By the Power of Inertia

Sometimes you make up your mind about something without knowing why, and your decision persists by the power of inertia. Every year it gets harder to change.

The longing for Paradise is man's longing not to be man.

Meaning of Darkness

That darkness was pure, perfect, thoughtless, visionless; that darkness was without end, without borders; that darkness was the infinite we each carry within us. (Yes, if you're looking for infinity, just close your eyes!)

...Franz himself disintegrated and dissolved into the infinity of his darkness, himself becoming infinite... But for her, darkness did not mean infinity; for her, it meant a disagreement with what she saw, the negation of what was seen, the refusal to see. 

More from The Unbearable Lightness...

Human life occurs only once, and the reason we cannot determine which of our decisions are good and which bad is that in any given situation we can make only one decision; we are not granted a second, third, or fourth life in which to compare various decisions.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

The goals we pursue are always veiled. A girl who longs for marriage longs for something she knows nothing about. The boy who hankers after fame has no idea what fame is. The thing that gives our every move its meaning is always totally unknown to us. Sabina was unaware of the goal that lay behind her longing to betray. The unbearable lightness of being--was that the goal?

A Short Dictionary of Misunderstood Words (From TULoB)

WOMAN

Being a woman is a fate Sabina did not choose. What we have not chosen we cannot consider either our merit or our failure. Sabina believed that she had to assume the correct attitude to her unchosen fate. To rebel against being born a woman seemed as foolish to her as to take pride in it.

Vertigo, the desire to fall, the intoxication of the weak

Anyone whose goal is "something higher" must expect some day to suffer vertigo. What is vertigo? Fear of falling? Then why do we feel it even when the observation tower comes equipped with a sturdy handrail? No, vertigo is something other than the fear of falling. It is the voice of the emptiness below us which tempts and lures us, it is the desire to fall, against which, terrified, we defend ourselves.

 ...
We might also call vertigo the intoxication of the weak. Aware of his weakness, a man decides to give in rather than stand up to it. He is drunk with weakness, wishes to grow even weaker, wishes to fall in the middle of the main square in front of everybody, wishes to be down, lower than down.

Fear of dreams

She looked at him with love in her eyes, but she feared the night ahead, feared her dreams. Her life was split. Both day and night were competing for her.

Laws of Beauty (from 'The Unbearable Lightness...')

Without realizing it, the individual composes his life according to the laws of beauty even in times of greatest distress.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

If eternal return is the heaviest of burdens, then our lives can stand out against it in all their splendid lightness.
...
Conversely, the absolute absence of a burden causes man to be lighter than air, to soar into the heights, take leave of the earth and his earthly being, and become only half real, his movements as free as they are insignificant.