Oli Anderson > Quotes

“Only ever doing what feels comfortable is a form of suicide.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“I decided to give up meaningless sex, but then I remembered that everything is meaningless.”
― Oli Anderson

“If you don’t accept yourself, you can’t transcend yourself and the world: first, you need to increase your awareness, then you need to accept what you learn, then you need to take action.”
― Oli Anderson, Shadow Life: Freedom from Bullshit in an Unreal World

“Your Shadow is all of the things, 'positive' and 'negative', that you’ve denied about yourself and hidden beneath the surface of the mask you forgot that you’re wearing.”
― Oli Anderson, Shadow Life: Freedom from Bullshit in an Unreal World

“Having problems doesn't make you noble or virtuous, it makes you human. Nobility and virtue comes from the way that you handle your problems and either learn to move past them or live with them if out of your control.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“This world is your world but that doesn't mean you can always stop it from burning.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“Unleash in the right time and place before you explode at the wrong time and
place.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“The first step to empathy and compassion is realising the similarities between yourself and those that are suffering; the first step to forgiveness is realising that we're all human and we all share the same capacity for fallibility and foible; the first step to growth is to recognise the value of things that are outside your current mental frameworks so that you can grow into them.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“Familiarity breeds contempt, for others at first, but then inwardly, contempt towards ourselves.”
― Oli Anderson, Synchronesia: A Depressing Existential Novel

“The Ego is the ‘thing’ that you’ve created to keep hiding from your Shadow, convinced that it’s all the ‘light’ or ‘good’ things about you – when in reality, the ego is neither ‘good’ nor ‘bad’ because it’s totally unreal.”
― Oli Anderson, Shadow Life: Freedom from Bullshit in an Unreal World

“Life is for those that deserve it. Those kings amongst men who can climb out of barrels and will dare to break through glass walls and to transcend all of this whatever it is, these eyes to the ground, this pretence, acting only as is expected and never as is intended. We have been told what is acceptable in what situation and so we take heed. This is not living. In the real world, in nature, there is no need to pretend. There is no place for it.”
― Oli Anderson, Synchronesia: A Depressing Existential Novel

“Idealism + Inaction = Depression”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“Life is too short for unreality and you don’t owe anybody anything - especially your time, energy, and attention.”
― Oli Anderson, Shadow Life: Freedom from Bullshit in an Unreal World

“Nobody is going to save you but yourself and the ‘best’ and only way to do so is
through action.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“There are two types of 'busy': 1)
Constantly distracting yourself from what is true. 2) Constantly working to create something real.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“If humans created it then it is the product of a choice that somebody made. And if it was chosen it can be changed.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“The Shadow Life is real life but it can only be for those who don’t deny the truth about themselves, the world, and reality by becoming AWARE, cultivating unconditional ACCEPTANCE, and talking real ACTION.”
― Oli Anderson, Shadow Life: Freedom from Bullshit in an Unreal World

“If we go in to each situation that life throws at us with an attitude that we can
learn from it then we will never be truly defeated.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“We have to accept that much of reality is ineffable and so to understand it we can't rely on words alone.”
― Oli Anderson, Dialogue / Ego - Real Communication

“Debate is an attempt to cling to the illusion of control provided by a point of view designed to keep the ego in place; dialogue is an attempt to dance with the unknown at the risk of losing what we think we know.”
― Oli Anderson, Dialogue / Ego - Real Communication

“When one dream dies we replace it with another.”
― Oli Anderson, Synchronesia: A Depressing Existential Novel

“The human condition is essentially the conflict between the human need for control and a universe that provides little if any of it. Once we accept this and get into the flow of life, we are free and, paradoxically, able to get better results.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“Whenever we find ourselves stuck, whenever we find ourselves lost or confused by the chaos of the world, we can be sure that the only way to free ourselves is to take action of some kind. Action is the only thing that ever changes anything and in a world that ever changes, it is the best way to keep ourselves in the flow of the world unfolding.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“Practicing dialogue helps you to cultivate a realness that allows you to face reality on its own terms, not just the terms you’d like it to have in order to remain in your comfort zone.”
― Oli Anderson, Dialogue / Ego - Real Communication

“Acceptance is an active response to a temporary situation; surrender is a passive reaction to a situation that you think will last forever.
-Personal Revolutions”
― Oli Anderson

“One of the most human things that you can do is reach out for the stars knowing that you might not ever touch them; we are all perfectly imperfect, but to live knowing so is to be a fulfilled human being.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“The final lesson is that 'reality' is always the way to go and that acceptance is the only way to get there.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“Refuse to waste time trying to convince yourself that you don't have time, when you could be using that time to actually 'do' it.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness

“Self-destruction and self-sabotage are often just the start of the self-resurrection process.”
― Oli Anderson, Shadow Life: Freedom from Bullshit in an Unreal World

“Don't cling to your self-concept purely because your will demands it. Demand that your environment aligns as much as possible and change what you must about yourself when the outer world can’t be changed. Mental health is about mental fluidity, mental illness stems in rigidity.”
― Oli Anderson, Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness