People try to get away from it all—to the country, to the beach, to the mountains. You always wish that you could too. Which is idiotic: you can get away from it anytime you like. By going within. Nowhere you can go is more peaceful—more free of interruptions—than your own soul. (Hays translation)

People look for retreats for themselves, in the country, by the coast, or in the hills, when it is possible for you to retreat into yourself any time you want.

People usually escape from their troubles into the future; they draw an imaginary line across the path of time, a line beyond which their current troubles cease to exist.

The destination was not really the point. The true desire was to get away — to go, as he concluded, ‘anywhere! anywhere! so long as it is out of the world!

Why do you go away? So that you can come back. So that you can see the place you came from with new eyes and extra colors. And the people there see you differently, too. Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving.

People will do anything, no matter how absurd, to avoid facing their own souls.

I don't understand why we must do things in this world, why we must have friends and aspirations, hopes and dreams. Wouldn't it be better to retreat to a faraway corner of the world, where all its noise and complications would be heard no more? Then we could renounce culture and ambitions; we would lose everything and gain nothing; for what is there to be gained from this world?

To escape from the world means that one's mind is not concerned with the opinions of the world.

The urge to escape from selfhood and the environment is in almost everyone almost all the time.

Whether a person is spiritual or not, we all seek to get away from the stress, anger, and anxiety of everyday life. Some people drink, do drugs, or do worse to escape, and they hurt themselves in the process. Some people listen to music, mine included, and feel better.

One can run away from anything but oneself.

To get away from one's working environment is; in a sense, to get away from one's self; and this is often the chief advantage of travel and change.

People have learned to escape reality very well but too often lose their way back.

I wanted to go away, in the midst of something entirely different,