Normality Barometer Quotes

Since we are living in an open society with a space for tolerance and indulgence, we must monitor assiduously the permanent changes of habits and customs and the "normality barometer" should be determined and adjusted, time after time. ("On a doggy day") ~ Erik Pevernagie

There is no normality in life. Having two houses means that we can get out of each other's hair - which, let's face it, we've both got a lot of ~ Helena Bonham Carter

Weird how I can feel so frail and tiny sometimes, and other times so brave and bold and reckless and free, and ... Does everybody feel the same? When people get grown-up, do they always feel grown-up and sensible and sorted out and ... And do I want to feel grown-up? Do I want to stop feeling ... paradoxical, nonsensical? Do I want to stop being crackers? Do I want to be destrangified? O yes, sometimes I want nothing more - but it only lasts a moment, then O I want to be the strangest and crakerest of everybody. ~ David Almond

Sanity is surely not about normality in the statistical sense: it is about an eternal and natural idea of the healthy personality - which indeed may be a rare achievement. ~ Michael Leunig

Money is the barometer of a society's virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion–when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing–when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors–when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don't protect you against them, but protect them against you–when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice–you may know that your society is doomed. Money is so noble a medium that does not compete with guns and it does not make terms with brutality. It will not permit a country to survive as half-property, half-loot ~ Ayn Rand

Green consumerism generally, and 'healthy' products and lifestyles in particular, contain quite precise notions about how an individual should consider his or her well-being. Not only is the market-place celebrated but an understanding of the 'natural body' itself becomes fetishised and idolised. Normality seems to have wholly dispensed with bodily illness and pain. Perfection is the norm, and one that can be gained through acquiring the correct products and perfecting the body. ~ Peter Dickens

Sane is the insanity most people call normality, put forth by society. ~ Erik Till

People say it's madness, Others call it danger, I call it Alternative Normality. ~ Sumeet Mathur

Between normality and madness, which are basically the same thing, there exists an intermediary stage: it is called "being different." And people were becoming more and more afraid of "being different. ~ Paulo Coelho

I'm so far from everything. From normality. From light. From everything I want to be. ~ John Fowles

Desire for normality; a longing to adapt to some recognized and general rule; a wish to be like everyone else, from the moment that being different meant being guilty. ~ Alberto Moravia

Nothing seems crazy when you're used to it. ~ Sarah Silverman

The anorexic body is held in the grip of will alone; its meaning is far from stable. What it says - 'Notice me, feed me, mother me' - is not what it means, for such attentions constitute an agonising test of that will, and also threaten to return the body to the dreaded 'normality' it has been such ecstasy to escape. ~ Rachel Cusk

Everyone has expectations of normality. I just accept that madness is my normality and struggling is madness. ~ Zachary Koukol

She had drawn strength from everyone else's weakness, hoping that her adrenaline-fueled bravery would carry her safely back to normality, ~ Robert Galbraith

As a consequence there are many people who become
neurotic because they are only normal, as there are
people who are neurotic because they cannot become
normal. For the former the very thought that you want
to educate them to normality is a nightmare; their
deepest need is really to be able to lead "abnormal"
lives. ~ C. G. Jung

What I consider to be the barometer for what is a rock artist and what is not, is somebody who has a certain element of blues, even a hint of soul or blues music, derivative of African-American blues, folk, spiritual, or gospel. ~ Ian Astbury

There are those whose own vulgar normality is so apparent and stultifying that they strive to escape it. They affect flamboyant behavior and claim originality according to the fashionable eccentricities of their time. They claim brains or talent or indifference to mores in desperate attempts to deny their own mediocrity. These are frequently artists and performers, adventurers and wide-life devotees.
Then there are those who feel their own strangeness and are terrified by it. They struggle toward normalcy. They suffer to exactly that degree that they are unable to appear normal to others, or to convince themselves that their aberration does not exist. These are true freaks, who appear, almost always, conventional and dull. ~ Katherine Dunn

The only people we can think of as normal are those we don't yet know very well. ~ Alain De Botton

Indeed, one of the functions of the structures of normality is that by making it unnecessary for almost everybody almost all the time to provide justifications for what they are doing or are about to do, they relieve us of what would otherwise be an intolerable burden. ~ Alasdair MacIntyre

Dishtowels are the same as they always were. Sometimes these flashes of normality ~ Margaret Atwood

Along the way I stopped into a coffee shop. All around me normal, everyday city types were going about their normal, everyday affairs. Lovers were whispering to each other, businessmen were poring over spread sheets, college kids were planning their next ski trip and discussing the new Police album. We could have been in any city in Japan. Transplant this coffee shop scene to Yokohama or Fukuoka and nothing would seem out of place. In spite of which
or, rather, all the more because
here I was, sitting in this coffee shop, drinking my coffee, feeling a desperate loneliness. I alone was the outsider. I had no place here.
Of course, by the same token, I couldn't really say I belonged to Tokyo and its coffee shops. But I had never felt this loneliness there. I could drink my coffee, read my book, pass the time of day without any special thought, all because I was part of the regular scenery. Here I had no ties to anyone. Fact is, I'd come to reclaim myself. ~ Haruki Murakami

I prefer not to starve, to live by the practice of medicine, which combines the best features of both science and philosophy with that imponderable and enlightening element, disease, unknown in its normality to either. But, like Pasteur, when he was young, or anyone else who has something to do, I wish I had more money for my literary experiments.
William Carlos Williams, c. 1931 ~ William Carlos Williams

Being a famous writer is a little like being a tall dwarf. You're on the edge of normality. ~ John Updike

The barometer of his emotional nature was set for a spell of riot. ~ James Joyce

I suspect each of us uses the past to prop up the bruised present. It's a clumsy try for the comfort of normality. ~ Adib Khan

Where there is no rest there is energy.
Where there is no disruption there is normality.
Where there is no profit there is bankruptcy.
Where there is no gain there is insolvency.
Where there is no injury there is safety.
Where there is no team there is individuality.
Where there is no hindrance there is opportunity.
Where there is no injury there is safety.
Where there is no sense there is inefficiency.
Where there is no failiure there is competency.
Where there is no decline there is industry.
Where there is no strength there is infirmity.
Where there is no idleness there is activity.
Where there is no weakness there is intensity.
Where there is no failiure there is industry.
Where there is no leadership there is anarchy.
Where there is no repetition there is originality.
Where there is no increase there is deficiency.
Where there is no ignorance there is capacity.
Where there is no impotence there is ability.
Where there is no falseness there is authenticity.
Where there is no excellence there is mediocrity.
Where there is no mistake there is quality.
Where there is no amatuer there is ingenuity.
Where there is no error there is mastery.
Where there is no defect there is virtuosity. ~ Matshona Dhliwayo

The truly fearless think of themselves as normal. ~ Margaret Atwood

There's been times where I've come out of the bullpen thinking I was going to throw a no hitter, and I've lasted two or three innings. So I try not to use my pre-game warm ups as a barometer of how I'm going to pitch. ~ Tim Wakefield

Concepts of triage and medical rationing are a barometer of how those in power in a society value human life. ~ Sheri Fink

Do soldiers feel this, when they get back from a war? The utter weirdness of utter normality. ~ David Mitchell

Normality is the Great Neurosis of civilization. ~ Tom Robbins

Don't go to men who are willing to kill themselves driving in circles looking for normality. ~ James Hunt