“True friends may only speak several times a year and visit even less. But when life's challenges leave one of them vulnerable and in need of compassion, time and distance are no obstacles.”
― The Happiness Tree: Grow Your Happiness by Cultivating a Healthy, Creative and Purposeful Life
― The Happiness Tree: Grow Your Happiness by Cultivating a Healthy, Creative and Purposeful Life
“She was almost in love with him. No, that’s impossible, she thought: either you are or you aren’t. Love’s the only thing in this world that is unequivocal. There are different kinds of love, certainly, but it’s a you-do or you-don’t proposition with them all." (Chapter 1)”
― Go Set a Watchman
― Go Set a Watchman
“People are supossed to aspire to become their fathers, not shudder at the thought.”
― Allegiant
― Allegiant
“Prejudice, a dirty word, and faith, a clean one, have something in common: they both begin where reason ends.”
― Go Set a Watchman
― Go Set a Watchman
“Empathy isn't just something that happens to us - a meteor shower of synapses firing across the brain - it's also a choice we make: to pay attention, to extend ourselves. It's made of exertion, that dowdier cousin of impulse. Sometimes we care for another because we know we should, or because it's asked for, but this doesn't make our caring hollow. This confession of effort chafes against the notion that empathy should always rise unbidden, that genuine means the same thing as unwilled, that intentionality is the enemy of love. But I believe in intention and I believe in work. I believe in waking up in the middle of the night and packing our bags and leaving our worst selves for our better ones.”
― The Empathy Exams
― The Empathy Exams
Bassem’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Bassem’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
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