Tao Lin
I like part-time jobs in restaurants.
I can discern that certain things have an effect on certain other things, but I don't view those effects as good or bad. If a context and a goal is defined, I could say if it's good or bad. But overall, I don't view things as good or bad.
I don't view my memory as accurate or static - and, in autobiographical fiction, my focus is still on creating an effect, not on documenting reality - so 'autobiographical,' to me, is closer in meaning to 'fiction' than 'autobiography.'
I don't have a definition for depression. I'm productive, and that's not a sign of depression, right? And I don't have weeks where I don't leave my bed. It seems like depressed people have those.
I don't think I understand the concept of regret. Because if I regret anything, that would mean, like, I hate myself.
I'm not being secretive about anything. I just actually don't have opinions about society.
If I were really rich, I would be flying places, I think.
I haven't written about an immigrant experience because I haven't experienced that before and am focused on existential themes.
I think I've written about family and things in 'Taipei' which could be considered Asian culture.
My first book was poetry, but I didn't write it first. I wrote it third. So my first two books were prose.
If I don't like someone and I start reading their stuff, it seems like my brain will just automatically start criticizing everything that's there. It's really hard to read a book without having all this outside information telling you what to think about it.
A lot of people think I'm a vegan. I'm not.
My face always looks bored or depressed. It's not an accurate impression.
I listen to music almost any time I'm not sleeping, 'hanging out' with specific people, or showering.
I don't have specific music for when I'm writing. I'm usually listening to the same playlist or 'artist' before I arrive at the computer as when I'm walking somewhere after leaving the computer.
I don't think music affects what words I choose to type in what order, within what punctuation, at this point, because I'm rereading and editing each sentence, at this point, in my published books, probably 100-150 times each, on average, and listening to probably 20-60 different songs in that time.
I feel 'proud' whenever I feel that I've worked on something for a certain amount of time with a certain amount of attention. I'm not sure if I think in terms of 'pride' though.
I think it would be funny for people to read in obituaries of me that my major contribution to the arts was the popularization of the phrases 'neutral facial expression' and 'screaming in agony.'
The idea of 'advice,' in terms of telling people advice or asking people for advice, has become not comprehensible to me, to a certain degree, due to feeling, like, for something to be accurately defined as 'good' or 'bad,' I would want to know the context, goal, perspective for it.
I like most any place if I have Internet access.
Patriotism is the belief that not all human lives are worth the same.Collection: Belief
Sometimes an alien would stand with a moose, not because of solidarity, but because of accidentally doing it.Collection: Moose
Life has never died, which is something that I think people ignore.Collection: Thinking
Most people will agree that they would like if they were treated by other people based on what they have concretely done in their life, not what other people have done, with their lives. Focusing on being a person instead of an Asian or an anything seems to promote a worldview that encourages people to treat others based on what each person has specifically done in their life, which seems like it would reduce such things as war, racism, unfairness, "hate crimes".Collection: Hate
Regarding drugs: just the existence of drugs seems troubling to me.Collection: Drug
I actually don't have...opinions. I'm not being secretive about anything. I just actually don't have opinions about society. I can discern that certain things have an effect on certain other things but I don't view those effects as good or bad.Collection: Views
I don't know how to incorporate regret. But I'll say, like, "It affected me that way," "I learned this," "Next time maybe I'll do it differently".Collection: Regret
I don't feel a connection with younger people or with Generation X, or any generation, I feel. If I felt a connection with people my age I wouldn't have written six books about feeling depressed, alienated, lonely. If I did I would have many friends and feel connected with them and probably be a happy person who has a real job.Collection: Lonely
I feel connected with people because of their sense of humor, worldview, and what they think and feel about certain existential issues (things not affected, in my view, by if someone rides a horse or drives a car or talks only IRL or only by typing), not how old they are, what they use to convey what they think and feel about certain existential issues, or if we have both watched the same TV shows or looked at the same websites.Collection: Horse
Do you sometimes look up from the computer and look around the room and know you are alone, I mean really know it, then feel scared ?Collection: Mean
I think everyone is "racist," to differing degrees, in that everyone's brain will automatically associate information with other information, based on the information they are looking at, but I think focusing on race in any manner that isn't neutral or self-aware probably increases racism.Collection: Thinking
I cried when my ex-girlfriend sent me a text message saying how much she liked my present to her.Collection: Girlfriend
If a context and a goal is defined I could say if it's good or bad. But overall I don't view things as good or bad. So I'm like a robot or computer in that sense. So maybe that's why people don't think they know me when they read my writing.Collection: Writing
As a child, she’d always had what she imagined were fascinating thoughts, but didn’t ever say them. Once, as a little girl, at recess, she thought that if she ran very fast at a pole and then caught it and swung quickly around, part of her would keep going, and she would become two girls.Collection: Girl
I can feel the universe expanding and making things be further apart.Collection: Expanding
I don't know what to say about Asians. I think everyone is "racist," to differing degrees, in that everyone's brain will automatically associate information with other information, based on the information they are looking at (for example skin color, bone structure), but I think focusing on race in any manner that isn't neutral or self-aware probably increases racism.Collection: Thinking
I think mostly the commodifying comes after I've done something that has some other value to me.Collection: Thinking
I think I don't view myself as an author. I view myself as a person. I view anything as part of being a person, so I feel okay with "marketing" or other things like that.Collection: Thinking
I just don't feel good if I'm repeating myself.Collection: Feel Good
I don't know what Douglas Coupland thinks about his writing. I've read maybe one page of one of his books and didn't think I was similar to him. But it seems like people just compare you to anyone, pretty much.Collection: Book
I like reading books where people with a lot of money use it to do whatever they want. Like stay in expensive hotels and do whatever drugs they want and fly wherever they want.Collection: Book
does a society exist where it's become acceptable to wear 'helmets' enclosing one's entire head when in public to preempt social interactionCollection: Doe
Novels–and memoirs–are perhaps the most comprehensive reports humans can deliver, of their private experiences, to other humans. In these terms there is only one kind of novel: a human attempt to transfer or convey some part or version of their world of noumenon to another’s world of noumenon.Collection: World
You were one person alive and your brain was encased in a skull. There were other people out there. It took effort to be connected.Collection: Skulls
I think Gmail chats are different than IRL conversations because Gmail chats are saved by Gmail exactly as they occurred. I like texts and emails. Seems like I don't have anything to say that isn't obvious about texts, emails, and Gmail chats.Collection: Thinking
It seems like I'm not [happy]. Because if you look at my tweets and what I think and say, it seems like I'm worried about what's going to happen.Collection: Thinking
It seems like most people will agree that they would like if they were treated by other people based on what they have concretely done in their life, not what other people have done, with their lives.Collection: People
I just keep investing in the future, and I haven't reached the point where I'm not doing that.Collection: Investing
I know Bret Easton Ellis has said he has some amount of empathy for every character he has written about, though, so maybe I am similar to him in terms of that. I'm not sure what he thinks exactly.Collection: Character
If you're, like, a PhD student in English, and you look at each instance that Richard Yates is mentioned in the book...it has sort of it's own narrative that one could analyze and write literary criticism about.Collection: Book