Quotes About Reflection

In writing, we see, sometimes with fear and trembling, who we have been, who we really are, and we glimpse now and then who we might become.

are a hundred ways to kneel and kiss the ground

Writing is often a struggle between the personal and the universal, and the way writers deal with that struggle varies.

I'd wake up in the morning and I would think, 'Where am I?' I'd have to gather myself.

Kay very calmly and sweetly said, "You know, Pat, how much better do you think Lea Henry and Cindy Noble are going to get at this point?" She was saying ease up—it's enough. I had reached the point of diminishing returns. "I think they are both trying really hard to please you, but how much more can they possibly do?" she said. "I just wonder if you've really thought about that.

Someday, I suppose I'll give up, and sit in the rocking chair. But I'll probably be rocking fast, because I don't know what I'll do without a job.

Every Moment is a Teaching Moment

Yes. It is. —June 23, 2012, at night driving from Henrietta back to Knoxville with the tape recorder off, thirteen months after diagnosis

about one's life; memories are unreliable—they smudge, and fade, like disappearing footprints in the sand. We're too busy standing in the middle of it all to remember everything perfectly

Art is a way of knowing what it is we actually believe.

Peace can be reached through meditation on the knowledge which dreams give. Peace can also be reached through concentration upon that which is dearest to the heart.

If you ever want to see how small you are in the plan of God, just stand at the edge of an ocean.

There are stories that don't need a plot. Sooner or later they rise above the confusion and untangle their mysteries in a series of sentences.

The man was hit in one eye by a stone, and that eye turned inward so that it looked into his mind, and he died of what he saw there

I did not want to think about people. I wanted the trees, the scents and colors, the shifting shadows of the wood, which spoke a language I understood. I wished I could simply disappear in it, live like a bird or a fox through the winter, and leave the things I had glimpsed to resolve themselves without me.

The giant Grof was hit in one eye by a stone, and that eye turned inward so that it looked into his mind, and he died of what he saw there. -Cyrin

It's so hard to think in winter. The world seems confined in the space of your heart; you can't see beyond yourself.

Humankind is drawn to dogs because they are so like ourselves—bumbling, affectionate, confused, easily disappointed, eager to be amused, grateful for kindness and the least attention.

My mother who died young In an outlandish rhythm Would have been seventy now And perhaps dead in funeral time. So I may start to mourn As I would celebrate The first or second birthday Of a still-born baby. - Out of Season

The view from outside is a better place to examine a society.

If you could just see your face," she told me. "You look like a cat in a bathtub.

Mercy?" "Just a minute," I told Adam. "I'm in the middle of a revelation.

Sometimes I think I live more closely to the past than the present.

Never accept the blame for what evil people do. We are all responsible for our own actions. She was lecturing him, so she stopped. "Sorry. Hang around with Bran too long, and see if you don't start passing around the Marrok's advice as if he were Confucius.