Anne Lamott
Tidiness makes me think of held breath, of suspended animation.Collection: Thinking
There is ecstasy in paying attention. You can get into a kind of Wordsworthian openness to the world, where you see in everything the essence of holiness.Collection: Inspirational
Novels ought to have hope; at least, American novels ought to have hope. French novels don't need to. We mostly win wars, they lose them. Of course, they did hide more Jews than many other countries, and this is a form of winning.Collection: Country
I worry that Jesus drinks himself to sleep when he hears me talk like this.Collection: Jesus
Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don’t give up.Collection: Hope
Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation. It’s like singing on a boat during a terrible storm at sea. You can’t stop the raging storm, but singing can change the hearts and spirits of the people who are together on that ship.Collection: Reading
E-books are great for instant gratification – you see a review somewhere of a book that interests you, and you can start reading it five minutes later.Collection: Reading
Or you might shout at the top of your lungs or whisper into your sleeve, “I hate you, God.” That is a prayer too, because it is real, it is truth, and maybe it is the first sincere thought you’ve had in months.Collection: Real
I used to tell my writing students that they must write the books they wished they could come upon – because then the books they hungered and thirsted for would exist.Collection: Book
I got one of the five golden tickets to be a writer, and I take that seriously. I don’t love my own work at all, but I love my own self. I love that I’ve been given the chance to capture the stories that come through me.Collection: Stories
Reading poetry and reading the great works of the canon that we were reading in the ’60s and the ’70s and ’80s was mind altering.Collection: Reading
I try to write the books I would love to come upon that are honest, concerned with real lives, human hearts, spiritual transformation, families, secrets, wonder, craziness – and that can make me laugh.Collection: Book
I’m very successful, but there are 50,000 general interest books published every year. If you don’t want to read mine, there are others.Collection: Book
Mothers are supposed to listen and, afterward, to respond with some wisdom and perspective, but these things were not my mother’s strong suit.Collection: Strong
Novels ought to have hope; at least, American novels ought to have hope. French novels don’t need to. We mostly win wars, they lose them. Of course, they did hide more Jews than many other countries, and this is a form of winning.Collection: Country
When you’re conscious and writing from a place of insight and simplicity and real caring about the truth, you have the ability to throw the lights on for your reader.Collection: Real