Quotes from Robyn Davidson

And there are new kinds of nomads, not people who are at home everywhere, but who are at home nowhere. I was one of them

To be free is to learn, to test yourself constantly, to gamble. It is not safe. I had learnt to use my fears as stepping stones rather than stumbling blocks, and

I experienced that sinking feeling you get when you know you have conned yourself into doing something difficult and there's no going back.

There are some moments in life that are like pivots around which your existence turns—small intuitive flashes, when you know you have done something correct for a change, when you think you are on the right track. I watched a pale dawn streak the cliffs with Day-glo and realized this was one of them. It was a moment of pure, uncomplicated confidence—and lasted about ten seconds.

Real travel would be to see the world, for even an instant, with another's eyes

It's important that we leave each other and the comfort of it, and circle away, even though it's hard sometimes, so that we can come back and swap information about what we've learnt even if what we do changes us and

I had to learn how to be cheerful in the face of adversity

desert time refused to structure itself. It preferred instead to flow in curlicues, vortices and tunnels,...

I had been sick of carrying around the self-indulgent negativity which was so much the malaise of my generation, my sex and my class.

When I die, this is the only gold that will go with me. What does one take after death? Just one's good deeds and the love of others.

To be free one needs constant and unrelenting vigilance over one's weaknesses. A vigilance which requires a moral energy most of us are incapable of manufacturing. We relax back into the moulds of habit. They are secure, they bind us and keep us contained at the expense of freedom. To break the moulds, to be heedless of the seductions of security is an impossible struggle, but one of the few that count. To be free is to learn, to test yourself constantly, to gamble.

Camel trips, as I suspected all along, and as I was about to have confirmed, do not being or end: they mere change form.

I had rediscovered people in my past and come to terms with my feelings towards them. I had learnt what love was. That love wanted the best possible for those you cared for even if that excluded yourself. That before, I had wanted to possess people without loving them, and now I could love them and wish them the best without needing them.

If I had any kind of creed in regard to living among strangers, it was this: once could criticize one's own place, indeed one had a duty to do so, but when crossing a cultural border one left behind judgements as to how life should be organized

Capacity for survival may be the ability to be changed by environment.

It is better to proceed with one's duty in the service of others than wallow in the pain attachments bring

If I do depart this world out here, let it be known that I went out grinning will you, and loving it. LOVING IT. Steve, are you listening ? I FEEL GREAT. Life's so joyous, so sad, so ephemeral, so crazy, so meaningless, so goddamn funny. This is paradise, and I wish I could give you some.

When God made the firs Raika, that man turned to God and said, "You're something else. You've given me two eyes, two ears, two feet, two hands but only one stomach. It isn't fair. Why did you do it?" God laughed at him and answered, "You foolish Raika, don't you realize how much trouble you're going to have filling one?

I could not get used to the idea of ther being classes of people inherently inferior to oneself, to whom one could be as odiously condescendign or downright brutal as one likes, yet with whom one lived as intimately as family.

One continues to learn things in life, then promptly forget them.

I am very lucky: not very many writers can say they genuinely like the film of their book. However, I do.

London sort of wore me down. I can't cope with the winters!

Camels are wonderful animals. Witty, intelligent and sensitive.

After thirty years of being 'the camel lady,' believe me: One becomes inured to the spotlight.