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C. Day Lewis Quote on Writing and How We Write To Understand; Not To Share What We Already Know

“I do not sit down at my desk to put into verse something that is already clear in my mind. If it were clear in my mind, I should have no incentive or need to write about it… We do not write in order to be understood; we write in order to understand.”
C. Day Lewis, The Poetic Image, via Sunbeams (Page 15)

Beyond the Quote (385/365)

It starts out as a feeling. An inquisition. A hunch. A curiosity. A reoccurring thought. An observation. An idea. A single line of text.

It proceeds as an exploration into the unknown. A navigating of unclear roads. A charting of unexplored territory. An unraveling of knotted up mental yarn. A sorting through of an unorganized desk. As trains of thought.

“True love has no object. Many speak of their unconditional love for another. Unconditional love is the experience of being; there is no ‘I’ and ‘other,’ and anyone or anything it touches is experienced in love. You cannot unconditionally love someone. You can only be unconditional love. It is not a dualistic emotion. It is a sense of oneness with all that is. The experience of love arises when we surrender our separateness into the universal. It is a feeling of unity. You don’t love another, you are another. There is no fear because there is no separation.”
Stephen Levine, Who Dies?, via Sunbeams (Page 15)

“Your principles can’t be extinguished unless you snuff out the thoughts that feed them, for it’s continually in your power to reignite new ones… It’s possible to start living again! See things anew as you once did—that is how to restart life!”
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, via The Daily Stoic (Page 28)

“In life, we don’t get what we ask for. We get what we believe. And what we believe about ourselves shows up in our energy. It’s how we walk into a room. It’s how we communicate, through body language, I don’t deserve to be here. It’s whether we sit up straight or hide out in the back of a meeting. At times, my own energy has been saying, ‘I’m cool with the bare minimum. Don’t give me more.’ Without knowing it, I stunted my growth because I was scared to be magnificent and doubtful that I was. It’s possible to say you want a grand life but then continue to play small.”
Alicia Keys, More Myself (Page 249)

“I feared that if I shared my experience in its entirety, if I took the lid off my joy, it would push others away or make them feel small. As my career progressed, that tendency took another form in my interactions around the industry. I don’t need much. Nothing has to be too grand. I’m cool with my little piano, my bench, and a cup of water. In a sense, that was true. I’ve never been an over-the-top kind of girl. But what’s also true is this: Some part of my spirit was always signing up for less because that is what I believed I deserved. For many years, I thought I was being modest. I never wanted to come across as self-absorbed, or as someone with a big head. It’s how we women are brought up: Don’t ask for more. Don’t take credit. Don’t outshine others. But there on the couch, it hit me that my alleged modesty was just a disguise—a mask for a lack of self-worth.”
Alicia Keys, More Myself (Page 248)

“The path to self-discovery is not a straight line. It’s a zigzag. We move in and out of awareness: one step forward, three steps to the left, a baby step back, another leap forward. A lightbulb moment might shine brightly one day, but then flicker the next. It takes work to hold tightly to a certain consciousness, to live in its wisdom. Every day, I have to intentionally maintain an awareness of my value. I know I’m worthy. But you don’t cross over into the Land of Self-Worth and just become a permanent resident. You have to keep your passport current. You have to work to preserve your status.”
Alicia Keys, More Myself (Page 246)

“Words hang like wash on the line, blowing in the winds of the mind.”
Rameshwar Das, Sunbeams (Page 15)

“The idea of a meaningless universe is in itself a highly creative imaginative act. Animals… could not imagine such an idiocy, so the theory shows an incredible accomplishment of an obviously ordered mind and intellect that can imagine itself to be the result of non-order or chaos—you have a creature who is capable of mapping its own brain, imagining that the brain’s fantastic regulated order could emerge from a reality that has no meaning.”
Jane Roberts, The Individual And The Nature Of Mass Events, via Sunbeams (Page 15)

“In all circumstances—adversity or advantage—we really have just one thing we need to do: focus on what is in our control as opposed to what is not. Right now we might be laid low with struggles, whereas just a few years ago we might have lived high on the hog, and in just a few days we might be doing so well that success is actually a burden. One thing will stay constant: our freedom of choice—both in the big picture and the small picture. Ultimately, this is clarity.”
Ryan Holiday, The Daily Stoic (Page 27)

Seth Godin Quote on Learning and How School Can Get In The Way Of Our Education

“As soon as we associate reading a book with taking a test, we’ve missed the point.”
Seth Godin, Whatcha Gonna Do With That Duck?

