Ken > Ken's Quotes

“It turns out that your life really does flash before your eyes during those final few moments. I thought that was just a myth designed to make dying seem more entertaining.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“Time disconnects from physical reality during periods of great joy, immense pain, and, as I was discovering, impending death.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“While conscious thoughts are self-forgiving, life-flashes, as I was also discovering, are raw and unfiltered. I envisioned instances when had been selfish, kind, petulant, generous, and emotionally careless, but mostly I saw myself as having been inattentive, not absent-minded, more in the sense of being oblivious.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“My mind was flashing, non-chronologically, through prior experiences in rapid fire succession. Good, bad and indifference were all jumbled into a sudden awareness that so many of my actions had been based on vanity, pride, or selfishness. I had lived a life of gratification without consequences. Such actions take on a different level of importance when you realize that they may define you for eternity.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“Confidence that your misdeeds and mistakes will be forgiven or forgotten is empowering and enabling. My mind flashed on times when an off-hand remark caused a hurt of which I was not even aware or at least pretended to not be aware.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“It is those moments when you’re existence is vacillating between the physicality of your body and the unearthly state of pure consciousness that your mind becomes uncontrollably and uncomfortably free.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“I tried to get off the phone quickly as I had a pounding headache and couldn’t stop thinking about why, if Jesus was going to save me, he couldn’t have made the wave break a little closer to shore and save me from what had been a wholly unpleasant experience.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“I pressed on, “Perhaps our life is constantly flashing before our eyes, but it’s only when we think our time is up that we actually pay attention.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“It was like a mental filter had been turned off. I saw my own thoughts and actions with a new unwelcome insight, devoid of the comforting delusion that normally softens our perceptions of our actions and true motives.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“Futures don’t usually reveal themselves in flashed visions; they unfold over time.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“It’s unnerving to foresee consequences, to know the cause, and yet to have no ability to prevent them from happening. It was like reliving the swirling action of being pummeled by the wave with both mind and body beyond my control.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“I had gotten caught up in a culture that champions individualism and self-determination, which often find their expression in oblivion to other people’s feelings and circumstances. Individualism, while admirable in some respects, is often at odds with empathy and social awareness.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“I prided myself on living in the moment. ‘carpe diem’, ‘go for the gusto’, ‘take the opportunity’, mantra level stuff for a testosterone fueled 18 year old surfer.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“That’s why I liked him. He saw the world with a simplistic clarity. The big questions don’t often lend themselves to rational inquiry. They are usually best left to rattle around in your head.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“Unspecified angst is a silent killer that targets the overly thoughtful and the inherently ungrounded. Drew was ungrounded because his self-perception was dependent on the opinions of people over which he had no control.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“Honesty may be the best policy, but it’s rarely the most welcomed.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“Father-son relationships are particularly tricky as each must grow and mature in sync”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“I had been raised to not fret, fear, or think of the future. The future was in God’s hands, but one crashing wave had tossed me out of the garden, and the salt water was as bitter as the bite of an apple from the tree of knowledge. My curse, however, was seeing life with an unwanted clarity.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“Extraordinary insight is neither a gift nor a blessing; it’s a malady of the mind.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“The human brain is not capable of absorbing things beyond what the senses reveal and the human mind is usually not capable of conceiving of things beyond the boundaries of logical cognition.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“Future blindness absolves us from accountability. A consequence realized long after the cause has been forgotten is easily attributable to bad luck or injustice. Our predisposition for short-sightedness also, however, relieves unethical actors from culpability.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“Seeing the world without the protective shade of bias, self-forgiveness, and delusion subjects one to judgement by the angriest of gods, raw unforgiving truth.”
― Ken Elmgren, Our Name is Joe: Let the Disinfo Battles Begin

“After my first book, Imagine, was met with the thunderous silence of an asteroid collision in a galaxy far beyond human perception, I fell into a state of disheartening introspection. To my surprise, I learned more about my world and myself from people's’ reactions to the book than I did from writing it.”
― Ken Elmgren, Truths and Their Consequences: Imagine a world where acknowledgment of cause and effect drives decisions, actions, and accepted truths

“Those individuals burdened with the gift of diversity whether gender identity, race, or neuro and those otherwise possessed by an overly reflective mind develop an emotional mask to hide the introspection that their diversity forces upon them. Sometimes it’s humor, sometimes it’s introversion, but most often it’s self-deprecation.”
― Ken Elmgren, Truths and Their Consequences: Imagine a world where acknowledgment of cause and effect drives decisions, actions, and accepted truths

“The only thing of which we are certain is death, and religions have convinced us that even death can be denied.”
― Ken Elmgren, Truths and Their Consequences: Imagine a world where acknowledgment of cause and effect drives decisions, actions, and accepted truths

“I dubbed the current age as being characterized by ‘Convenient Delusionism’ wherein people are willing to believe in things which are false or misleading when believing such things is more agreeable or convenient than facing a more fact-based concept of reality.”
― Ken Elmgren, Truths and Their Consequences: Imagine a world where acknowledgment of cause and effect drives decisions, actions, and accepted truths

“People value certainty over truth, which is convenient because certainty, a state of mind, is easily attainable, truth is more elusive. Certainty is merely being certain about what you choose to believe, truth requires verification and universality.”
― Ken Elmgren, Imagine: An Inquiry into Spirituality, Political Economics, and Personal Autonomy in a Modern World

“Certainty may be found in the belief in a Supernatural god, in Dharmic Celestial Laws, in the scientific Laws of Nature, or through Introspection. Introspection is the most difficult, the most uncertain, and the one least pursued.”
― Ken Elmgren, Imagine: An Inquiry into Spirituality, Political Economics, and Personal Autonomy in a Modern World

“People’s need for certainty is greatest when certainty is most scarce. During periods of overwhelming complexity, even the most implausible sources of certainty will be embraced if they are able to provide psychological closure. Verification and universality become casualties of expediency.”
― Ken Elmgren, Imagine: An Inquiry into Spirituality, Political Economics, and Personal Autonomy in a Modern World

“People need to feel significant and have a sense of Purpose despite each of us being one of 7.9 billion humans and having an average lifespan of a mere 0.025% of the 300,000 years since the first homo sapient roamed the earth. Achieving significance is increasingly difficult. Jesus, at birth, was one of 200 million people. I was one of 2.7 billion. When my kids are my age, they will each be one of 10 billion.”
― Ken Elmgren, Imagine: An Inquiry into Spirituality, Political Economics, and Personal Autonomy in a Modern World