I seem to have run in a great circle, and met myself again on the starting line.
Interpretation
This quote reflects the cyclical nature of life and self-discovery.
Jeanette Winterson's quote suggests that life is not a straightforward journey but rather a circular one, where we may find ourselves revisiting the same experiences or realizations. It emphasizes the idea that through our journeys, we often return to our origins, perhaps changed but still fundamentally connected to who we are at our core.
In practice
In a speech about personal growth, you could say, 'As Jeanette Winterson beautifully puts it, I seem to have run in a great circle, and met myself again on the starting line.'
What is remembered is not a deed in stone but a metaphor. Meta = above. Pheren = to carry. That which is carried above the literalness of life. A way of thinking that avoids the problems of gravity. The word won't let me down. The single word that can release me from all that unuttered weight.
Reading things that are relevant to the facts of your life is of limited value. The facts are, after all, only the facts, and the yearning passionate part of you will not be met there. That is why reading ourselves as a fiction as well as fact is so liberating. The wider we read the freer we become.
I have a list of titles that I leave at the [library] desk, because they are bound to be written some day, and it's best to be ahead of the queue.
Woolf wanted to say dangerous things in Orlando but she did not want to say them in the missionary position.
In that house, you will find my heart. You must break in, Henri, and get it back for me.' Was she mad? We had been talking figuratively. Her heart was in her body like mine. I tried to explain this to her, but she took my hand and put it against her chest. Feel for yourself.
History is a string full of knots, the best you can do is admire it, and maybe tie it up a bit more. History is a hammock for swinging and a game for playing.
The silence drew off, baring the pebbles and shells and all the tatty wreckage of my life.
Itβs a very difficult era in which to be a person, just a real, actual person, instead of a collection of personality traits selected from an endless Automat of characters.
Pride is one of the socially acceptable sins in some corners of the evangelical culture. It's just straight-out ego gratification - how important I am; whether my name gets on the building or on the TV program or in the magazine article.
The body is not a thing, it is a situation: it is our grasp on the world and our sketch of our project
I do not hold to non-violence for moral reasons, but for political and practical reasons.
Amnesia is not knowing who one is and wanting desperately to find out. Euphoria is not knowing who one is and not caring. Ecstasy is knowing exactly who one is - and still not caring.
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