#person

We could never learn to be brave and patient if there were only joy in the world ↗

— Helen Keller

#inspirational #personal-growth #inspirational

He had also been demonstrative and intelligent from the very beginning, his questions startlingly insightful. She would watch him absorb a new idea and wonder what effect it would have on him, because, with Edgar, EVERYTHING came out, eventually, somehow. But the PROCESS – how he put together a story about the world’s workings – that was mysterious beyond all ken. In a way, she thought, it was the only disappointing thing about having a child. She’d imagined he would stay transparent to her, more PART of her, for so much longer. But despite the proximity of the daily work, Edgar had ceased long before to be an open book. A friend, yes. A son she loved, yes. But when it came to knowing his thoughts, Edgar could be opaque as a rock. (295) ↗

— David Wroblewski

#development #distance #growth #insight #motherhood

I don't think most people would like my personality. There might be a few -- very few, I would imagine- who are impressed by it, but rarely would anyone like it. ↗

— Haruki Murakami

#personal #personality #imagination

The nerve-system of many an Urning is the finest and the most complicated musical instrument in the service of the interior personality that can be imagined. ↗

— Otto de Joux

#personalities #imagination

The compass rose is nothing but a star with an infinite number of rays pointing in all directions. It is the one true and perfect symbol of the universe. And it is the one most accurate symbol of you. Spread your arms in an embrace, throw your head back, and prepare to receive and send coordinates of being. For, at last you know—you are the navigator, the captain, and the ship. ↗

— Vera Nazarian

#captain #compass-rose #coordinates #direction #directions

I remembered learning from my favorite professor at Belmont to “surround yourself with people who are better than you,” and I was now living that mantra. ↗

— Kimberly Novosel

#good-people #growing-up #inspirational #learning #lessons

As soon as I saw him again I could forget all this existed; I would be calm. Was that a definition of love: a force that can drug you with calm and help you forget all the sandpaper realities of the world? ↗

— Alix Ohlin

#love

[On playing a bad guy in Harry Potter's film]: I think it's more fun, there are a lot of goodies in the film and not a lot of baddies, so I like to be in the baddie group. ↗

— Tom Felton

#love #personal-quote #tom #love

Miri once told me that there were only four important ques­tions you could ask about any human being: How does he fill up his time? How does he feel about how he fills up his time? What does he love? How does he react to those he perceives as either inferior or superior to him? If you make people feel inferior, even unintentionally," she had said, her dark eyes intense, "they will be uncomfortable around you. In that situation, some people will attack. Some will ridicule, to 'cut you down to size.' But some will admire, and learn from you. If you make people feel superior, some will react by dis­missing you. Some by wielding power — just because they can — in greater or lesser ways. But some will be moved to protect and help. All this is just as true of a junior lodge clique as of a group of governments. ↗

— Nancy Kress

#love

Still is the night, it quiets the streets down, In that window my love would appear; She's long since gone away from this town, But this house where she lived still remains here. A man stands here too, staring up into space, And wrings his hands with the strength of his pain: It chills me, when I behold his pale face For the moon shows me my own features again! You spirit double, you specter with my face Why do you mock my love-pain so That tortured me here, here in this place So many nights, so long ago? ↗

— Heinrich Heine

#love