But all too many adolescents in all to many cultures never passed through Chaos at all. They were born, they were acculturated, they were schooled, they took up their adult stations in life, passed through an ill-defined period of mid-life angst, resigned themselves to old age, and died, without ever walking the Yellow Brick Road, indeed without ever understanding what it was that they had missed in their lives.

from Child of Fortune
by Norman Spinrad

Man is the animal that holds up a mirror to himself. If he does this in an entirely honest way, it is a great achievement.

Ernest Becker