronically feel unsafe inside their bodies: The past is alive in the form of gnawing interior discomfort. Their bodies are constantly bombarded by visceral warning signs, and, in an attempt to control these...

It was strange how in that moment of tragedy, it had seemed so unreal, like an old-fashioned movie reel playing on a screen for my eyes only. The pain and broken heart were blocked off...

Physical pain was easy. It would always pass in the end. All it needed was time – a ticking clock.

You think being dead inside is bad until someone brings you back to life and stabs you in the chest without the intention of killing you.

I walked back to the window to look down at the people who shared this city with me. The people who made every day a series of mediocrities.The unreformed murderers masquerading as businessmen in borrowed...

Someone is going to tell you to get use to this. That feeling of being scared and sad. They’re going to say it’ll be better when you learn to ignore it. Don’t listen to them....

In general, it’s not too hard to corrupt an American, mostly a matter of supply to their demand. Supply should be variegated to encourage the Illusion of Choice. Other than that they’re looking for numbness,...

You’ve faced horrors in these past weeks… I don’t know which is worse. The terror you feel the first time you witness such things, or the numbness that comes after it starts to become ordinary.

I thought about suicide all the time, but it seemed toomuch effort, swallowing all those pills or jumping off things. If I’d lived out in the country I would have found a quiet stretch of...

I lean to you, numb as a fossil. Tell me I’m here.

You know, I think the people I feel saddest for are the ones who once knew what profoundness was, but who lost or became numb to the sensation of wonder, who felt their emotions floating...

Depression means self-loathing, self-disgust, and the kind of emotional numbness that feels like psychic death.

Parched by the deprivation of your love for so long made me forget what a cup brimming with love, on my lips, felt like. Everything that now wets it, only wrinkles it with a bland...

After great pain, a formal feeling comes – The Nerves sit ceremonious, like Tombs – The stiff Heart questions was it He, that bore,And Yesterday, or Centuries before?The Feet, mechanical, go round – Of Ground,...

I felt very still and empty, the way the eye of a tornado must feel, moving dully along in the middle of the surrounding hullabaloo.

The same numbness and disappointment every day sends some people looking for something tragic for proof of life.

Without love everything can be nothing. Does that make me want to love? No. For me, Ignorance is still better than martyrdom.

I guess I should have reacted the way most of the other girls were, but I couldn’t get myself to react. I felt very still and very empty, the way the eye of a tornado...

We conform to pain until we don’t notice it anymore; it’s what you call — numb — and it tragically blots out our pleasure too.

Some attribute had departed from her, the permanence of which had been essential to keep her a woman. Such is frequently the fate, and such the stern development, of the feminine character and person, when...

Numb the dark and you numb the light.

No achingJust numbnessSadnessThat feeling as ifU miss himBut then you realized,Maybe he wasn’t yours To begin with.AndThere were no memories To Reminisce,Only pain.Because you knewFrom the very beginningHe didn’t love u as muchAs you loved...

To distort our faces with joy, or wail and weep with sorrow, or collapse in agony, or wallow in sentimentality – wasn’t an inviolable human trait but something we can lose simply by leading dull...

I have outlasted all desire,My dreams and I have grown apart;My grief alone is left entire,The gleamings of an empty heart.The storms of ruthless dispensationHave struck my flowery garland numb,I live in lonely desolationAnd wonder...

MOMENTSI saw you firstYou looked exactly The same as beforeTall and awkward and shyI walked towards youMy hands clammy I felt cold insideMy insides were shakingCant runThis is it.U saw meYour face brightenedA smile painted...