The greatest form of indifference is the annihilation of the very concept of indifference itself.
The greatest form of indifference is the annihilation of the very concept of indifference itself.
―
Atrona Grizel
As a typical
perception, when someone is called “Western,” the mind conjures an image of a
person who is scientific, intellectual, rational, questioning, and innovative.
“Eastern,” on the other hand, is portrayed as reactionary, religious, bigoted,
closed-minded, and traditional. In my mind, however, what emerges is this: the
Westerner, constrained by the narrowness of their perspective, is an arrogant
lover of money and pleasure, while the Easterner is an ascetic priest
possessing inner depth and bearing spiritual resilience.
―
Atrona Grizel
I have seen what
those who managed to escape from North Korea ended up becoming: faces covered
in makeup, body parts filled with Botox, dyed hair, tattoos on their arms,
rings on their hands, piercings in their navels, and underneath it all,
American denim jeans. And most importantly: a social personality, a language
shaped by internet diction, a Western-style slur fetishism, and an empty
existence in pursuit of pleasure and comfort. Seeing this instinctive
animality, I can understand why they defect from the Democratic People’s
Republic.
―
Atrona Grizel
Total systems
offer something liberal modernity cannot: existential weight. They say: “This
is the world. Take it or be crushed.” Because they do not pretend to be gentle,
which is key for reality-building.
―
Atrona Grizel
I am drawn not to
absence, but to what follows the annihilation of that which once existed. I
prefer not the world where humans have never existed, but the world after
humans have gone extinct. The ruins of the system that was built are frozen in
time, yet the system itself is gone: this is the greatest bliss. For only then
will I touch the sunlight seeping through the ruins and set off on an adventure
as free as a bird, as I come from the post-collapse—I can have no mission in a
world that still believes in itself.
―
Atrona Grizel
When thoughts
cease to be confined to certain places, one adopts a cosmic perspective—no
longer focusing merely on surroundings or the world itself, but on the entire
universe. In this vastness, temporariness and tininess are found, and thus an
odd sense of solace emerges.
―
Atrona Grizel
The deepest smiles
begin with the deepest wounds—like flowers blooming from shattered concrete,
like scars laughing at knives.
―
Atrona Grizel
Whoever I address
looks to me like monkeys with whom I am trying to communicate in vain,
including all those “great minds.” When I tell people honestly that I simply
make do with them rather than being in a deep relationship, they immediately
withdraw and, in their own way, punish my frankness. Yet I can only settle for
humans. I can do nothing else with them; they are unbelievably low as species.
―
Atrona Grizel
Whoever does not
fill their days with thoughts of death should not have the right to live.
―
Atrona Grizel
Whenever
someone—whoever it may be—expresses their thoughts about something—whatever it
may be—my first reaction is not agreement or disagreement, but a reflexive urge
to burst into laughter inside.
―
Atrona Grizel
For a Christian,
the true religion is Christianity; for a Muslim, it is Islam; for a Buddhist,
it is Buddhism; or for a Shintoist, it is Shintoism. But the most important
point to pay attention to is that a Christian will almost always emerge in
lands where Christianity is dominant, just as others do. That is why these
faiths are more cultural absorption than independent choice.
―
Atrona Grizel
In a city, one
lives in such a way that if something is missed, even for just a second, there
may never be another chance to have it again. For example, one must be at the
bus stop before the bus arrives, or else it won’t be seen for a long time. Or,
if late for a meeting, it is not just the meeting that’s lost, but the ripple
effect that follows: another delay, another wait. When the day is packed with
moments like these—where each second demands attention—there is almost no
possibility of simply being. The city forces people into a constant state of
urgency, making them live reactively rather than reflectively. The clock never
stops, for this is its nature; even if cities are not intentionally designed
this way, they are doomed to be so. Even the remaining free time is swallowed
by the noise of machines, phones, conversations, and the constant pull to move
and do. There is no space for peace and silence amidst the constant obligation
to act and execute, and thus no room for contemplation.
―
Atrona Grizel
The person just
beyond arm’s reach as one passes by on the street is not a concern; unknown to
one, unknown to them. In cities, the individual is insignificant.
―
Atrona Grizel
Everyone has had
and has thought of killing someone, but very few have actually done it. So,
where does this feeling go? Nowhere.
―
Atrona Grizel
To be among
people is like being at a masquerade ball. Crazy people are “crazy” simply because
they attend this ball without a mask.
―
Atrona Grizel
I have the
ability to create feeling out of nothingness. Because to extract nobility from
the superficiality that is occupying everywhere, I have to invent the sun with
my own hands every day just to keep myself warm. When I speak of creating
feeling, I mean that emotions are formed from me, not I from emotions. For
example, someone may have said something, but I can deliberately or
inadvertently perceive it in a different way, and my reaction may change
accordingly. If that person insulted me, I might see it not as derogatory but
as a joke, and believe this with complete sincerity. Thus, my reaction would be
laughter, not anger. In other words, everything depends not on what is said but
on what I hear being said. Whatever I want to see a thing as, that’s what it
becomes, and this is my mystical power. Flat people who experience events as
they are are prisoners of experiences. But for me, imagination ceases to be
imagination, bending reality and taking its place, becoming reality itself.
This is not “delusion” but sovereignty of interpretation; it is the most inward
and most subjective way of living existence. It’s the recognition that the raw
data of life arrive as empty noise until they are filtered, framed, and
ultimately authored by a consciousness—me.
―
Atrona Grizel
As if committing
a crime, I “commit thought.”
―
Atrona Grizel
Cities are no
different from massive prisons: places dominated by turmoil and chaos, where
temporary pleasures and amusements are clung to merely as a way to hold on to
life; where inmates devour and fight each other for some hollow sense of
entertainment; where they passively or actively obey every given order; where
they spend all their days within colorless, gray, concrete walls—without
freedom, without genuine engagement—simply because this is their only choice.
The only way out is to wait for the “sentence” to end—or to choose the
ultimate, shortest escape: suicide. People have been forcibly confined here,
like prisoners serving time. Being here was not their choice, so why are they
even here?
―
Atrona Grizel
Sometimes I wish
I could not calm myself, so that I could feel the desire and impulse to end my
life, but I cannot. No matter what I experience, as soon as I return to
solitude, I pull myself together. It is like entering a portal: when I withdraw
into seclusion, I change dimensions and find the strength to deal with any
pain. If I wanted to commit suicide, I would have to consciously learn how to
make myself suicidal, because no impulse has authority over me.
―
Atrona Grizel
My solitude
functions as a kind of “reset button” that renders everything that came before
it ineffective. That is to say, as long as I am with people, the only thing I
think about is getting away from them as soon as possible and returning to my
solitude, to my home. And when I return, I do not even remember what I
experienced outside; as I get lost in my inner world once more, these things
remain only in theory. The danger is not that toxicity enters my life, but that
nothing external can survive for long in my inner world. This is not
repression, but mastery. Defensive adaptation taken to an extreme.
― Atrona Grizel