Laurence Gonzales > Quotes

“The word 'experienced' often refers to someone who's gotten away with doing the wrong thing more frequently than you have.”
― Laurence Gonzales, Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why

“Survival is the celebration of choosing life over death. We know we're going to die. We all die. But survival is saying: perhaps not today. In that sense, survivors don't defeat death, they come to terms with it.”
― Laurence Gonzales, Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why

“We don't understand the power of nature and the world because we don't live with it. Our environment is designed to sustain us. We are the domestic pets of a human zoo called civilization.”
― Laurence Gonzales, Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why

“But what is the way forward? I know what it isn't. It's not, as we once believed, plenty to eat and a home with all the modern conveniences. It's not a 2,000-mile-long wall to keep Mexicans out or more accurate weapons to kill them. It's not a better low-fat meal or a faster computer speed. It's not a deodorant, a car, a soft drink, a skin cream. The way forward is found on a path through the wilderness of the head and heart---reason and emotion. Thinking, knowing, understanding.”
― Laurence Gonzales, Everyday Survival: Why Smart People Do Stupid Things

“To deal with reality you must first recognize it as such.”
― Laurence Gonzales, Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why

“The summit is not the only place on the mountain.”
― Laurence Gonzales

“The sun beams are always there. The trick is in seeing them.”
― Laurence Gonzales, Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why

“With the illusion that we have dominion over the earth we conclude we have nothing to fear.”
― Laurence Gonzales, Everyday Survival: Why Smart People Do Stupid Things

“I am constantly surrounded by a display of natural wonders...It is beauty surrounded by ugly fear. I write in my log that it's a view of heaven from a seat in hell. (survivor after 53 days at sea)”
― Laurence Gonzales, Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why

“To lose everything at such a glorious eternity is far sweeter than to win by plodding through a cautious, painless, featureless life.”
― Laurence Gonzales, Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why

“Bureaucracies force us to practice nonsense. And if you rehearse nonsense, you may one day find yourself the victim of it.”
― Laurence Gonzales, Everyday Survival: Why Smart People Do Stupid Things