A friend recently gave me a book by Doris Lessing. Not one of her fiction. Rather a collection of essays entitled ‘Prisons we choose to live inside.’  I have three powerful reasons to read this book. One, the friend who gave it to me. Two, Doris Lessing. Three, the title itself!

There are gems in this book – that demands to be read slowly – that I’ll be sharing.

Here’s the first:  “This is a time when it is frightening to be alive, when it is hard to think of human beings as rational creatures. Everywhere we look we see brutality, stupidity, until it seems that there is nothign else to be seen but that – a descent into barbarism, everywhere, which we are unable to check.  But I think that while it is true there is a general worsening, it is precisely because things are so frightening we become hypnotized, and do not notice — or if we notice, belittle — equally strong forces on the other side, the forces, in short, of reason, sanity, and civilization.”

Much to think about.