I finally know the difference between pleasing and loving, obeying and respecting. It has taken me so many years to be okay with being different, and with being this alive, this intense.
Interpretation
The quote expresses the distinction between superficial actions and genuine emotions, emphasizing self-acceptance and embracing one's intensity.
Eve Ensler reflects on her journey of understanding the vital differences between pleasing someone and true love, as well as between mere obedience and genuine respect. This realization comes from years of personal growth and acceptance of her own uniqueness, encouraging an authentic and vibrant way of living that embraces emotional depth.
In practice
In a speech about personal growth, one might say, 'Like Eve Ensler, I finally understand the difference between pleasing others and truly loving them.'
Dancing insists we take up space, and though it has no set direction, we go there together. Dance is dangerous, joyous, sexual, holy, disruptive, and contagious and it breaks the rules. It can happen anywhere, at anytime, with anyone and everyone, and it's free. Dance joins us and pushes us to go further and that is why it's at the center of ONE BILLION RISING.
Before cancer, I was obviously disconnected. I had a tumor the size of a mango inside me and didn't do anything about it. It wasn't like I didn't know something was wrong.
It's a weird thing about the truth: It protects you. What really makes you vulnerable is when you're lying because you're going to get caught. When you tell the truth, there's a strange relief that comes.
Well, the tyranny of masculinity and the tyranny of patriarchy I think has been much more deadly to men than it has to women. It hasn’t killed our hearts. It’s killed men’s hearts. It’s silenced them, it’s cut them off.
Why are women immobile? Because so many feel like they’re waiting for someone to say, "You’re good, you’re pretty, I give you permission."
Security is elusive. It's impossible. We all die. We all get old. We all get sick. People leave us. People change us. Nothing is secure.
To be humble to superiors is a duty, to equals courtesy, to inferiors nobleness.
Sometimes it has to do with other longings that are much more existential. Sometimes you go elsewhere not because you are not liking the one you are with; you are not liking the person you have become.
Elinor was to be the comforter of others in her own distresses, no less than in theirs; and all the comfort that could be given by assurances of her own composure of mind, and a very earnest vindication of Edward from every charge but of imprudence, was readily offered.
A lot of times, rather than helping people with horse problems, I'm helping horses with people problems.
A good test of a relationship is how a person responds to the word 'no.' Love respects 'no,' control does not.
The essential problems remain the same... The kids I write about are asking for the same things I wanted. They want two contradictory things. They want to be the same as everyone else, and they want to be different from everyone else. They want acceptance for both.
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