It will take all your heart, it will take all your breath It will be short, it will not be simple
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the intensity and challenges of deep experiences in life.
Adrienne Rich's quote reflects on the commitment and effort required to engage fully in life and its complexities. It suggests that while profound experiences may be brief and not straightforward, they are deeply impactful and demand our entire being—our heart and breath—indicating that living authentically is a profound endeavor.
In practice
In a motivational speech about pursuing one's passions, this quote could illustrate the depth of commitment required.
My children cause me the most exquisite suffering of which I have any experience. It is the suffering of ambivalence: the murderous alternation between bitter resentment and raw-edged nerves, and blissful gratification and tenderness. Sometimes I seem to myself, in my feelings toward these tiny guiltless beings, a monster of selfishness and intolerance.
The word revolution itself has become not only a dead relic of Leftism, but a key to the deadendedness of male politics: the revolution of a wheel which returns in the end to the same place; the revolving door of a politics which has liberated women only to use them, and only within the limits of male tolerance.
A president cannot meaningfully honor certain token artists while the people at large are so dishonored.'”
There is no 'the truth','a truth' - truth is not one thing, or even a system. It is an increasing complexity. the pattern of the carpet is a surface. When we look closely, or when we become weavers, we learn of the tiny multiple threads unseen in the overall pattern, the knots on the underside of the carpet
It is the suffering of ambivalence: the murderous alternation between bitter resentment and raw-edged nerves, and blissful gratification and tenderness
It's as if, in the mother's eyes, her smile, her stroking touch, the child first reads the message:'You are there!'
Spend the afternoon. You can't take it with you.
I have two main reasons for retiring. The first is I can no longer play at a level I was accustomed to in the past. That has been very, very frustrating to me throughout this past year. The second one is realizing my health, along with my family, is the most important thing in the world.
Suddenly it wasn't only a personal thing to me. I could picture hundreds and hundreds of boys living on the wrong sides of cities, boys with black eyes who jumped at their own shadows. Hundreds of boys who maybe watched sunsets and looked at stars and ached for something better. I could see boys going down under street lights because they were mean and tough and hated the world, and it was too late to tell them that there was still good in it, and they wouldn't believe you if you did.
As you walk down the fairway of life you must smell the roses, for you only get to play one round.
A poet might die at twenty-one, a revolutionary or a rock star at twenty four. But after that you assume everything’s going to be all right. you’ve made it past Dead Man’s Curve and you’re out of the tunnel, cruising straight for your destination down a six lane highway whether you want it or not.
I think the earlier stages of Alzheimer's are the hardest. Particularly because the person knows that they are losing awareness. They're aware that they're losing awareness, and you see them struggling.
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