We weren't listening to guitar bands, we were thoroughly ashamed of being a guitar band. So we bought loads of keyboards and learned how to use them, and when we got bored we went back to guitars.
Thom YorkeRead
I'm achingly aware of my own limitations as both part of the human race and as an individual. I'm just, casting this out that, maybe, I'm not so perfect as is the affront I oft put on. After all, the lyric is 'I wish I was special'. I truly just want to be loved and accepted, I think, like all humans.
Interpretation
This quote reflects on the desire for acceptance and the acknowledgment of personal imperfections.
Thom Yorke expresses a poignant awareness of his limitations as a human being, indicating a universal longing for love and acceptance. He reflects on the complexity of self-perception, acknowledging that while he may present an image of perfection, deep down, he yearns for the same affection and validation that everyone seeks, highlighting an inherent vulnerability in all individuals.
In practice
In a speech about self-acceptance, one might quote this to emphasize our common desire to be loved despite our flaws.
We weren't listening to guitar bands, we were thoroughly ashamed of being a guitar band. So we bought loads of keyboards and learned how to use them, and when we got bored we went back to guitars.
There's a pervading sense of loneliness I've had since the day I was born. Maybe a lot of other people feel the same way, but I'm not about to run up and down the street asking everybody if they're as lonely as I am. I'd probably get locked up.
People in bands don't have the kind of conversations people might think they have. The best things about being in a band are the things that are unsaid.
I don't think young people are as demoralized as the media and government would like us to think. The obvious sign of that is how strong and how close personal connections are and how much people are able to build a life for themselves, despite all this stuff that's been thrown at them.
I tell you what's really ridiculous--going into a bookstore and there's all these books about yourself. In a way, it feels like you're already dead.
We're at a time when we are being presented with undeniable changes in the global climate and fundamental issues that affect every single one of us, and it's the time we're listening to the most hokey shite on the radio and watching vacuous bullshit celebrities being vacuous bullshit celebrities and desperately trying to forget about everything. Which is fine, you know, but personally speaking, I can't do that.
The very ingredients that nurture love - mutuality, reciprocity, protection, worry, responsibility for the other - are sometimes the very ingredients that stifle desire.
Women as mothers grapple with corresponding contradictions. The adoration they feel for their grown daughters, mixed with the sense of responsibility for their well-being, can be overwhelming, matched only by the hurt they feel when their attempts to help or just stay connected are rebuffed or even excoriated as criticism or devilish interference.
I don’t want your candor. I want your soul in a silver thimble.
We must keep ourselves in touch, not with theories, but with people. We must never get out of touch with them if we are going to use the Word of God skillfully amongst them and if the Holy Spirit is to apply the Word of God through us.
Some of our loves and attachments are elemental and beyond our choosing, and for that very reason they come spiced with pain and regret and need and hollowness and a feeling as close to anger as I will ever be able to manage.
We're all strangers connected by what we reveal, what we share, what we take away--our stories. I guess that's what I love about books--they are thin strands of humanity that tether us to one another for a small bit of time, that make us feel less alone or even more comfortable with our aloneness, if need be.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.