Beyond the Quote (Day 384)

Forcing yourself to learn is like trying to force the last of the ketchup out of the ketchup bottle. You can shake, squeeze, tap, and torture the bottle all you’d like, you simply won’t be able to get all of it out when in a rush. A lot of the ketchup will be stuck throughout the container and will only come out with time. This is why you flip the bottle upside down when you put it back away—so that gravity will move it down for the next time. Learning works the same way.

“We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there “is” such a thing as being too late. This is no time for apathy or complacency. This is a time for vigorous and positive action.”
Martin Luther King Jr.

Beyond the Quote (Day 383)

There is such a time as too late. Just as quickly as yesterday has already come and gone—so, too, will today soon fade away. Procrastination is a very real and deceitful combatant that is waging war on our most precious commodity—time. And if we continue to align with apathy and complacency—procrastination will surely win and leave us with nothing behind except a head full of ideas and regret.

“Outside input is great, even necessary. It’s smart to receive feedback. But once you’ve heard all the opinions, there comes a point when you have to make your own choice.”
Alicia Keys, More Myself (Page 239)

“Music is one of the most potent forms of protest, the gateway to connection. Seldom has there been a more important time to raise consciousness and shift conversations by picking up a mic. A song, at its core, is a testimony. It’s how we tell our stories, both individually and collectively. It’s how we forget our troubles for a time, and how we remember who we are emotionally. It’s how we rally and how we heal. A song, like no other art form, has the ability to curl up inside of our spirits and never move out. I may have become fluent in the language of social justice, but music will always be my mother tongue. My native language. My way of reaching a world that can never have too many songs in it.”
Alicia Keys, More Myself (Page 220)

“Our business is to wake up. We have to find ways in which to detect the whole of reality in the one illusory part which our self-centered consciousness permits us to see. We must not live thoughtlessly, taking our illusion for the complete reality, but at the same time we must not live too thoughtfully in the sense of trying to escape from the dream state. We must be continuously on our watch for ways in which we may enlarge our consciousness.”
Aldous Huxley, Sunbeams (Page 14)

“A tree growing out of the ground is as wonderful today as it ever was. It does not need to adopt new and startling methods.”
Robert Henri, Sunbeams (Page 14)

“There is no coming to consciousness without pain.”
Carl Jung, Sunbeams (Page 14)

“When the stomach is full, it is easy to talk of fasting.”
St. Jerome, Sunbeams (Page 14)

Carl Jung Quote on How Confronting Darkness Can Show You To Your Light

“To confront a person with his own shadow is to show him his own light.”
Carl Jung, Sunbeams (Page 3)

Beyond the Quote (Day 382)

Like most, I can still vividly recall moments when I was caused a great deal of irritation, frustration, anger, and pain. Times when people didn’t follow through with their word, or when they would treat others unfairly, or when they did things that were irrational, nonsensical, or just plain malicious. And sometimes, those moments would get the best of me and cause an influx of negative, overpowering, blinding emotions. But what I didn’t realize then, that I can see more clearly now, is that the only reason I was able to see those shadows was because of my own light.

“I now live in woke mode. For me, every moment is a reawakening, a chance to meet myself exactly as I am. I’m finally allowing myself to just be. Be giddy. Be irritable. Be vulnerable. Be silly. Be exhilarated. Be whomever and however I am. That is my practice, my daily meditation. It’s also my daily prayer for all of us—that we allow others the same freedom of expression that we are learning to grant to ourselves.”
Alicia Keys, More Myself (Page 216)

“A lot of us are over the fakeness. Much of what we see and consume in our world is so carefully constructed and polished, so highly curated. Like never before, we crave the authentic, not just when it comes to appearance, but also in our narratives. In our conversations. In our work and political spheres. In our friendships and intimate relationships. And as we uncover that truth, as we remove the masks and falsehoods and finally get clear on what’s real, the work of our lives, as I see it, is to stand immovably in that truth.”
Alicia Keys, More Myself (Page 211)