It’s more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories.” – Ray Bradbury from Fahrenheit 451 “Stuff your eyes with wonder, he said, live as if you’d drop dead in ten seconds. “Instead, pursue the things you love doing, and then do them so well that people can’t take their eyes off you.” – Maya Angelou from I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings “Two roads diverged in a wood, and I - I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.” – Robert Frost from “ The Road Not Taken” I’m making space for the unknown future to fill up my life with yet-to-come surprises.” – Elizabeth Gilbert from Eat, Pray, Love “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” – Mary Oliver from “ The Summer Day” We build ourselves out of that story.” – Patrick Rothfuss from The Name of the Wind “It’s like everyone tells a story about themselves inside their own head. “I am no bird and no net ensnares me.” – Charlotte Brontë from Jane Eyre(print from Lucky Skye) “People are capable, at any time in their lives, of doing what they dream of.” – Paulo Coelho from The Alchemist “Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt.” – William Shakespeare from Measure for Measure And we abandon our souls because we are afraid if we don’t, others will abandon us.” – Terry Tempest Williams from When Women Were Birds When we don’t listen to our intuition, we abandon our souls. And for far too long we have said no when we desperately wanted to say yes. For far too long we have said yes when we wanted to say no. “For far too long we have been seduced into walking a path that did not lead us to ourselves. “Beware for I am fearless, and therefore powerful.” – Mary Shelley from Frankenstein Rage, rage against the dying of the light.” – Dylan Thomas from “ Do not go gentle into that good night” Rowling from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets “It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.” – J.K. “Resist much, obey little.” – Walt Whitman from “ Caution” Alfred Prufrock” (print from Obvious State)
Jemisin from The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms “There is nothing foolish about hope.” – N.K.
And, in some small way, their quotes about change can help. That someone before us has been in the thick of it. Those words show us that our change, our struggle, our hurt, our need is not ours alone to bear. In them, another person has thrown us an anchor across their words. But, when you’re in the thick of a change–heading off to school again, finding the bravery to do more and be more, thinking about a new career path, considering marriage or divorce or children, or dealing with loss–change can be fucking hard.īook lovers all know that we can find solace in books (or poems or plays). I don’t really know.Ĭhanges are, of course, so necessary in this whole life thing we’re all doing. Maybe it’s just what happens during election years. I’ve been in the business of collecting quotes about change recently because, if you’re anything like me or the people I’m surrounded by, 2016 has been a year of some big damn changes.