QuoteProject
Joy and life exist nowhere but the present.
Maxine Hong Kingston
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

Joy and life can only be experienced in the current moment, not in the past or future.

This quote by Maxine Hong Kingston emphasizes the importance of living in the moment. It suggests that true joy and the essence of life are found in our present experiences, rather than being tied to memories of the past or aspirations for the future. This perspective encourages mindfulness and embracing the current moment to fully appreciate life.

Themes

JoyLifePresentMindfulnessExperience

In practice

Example use cases

In a mindfulness workshop, when discussing the importance of being present.

More from Maxine Hong Kingston

When I'm teaching, I tell my students: It's all process. Don't even think of product.
Maxine Hong KingstonRead
There can't be a pure myth, especially when the myth has been handed down in the oral tradition. As the stories are told, they change. If the stories don't change they just die.
Maxine Hong KingstonRead
In a time of destruction, create something.
Maxine Hong KingstonRead
We're all under the same sky and walk the same earth; we're alive together during the same moment.
Maxine Hong KingstonRead
I learned to make my mind large, as the universe is large, so that there is room for paradoxes.
Maxine Hong KingstonRead
The work of preservation demands that the feelings playing about in one's guts not be turned into action. Just watch their passing like cherry blossoms.
Maxine Hong KingstonRead

Similar quotes

I rose as from the death that wipes out the sadness of life, and then dies itself in the new morrow.
George MacdonaldRead
I acquired more wealth, power, and prestige than most. But you can acquire all you want and still feel empty. What power wouldn't I trade for a little more time with my family? What price wouldn't I pay for an evening with friends? It took a deadly illness to put me eye to eye with that truth, but it is a truth that the country, caught up in its ruthless ambitions and moral decay, can learn on my dime.
Lee AtwaterRead
Do not say that every day you spend on this earth is a day closer to dying. Every day you spend on this earth is a day closer to finally living.
Yasmin MogahedRead
It is youth’s felicity as well as its insufficiency that it can never live in the present, but must always be measuring up the day against its own radiantly imagined future
F. Scott FitzgeraldRead
Looking forward into an empty year strikes one with a certain awe, because one finds therein no recognition. The years behind have a friendly aspect, and they are warmed by the fires we have kindled, and all their echoes are the echoes of our own voices.
Alexander SmithRead
Grief is accepting the reality of what is. That is grief's job and purpose-to allow us to come to terms with the way things really are, so that we can move on. Grief is a gift of God. Without it, we would all be condemned to a life of continually denying reality, arguing or protesting against reality, and never growing from the realities we experience.
Henry CloudRead

A little wisdom, now and then

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