John S. Hall Quotes

56 Sourced Quotes

The task that lies before me is daunting and the rewards are uncertain. I should probably let someone else do it.

John S. Hall
Life is so much easier today than it was a hundred years ago. People used to have to work on farms from sun-up to sun-down, and still their children would die, and there often wouldn't be enough to eat. I wouldn't have lasted three days under such conditions. I have no right to be alive.

John S. Hall
Today, life will offer me many lessons. I will learn nothing.

John S. Hall
There is no better feeling than the feeling that I have done something right. That feeling comes so rarely and is so fleeting that I can never really enjoy it. So in a way, it's not a good feeling at all.

John S. Hall
When the [Mystical Shit] CD first started to take shape, I was very unsure about what was happening—I wasn't sure I liked what these guys were coming up with. I missed Dogbowl's melodies, and I didn't like that it was loud. But other people seemed to like it a lot, and at that time, that was important to me, so I went with it. As time went by, I started to appreciate the oddity of me in a rock band. Unfortunately, I didn't really embrace the idea fully until that band had broken up. Nowadays, I can look back and think it was fun and funny that I was in a rock band, but at the time, it bothered me a lot and I complained about it all the time, but I lacked the moral character to do anything about it.

John S. Hall
My father was a really great man. I'll never forget the last thing he ever said to me. Nor will I ever repeat it.

John S. Hall
There will always be people who have power over me, who can destroy my spirit and drain my soul. My best defense is to behave as if I have no soul, to act as if my spirit has already been crushed. Perhaps then, I will be left alone or ignored.

John S. Hall
The fact that many people overindulge, and lose themselves in excess, and make fools of themselves and act like idiots, is no reason for me to do these things. The reason for me to do these things is that I, too, am an idiot.

John S. Hall
I think it is considered bad to be clever, because I think people usually assume that a clever person or a clever band doesn't have substance, doesn't really care about anything. People want music that matters, that believes in something, I think, whether it expresses anger or despair or love. People want to believe that their artists are portraying emotions that they really feel. And I think that's true of Patsy Cline, Johnny Rotten, whoever you want to name. If you believe the artist, you're going to go for it.

John S. Hall
Tonight, I should watch the sun set, and think of the impending darkness as a metaphor for my wasted life: once it was bright, and full of potential, and now it is dark and hopeless and bleak. I should not make the mistake of thinking that the moon and the stars represent slim glimmers of hope, or evidence that there is light on the other side. Even if there is light somewhere I will never walk in it again.

John S. Hall
I think these are some of the common themes [of my work]: a) life is hard, brutal, capricious and unfair, b) sometimes there is a benefit to seeing it clearly, and acknowledging it truthfully..., and c) other times it is best to find something to laugh about, lest despair crush one completely. I find a lot of humor in shocking or so-called taboo things: castration, excrement, violence (usually self-inflicted or inflicted on the narrator, "[Martin] Scorsese" being an exception), sex and sexual perversions... etc.

John S. Hall
When my mind is operating at its peak, it should depress me to think that this is the best I can do, because it's not very good at all. When my mind is operating normally, I should be even more depressed.

John S. Hall
Gary and Melissa loved to make love, loved to make love, loved to make love to each other over and over and over again. For the first few weeks of their relationship, they made love four or five times a night. They were really turned on for a while. Then, to heighten their passion, they bought sex books: The Joy of Sex, The Sensuous Couple, The Joy of Sex Part Two, The Kama Sutra, Even Yet Still More Joy of Sex, Popular Mechanics, Betty Crocker, anything.

John S. Hall
If most of us were wind up-toys, could we trust the few of us that weren't to wind us up when necessary? I think not. We would be a separate oppressed minority. Even if we were in the majority, it would still be that way. The ones that weren't wind-up toys would have the upper hand, and we would have to look out for each other, because they wouldn't.

John S. Hall
Today, I should think of something about myself that really annoys me, and I should try to change it. Then, when I fail to change it, I can be annoyed by that as well. Then, I can be annoyed about how easily I get annoyed. Then I can get angry.

