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About this quote

What does it mean?
The speaker builds emotional walls, rejecting friendship and love as sources of pain.
In plain terms
He builds a fortress to avoid painful friendships.
What can you take from it?
Opening up can be risky but may prevent isolation.

Where it applies

  • mental health
  • interpersonal relationships

Putting it to work

  • therapy
  • social support groups

Questions to consider

  • What drives people to build emotional walls?
  • How can one safely lower those walls?

Another view

Self‑isolation can worsen mental health.

More from Paul Simon

  1. I am a rock. I am an island.

    Permalink to quote #16
  2. If I never loved I never would have cried.

    Permalink to quote #18
  3. A winter's day In a deep and dark December I am alone.

    Permalink to quote #15

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