QuoteProject
When fear makes your choices for you, no security measures on earth will keep the things you dread from finding you. But if you can avoid avoidance - if you can choose to embrace experiences out of passion, enthusiasm, and a readiness to feel whatever arises - then nothing, nothing in all this dangerous world, can keep you from being safe.
Martha Beck
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

Fear should not dictate our choices; embracing experiences can lead to true safety.

Martha Beck's quote highlights the importance of not letting fear make decisions for us. Instead of avoiding situations due to fear, we should embrace our experiences with passion and enthusiasm, which ultimately leads to a sense of safety and security that is unaffected by external dangers.

Themes

FearCourageChoicesSafetyExperience

In practice

Example use cases

During a motivational speech about overcoming personal challenges.

More from Martha Beck

Whatever terrible things may have happened to you, only one thing allows them to damage your core self, and that is continued belief in them.
Martha BeckRead
Instead of fretting about getting everything done, why not simply accept that being alive means having things to do? Then drop into full engagement with whatever you're doing, and let the worry go.
Martha BeckRead
To complete your daily mental hygiene, observe any part of you that is upset or anxious, and offer that part of yourself the following simple wishes: 'May you be well. May you be happy. May you be free from suffering.' Repeat this until you actually mean it.
Martha BeckRead
Something in the human psyche confuses beauty with the right to be loved. The briefest glance at human folly reveals that good looks and worthiness operate independently. Yet countless socializing forces, from Aunt Clara to the latest perfume ad, reinforce beliefs like 'If I were pretty enough, I would be loved.'
Martha BeckRead
Since our society equates happiness with youth, we often assume that sorrow, quiet desperation, and hopelessness go hand in hand with getting older. They don't. Emotional pain or numbness are symptoms of living the wrong life, not a long life.
Martha BeckRead
To live a life that is wrong for you is a form of dying. There are people who have lives that look perfect. They try to be happy, they believe they should be happy, they are trying to like it, but if it's off course from their north star, they aren't satisfied.
Martha BeckRead

Similar quotes

Most people would have given up when faced with all the criticism I've received over the years.
Albert EllisRead
The miracle isn't that I finished. The miracle is that I had the courage to start.
John BinghamRead
It is a call for black people in this country to unite, to recognize their heritage, to build a sense of community. It is a call for black people to define their own goals, to lead their own organizations.
Stokely CarmichaelRead
Whether our feet are compressed in iron shoes, our faces hidden with veils and masks; whether yoked with cows to draw the plow through its furrows, or classed with idiots, lunatics and criminals in the laws and constitutions of the State, the principle is the same; for the humiliations of the spirit are as real as the visible badges of servitude.
Elizabeth Cady StantonRead
Black women have a kind of advantage over white women in the workplace. They go in prepared to face some discrimination, so when it happens, they aren't shocked.
Mellody HobsonRead
If you are hurt, whether in mind or body, don't nurse your bruises. Get up, and light-heartedly, courageously, good-temperedly, get ready for the next encounter.
Emily PostRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.