Quotes from Anne Lamott

So what are we supposed to do again, when we hate everything? You stop pretending life is such fun or makes sense. It's often messy and cruel and dull, and we do the best we can. It's unfair, and jerks seem to win. But you fall in love with a few people. Like I love you, Elizabeth. You're the angel God sent me.

I do know the sorrow of being ordinary, and that much of our life is spent doing the crazy mental arithmetic of how, at any given moment, we might improve, or at least disguise or present our defects and screw-ups in either more charming or more intimidating ways.

Some people wanted to get rich or famous, but my friends and I wanted to get real. We wanted to get deep. (Also, I suppose, we wanted to get laid.)

Becoming a better writer is going to help you become a better reader, and that is the real payoff.

everyone has come to understand that unconditional love is a reality, but with as shelf life of about eight to ten seconds. [p. 110]

But you can't teach writing, people tell me. And I say, 'Who the hell are you, God's dean of admissions?

Prayer means that, in some unique way, we believe we're invited into a relationship with someone who hears us when we speak in silence.

What's the difference between you and God? God never thinks he's you.

It really IS easier to experience spiritual connection when your life is in the process of coming apart.

Toddlers can make you feel as if you have violated some archaic law in their personal Koran and you should die, infidel.

it speaks of such integrity to refuse to pretend that you're doing well just to help other people deal with the fact that sometimes we face an impossible loss.

by then I'd figured out the gift of failure, which is that it breaks through all that held breath and isometric tension about needing to look good: it's the gift of feeling floppier.

butterflies were wind energy made visible.

Nothing can be delicious when you are holding your breath.

When people shine a little light on their monster, we find out how similar most of our monsters are.

A hundred years from now? All new people.

Help is the sunny side of control.

You should not bring more items and hurdles to the obstacle course.

You get your confidence and intuition back by trusting yourself, by being militantly on your own side. You need to trust yourself, especially on a first draft, where amid the anxiety and self-doubt, there should be a real sense of your imagination and your memories walking and woolgathering, tramping the hills, romping all over the place. Trust them. Don't look at your feet to see if you are doing it right. Just dance.

Whenever the world throws rose petals at you, which thrill and seduce the ego, beware.

We are a species that needs and wants to understand who we are. Sheep lice do not seem to share this longing, which is one reason why they write so little.

You have to be a warrior and say, Maybe it's everyone else's system, but it's not mine. (from her recent interview here, on Goodreads)

It is most comfortable to be invisible, to observe life from a distance, at one with our own intoxicating superior thoughts. But comfort and isolation are not where the surprises are. They are not where hope is.

Some people may have thought that this book was too personal, too confessional. But what these people think about me is none of my business.