Quotes About Reflection

the dual life—that outward existence which conforms, the inward life which questions.

She perceived that her will had blazed up, stubborn and resistant. She could not at that moment have done other than denied and resisted. She wondered if her husband had ever spoken to her like that before. and if she had submitted to his command. Of course she had; she remembered that she had. But she could not realise why or how she should have yielded, feeling as she then did.

When Edna was at last alone, she breathed a big, genuine sigh of relief.

She let her mind wander back over her stay at Grand Isle; and she tried to discover wherein this summer had been different from any and every other summer of her life. She could only realize that she herself--her present self--was in some way different from the other self. That she was seeing with different eyes and making the acquaintance of new conditions in herself that colored and changed her environment, she did not yet suspect.

Or else she stayed indoors and nursed a mood with which she was becoming too familiar for her own comfort and peace of mind. It was not despair; but it seemed to her as if life were passing by, leaving its promise broken and unfulfilled.

Thank God for my hobgoblin, small-minded consistency...

Everything that has ever happened to me is still all with me.

I worked at home, all by myself. Of course, I had Dingo, but a dog just doesn't cut it in the blue hour.

But sometimes, if I start to picture what's downstairs in the kitchen cupboards and fridge and those bowls on the counter, and try to piece everything together in a series of interesting meals and fill in any gaps with a mental grocery list, it turns into a fun, riveting game so engaging I forget what a horrible person I am and fixate instead on the far more relevant question of what I plan to cook and eat in the near future.

you're doing the same thing I am, only more slowly, and less honestly. You drive a car; you use plastic products; you do whatever the hell you do knowing full well that it's contributing to the end of everyone, and a lot of other animals besides. So don't get all more-life-affirming-than-thou with me, missy, you're on your way out too. In a way, you could see me as he canary down a mine shaft, or maybe synecdoche, the small part representing the whole.

Melancholy, I repeated. I liked the way it sounded, like there was music hidden somewhere inside it. Kate Di Camillo, Because of Winn Dixie

Have you, in truth, ever seen something so heartbreakingly lovely? What are we to make of a world where stars shine bright in the midst of so much darkness and gloom?

Dear God, thank you for warm summer nights and candlelight and good food. But thank you most of all for friends. We appreciate the complicated and wonderful gifts you give us in each other. And we appreciate the task you put down before us, of loving each other the best we can, even as you love us. We pray in Christ's name, Amen.

Thinking about her was the same as the hole you keep on feeling with your tongue after you lose a tooth. Time after time, my mind kept going to that empty spot, the spot where I felt like she should be.

Life was so short; so many beautiful things slipped away.

We must ask ourselves these questions as often as we dare. How will the world change if we do not question it?

How can you make a beautiful ending without making beautiful mistakes.

My heart, thought Edward, my heart is broken.

You can't always judge people by the things they done. You got to judge them by what they are doing now.

If you want to be a writer, write a little bit every day. Pay attention to the world around you. Stories are hiding, waiting everywhere. You just have to open your eyes and your heart.

Sometimes he reminded me of a turtle hiding inside its shell, in there thinking about things and not ever sticking his head out into the world.

What world is this I now inhabit, and how shall I live in it?

How many times, Edward wondered, would he have to leave without getting the chance to say goodbye?

I have a deep gratitude that Ida B exists.