John S. Hall
Look. I'd be the first to admit that I don't have an ounce of common sense, but I think people should be fucking in the streets. Assfucking. Especially women fucking men in the ass with dildos. What this country needs is a lot more sodomy. Because there are a lot of crises a-coming: global warming as we rape Alaska for oil, the return of coathanger abortions, downward economic spirals, nuclear terrorism, the reemergence of "Burn the motherfucker down," "Fuck the police," "Blow it all up and let's start all over again"—it will be a dark and frightening time. And our retarded president will offer little solace or hope. If you think things cannot get any worse, you have no imagination and no sense of history.

John S. Hall
It seems, in theory, that I should be able to control at least a few of my bad habits. The problem is that my habits make me depressed, and the depression makes me want to indulge my habits and so I do. There isn't any solution to this.

John S. Hall
I'm a vegetarian now, but I'm willing to make an exception in the event I'm presented with people. Because I've always been fairly standoffish; I have this tendency not to get to know people very well. And I don't think there is any better way to get to know humanity than to ingest it.

John S. Hall
I can't make people change, and I can't change myself. I can't change the political climate, or fix the myriad problems of the world, or make anyone else happy. When I think about these things, I feel impotent and sad. When I don't think about them, I am running away from the truth. Either way I lose.

John S. Hall
Why don't I have enough money? The answer is obvious. Money is how people are measured. What you are worth is what you are worth. The reason I am not worth very much is because I am not worth very much. Nothing could be simpler.

John S. Hall
Whenever the circus would come to town, I would tell Ethan all kinds of kinky clown domination stories involving the leather clown, like the time she forced me to have sex with her in the little car, or the time she kept spraying me with the seltzer bottle until I obeyed her every command. Ethan and I would laugh and laugh at these tall tales, but I could tell deep down, he was wondering whether the leather clown was really real or not. And I would let him wonder.

John S. Hall
Today, I will try to remember to regret the past. I will think of how many mistakes I have made throughout my life. I will say to myself, "If only I could go back in time and make different choices, so that my life could be the way it should have been." Then I will remind myself that I cannot.

John S. Hall
It may seem sometimes that the whole world is against me and the reason I have failed in life is because of fate—that I was destined to fail, and there was nothing I could have done. But that's not true. There was plenty I could have done. Why didn't I do something?

John S. Hall
I have tried very hard to find meaning in what I do, but I have found instead a vast and limitless nothingness. I tried to embrace the nothingness, but it slipped through my grasp, and now there is nothing where the nothingness was. This may sound meaningful, but it isn't.

John S. Hall
I am not well suited to the tasks that are set before me today. Most of what I must do is either insulting to my intelligence, or far beyond my capabilities. This explains why I am so frustrated and full of rage most of the time.

John S. Hall
Many people talk as if they have all the answers, whereas I know I don't. That's probably why no one listens to me.

John S. Hall
You are responsible for all of your successes, and the lack thereof. And that is the essential point that failure, your ever-faithful friend, wants to make: that your failure could not exist without you—without your stupidity, without your lies, without your mistakes, your uselessness, your lack of faith, your ineptitude, your unjustifiable confidence in your alleged abilities, you stupid loser—failure is your only friend. Failure is your only lover. Failure is your only hope.

John S. Hall
A tree does not try to be a koala bear. A dog does not try to be a bird. A stone does not pretend it is alive. Why should I pretend I am intelligent, or good-looking, or successful?

John S. Hall
It is extremely unlikely that I will ever be one of the richest people in the world. Almost all rich people were born rich, and almost all of them marry other rich people, and almost all of them hold onto almost all of their money, to pass on to their kids. Money doesn't appear out of nowhere—the more they have, the less for me. Life is a "zero sum game," and I am the zero.

John S. Hall
You know what's a good food? Avocados. They fucking rule. Fucking avocados. I'm so there if it's gonna be avocados, I'm there. If I can have that with avocado, I'm gonna order it with avocado. That's my way. I'm like, yes to avocado. Yes. Yes, yes.

John S. Hall