And you have treasures hidden within you – extraordinary treasures – and so do I, and so does everyone around us. And bringing those treasures to light takes work and faith and focus and courage and hours of devotion, and the clock is ticking, and the world is spinning, and we simply do not have time anymore to think so small.
His penmanship was shamefully crabbed. Each sentence was a crowded village of capital letters and small letters, living side by side in tight misery, crawling up on one another as though trying to escape the page.
She’s a cheerful soul who’s having a wonderful time living out the existence that best suits her nature and most brings her to life.
I’ve heard it said that prayer is the act of talking to God, while meditation is the act of listening.
Though I suppose people do reproduce sometimes for that reason – for insurance against later regret.
I used to think the 109th bead was an emergency spare. Like the extra button on a fancy sweater, or the youngest son in a royal family.
My desire to work – my desire to engage with my creativity as intimately and as freely as possible – is my strongest personal incentive to fight back against pain, by any means necessary, and to fashion a life for myself that is as sane and healthy and stable as it can possibly be. But.
I pause here for a moment to explain exactly what I mean when I say that word, just so people can decide right away how offended they need to get.
Well, you can’t have too much conscience about things!” said Gladys. “Or else you’ll never stop worrying!” And that, I’m afraid, was the extent of our moral agonies. Subject closed.
If your goal in life is to become fearless, then I believe you’re already on the wrong path, because the only truly fearless people I’ve ever met were straight-up sociopaths and a few exceptionally reckless three-year-olds – and those aren’t good role models for anyone.
Worse, their relationship with their work is often emotionally violent. You want to make something? You are told to open up a vein and bleed. Time to edit your work? You are instructed to kill your darlings.
Instead of trying to forcefully take thoughts out of your mind, give your mind something better to play with. Something healthier.
I would so much rather that you wrote a book in order to entertain yourself than to help me. Or if your subject matter is darker and more serious, I would prefer that you made your art in order to save yourself, or to relieve yourself of some great psychic burden, rather than to save or relieve us.
Curiosity is what keeps you working steadily, while hotter emotions may come and go.
Admit what you did... Take your lumps... The sooner you get flattened to the ground, the sooner you can begin to rebuild your life again.
Prayer is a relationship; half the job is mine.
His face is a comprehensive encyclopaedia of kindness.
You must keep your feet grounded so firmly on the earth that it’s like you have four legs, instead of two. That way, you can stay in the world. But you must stop looking at the world through your head. You must look through your heart, instead. That way, you will know God.
Students told me he was the most extraordinary man they’d ever encountered. He had seemed not quite of this world, they said. He seemed to live in a state of uninterrupted marvel, and he encouraged them to do the same. He didn’t so much teach them how to write poetry, they said, but why: because of delight. Because of stubborn gladness. He told them that they must live their most creative lives as a means of fighting back against the ruthless furnace of this world.
But I disappear into the person I love. I am the permeable membrane. If I love you, you can have everything. You can have my time, my devotion, my ass, my money, my family, my dog, my dog’s money, my dog’s time – everything.