Quotes from Susan Wittig Albert

generosity as a means of controlling someone is no gift at all. It's a curse.

Farmers could do better if the government didn't meddle and the free market was allowed to take its course. And we could all grow at least some of our food, if we invested a bit of work.

Stories are never a waste of time

if we are aiming to be genuinely self-reliant, we must learn to embrace uncertainty and anxiety. If we fail, there will be nothing to break our fall—nothing but whatever cushion we have managed to create for ourselves.

I'm sure of one thing," she said earnestly. "It hurts to—to let go of anything beautiful. But something will come to take its place, something different, of course, but better. The future's always better than we can possibly think it will be . . . We ought to live confidently. Because whatever's ahead, it's going to be better than we've had." Rose Wilder Lane Diverging Roads

Don't part with your illusions; when they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.

Writing isn't magic, it's work; earning a living as a writer means showing up at the typewriter every day, whether you feel like it or not.

Courage. Whatever the storm, we must remain invincible.

It was too easy to lose focus, to scatter my energies, to fragment—perhaps (and this was the hard part) because I lacked the sense of purpose that would bind all the loose pieces of myself together.

Right after the war, in 1919, she'd been hired by the Red Cross Publicity Bureau. She was assigned to travel through devastated Europe and the Balkans and write newspaper articles that would persuade compassionate Americans to contribute to the rebuilding process—through the Red Cross, of course.

shop and I was making notes on some of

We're not born to be ruthless, we women. But that's what it takes to hit the hands on the gunwale with an oar until they let go.

as Thomas Paine said, it has never been discovered how to make a man unknow his knowledge.

Knowing the price and choosing to pay it and keep on paying it, over and over again—that's what makes him invincible.

Gratitude is the richest, most joyful feeling humans are privileged to experience.