...we shall board our imagined ship and wildly sail among sacred islands of the mad till death shatters the fabulous stars and makes us real.
Sylvia PlathRead
I felt dumb and subdued. Every time I tried to concentrate, my mind glided off, like a skater, into a large empty space, and pirouetted there, absently.
Interpretation
The quote reflects feelings of distraction and mental emptiness when trying to focus.
In this quote, Sylvia Plath expresses a sense of mental disengagement and struggle with concentration. The imagery of a skater gliding into a large, empty space conveys the feeling of wandering thoughts and the difficulty in capturing focus, emphasizing a common human experience of distraction and introspection, particularly in moments of emotional vulnerability.
In practice
During a mental health workshop, this quote can be shared to illustrate the common struggle of maintaining concentration.
...we shall board our imagined ship and wildly sail among sacred islands of the mad till death shatters the fabulous stars and makes us real.
The hardest thing, I think, is to live richly in the present, without letting it be tainted & spoiled out of fear for the future or regret for a badly-managed past.
It is as if my life were magically run by two electric currents: joyous positive and despairing negative--which ever is running at the moment dominates my life, floods it.
You walked in, laughing, tears welling confused, mingling in your throat. How can you be so many women to so many people, oh you strange girl?
I keep wanting to crawl back into the womb.
It's the living, the eating, the sleeping that everyone needs. Ideas don't matter so much after all. My three best friends are Catholic. I can't see their beliefs, but I can see the things they love to do on earth. When you come right down to it, I do believe in the freedom of the individual.
I have far more respect for the person with a single idea who gets there than for the person with a thousand ideas who does nothing.
However,' said Dumbledore, speaking very slowly and clearly so that none of them could miss a word, 'you will find that I will only truly have left this school when none here are loyal to me. You will also find that help will be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it.
Don't expect smart people to listen to you without proof.
Where I live, nobody who's fourteen is having sex and doing major drugs. And I think if you see it in the movies, you may be influenced by it. I think it's so important to preserve your innocence.
The truth is the kindest thing we can give folks in the end.
It is not the number of books you read; nor the variety of sermons which you hear; nor the amount of religious conversation in which you mix: but it is the frequency and the earnestness with which you meditate on these things, till the truth which may be in them becomes your own, and part of your own being, that ensures your spiritual growth.
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