What people valued, economically, merely reflected what they believed to be important. This meant that real motivation had to lie in the domain of value, of morality.

— Jordan B. Peterson, Maps of Meaning

The financial success of the happiness industry relies heavily on the idea that circumstances matter little, that we are in complete control of our own mental state and can simply choose to upgrade it at will.

— Ruth Whippman, American the Anxious

If what you believe doesn’t depend on what you see, you’ve been blinded as effectively as by poking out your eyeballs.

— Eliezer Yudkowsky, Maps and Territory

…maturity is being able to hold two contradictory messages in your head at the same time.

— Grayson Perry, The Descent of Man

…anytime you face a difficult decision, you should have no less than 40% and no more than 70% of the information you need to make that decision. In that range, you have enough information to make an informed choice but not so much intelligence that you lose your resolve and simply stay abreast of the situation. This makes you faster than more “informed” people and more informed than “fast” people.

— Peter Hollins, Mental Models