Character Disturbance Quotes

“Aggressive characters don’t just disregard the truth, they’re at war with it. Truth is the great equalizer, and aggressive personalities always want to maintain a position of advantage. So, they deliberately play very fast and loose with the truth when they’re not flat out lying. They don’t want you to “have their number.” That upsets the balance of power. So, they’re usually about the business of conning and duping you. And because they want to have advantage over you, they often lie in subtle and sophisticated ways, carefully managing your impression of them and manipulating you through deception. Their lying is so pervasive and automatic, they will lie even when the truth would do just fine; except lying keeps the con game going, which they perceive as maintaining the position of advantage. Also, the lying takes so many forms it’s almost impossible to count them all.”
― George K. Simon Jr., Character Disturbance: The Phenomenon of Our Age

“As adherents to A.A. precepts know, there are many ways to conceive of a higher power. For the humanist, one needs to respect the collective “greater good” of society. For the non-deist scientist it might be recognizing the nature and complexity of the physical universe that leads to humbly identifying oneself as a relatively insignificant character in a grand cosmic drama. Most of us have a deep, abiding sense that there is something bigger than us.”
― George K. Simon Jr., Character Disturbance: The Phenomenon of Our Age