The life you have led doesn't need to be the only life you have.
Anna QuindlenRead
All of life like a series of tableaux, and in the living we missed so much, hid so much, left so much undone and unsaid.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Life is a series of moments where we often overlook important truths and feelings.
In this quote, Anna Quindlen reflects on the nature of life as a collection of snapshots or 'tableaux', suggesting that in our daily lives, we often fail to communicate our true thoughts and emotions. She emphasizes the idea that many things go unsaid or undone, indicating a longing for deeper connection and acknowledgment of the experiences that shape our existence.
Themes
LifeExperiencesCommunicationConnectionsTruth
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be shared during a reflective gathering where participants discuss their life experiences.
More from Anna Quindlen
All quotes βThe future is built on brains, not prom court, as most people can tell you after attending their high school reunion. But you'd never know it by talking to kids or listening to the messages they get from the culture and even from their schools.
Anna QuindlenRead
I read and walked for miles at night along the beach, writing bad blank verse and searching endlessly for someone wonderful who would step out of the darkness and change my life. It never crossed my mind that that person could be me.
Anna QuindlenRead
With reference to the younger generation..."If the experience of their exhausted, insomniac, dispirited elders makes them decide they'd prefer not to go straight from the classroom to the cubicle to the coffin, it doesn't mean they're lazy. It means they're sane."
Anna QuindlenRead
Ideas are only lethal if you suppress and don't discuss them. Ignorance is not bliss, it's stupid. Banning books shows you don't trust your kids to think and you don't trust yourself to be able to talk to them.
Anna QuindlenRead
I conveniently forgot to remember that people only have two hands, or, as another parent once said of having a third child, it's time for a zone defense instead of man-to-man.
Anna QuindlenRead
Similar quotes
Most people struggle with life balance simply because they haven't paid the price to decide what is really important to them.
Stephen CoveyRead
I used to think...that I had to be careful with how much I lived. As if life was a pocketful of coins. You only got so much and you didn't want to spend it all in one place...But now I know that life is the one thing in the world that never runs out. I might run out of mine, and you might run out of yours, but the world will never run out of life. And we're all very lucky to be part of something like that.
Anthony DoerrRead
The great object of life is Sensation - to feel that we exist - even though in pain - it is this "craving void" which drives us to gaming - to battle - to travel - to intemperate but keenly felt pursuits of every description whose principal attraction is the agitation inseparable from their accomplishment.
Lord ByronRead
I always knew looking back on my tears would bring me laughter, but I never knew looking back on my laughter would make me cry.
Cat StevensRead
Life is like skiing. Just like skiing, the goal is not to get to the bottom of the hill. It's to have a bunch of good runs before the sun sets.
Seth GodinRead
As long as skies are blue, and fields are green Evening must usher night, night urge the morrow, Month follow month with woe, and year wake year to sorrow
Percy Bysshe ShelleyRead