26
" It is hard to believe, but there is something inside of you, no matter how sick and fed up with your sickness you are, that does not want you to heal. It will actually fight you. Sometimes I think of it as a small boy, he said, and laughed. He is there having s good time at your expense and if you get well he worries there will be nothing left to do. No games to play with your sick body, no games to play with your mind. And this little boy will have to be negotiated . [...] if I am well, you must tell him, there will actually be lots more for you to do. More games for you to play, because we will be much stronger. If we are much stronger, we can go more places. We can have more fun. He is an odd little boy, this part of yourself that wants to control you while you are sick. And sometimes we are all charmed by him. That is why sometimes people who are not very sick will suddenly die. They have listened to his voice too long. It is very seductive. "
― Alice Walker , Now Is the Time to Open Your Heart
38
" Do people just wan to get high, fly away from their troubles? Are they trying to knock themselves out? What?
Rick was thoughtful for a moment. They just want to feel normal, he sad. The way they used to feel. They can still remember that feeling, you know, like a sense of home within, and they keep trying to get back to it.
I certainly understand that, said Lalika. Sometimes I feel like if I can’t get back to the wholeness of myself I’d rather be dead. I feel like being dead might even approximate that feeling, you know, of being one with myself again, of being whole. "
― Alice Walker , Now Is the Time to Open Your Heart