Our business in life is not to succeed, but to continue to fail in good spirits.
Robert Louis StevensonRead
Like a bird singing in the rain, let grateful memories survive in time of sorrow.
Interpretation
Cherish positive memories even during difficult times.
This quote by Robert Louis Stevenson suggests that, much like a bird finds joy in singing despite the rain, we should hold onto our grateful memories during times of sorrow. It emphasizes the importance of resilience and finding solace in the past when facing hardships.
In practice
In a motivational speech about overcoming adversity.
Our business in life is not to succeed, but to continue to fail in good spirits.
That man is a success who has lived well, laughed often and loved much.
His past was fairly blameless; few men could read the rolls of their life with less apprehension; yet he was humbled to the dust by the many ill things he had done, and raised up again into sober and fearful gratitude by the many he had come so near to doing, yet avoided.
The habit of being happy enables one to be freed, or largely freed, from the domination of outward conditions.
It is the history of our kindnesses that alone make this world tolerable. If it were not for that, for the effect of kind words, kind looks, kind letters . . . I should be inclined to think our life a practical jest in the worst possible spirit.
Strange as my circumstances were, the terms of this debate are as old and commonplace as man; much the same inducements and alarms cast the die for any tempted and trembling sinner; and it fell out with me, as it falls with so vast a majority of my fellows, that I chose the better part and was found wanting in the strength to keep to it.
It is less difficult to bear misfortunes than to remain uncorrupted by pleasure.
I would run into the corner store, the bodega, and just grab a paper bag or buy juice - anything just to get a paper bag. And I'd write the words on the paper bag and stuff these ideas in my pocket until I got back. Then I would transfer them into the notebook.
I think, with never-ending gratitude, that the young women of today do not and can never know at what price their right to free speech and to speak at all in public has been earned.
I can focus on writing, or I can get lost in wonderfully fun but endless conversations and produce nothing new at all. I count on those people who enjoy my work to understand this.
Only in quietness do we possess our own minds and discover the resources of the Inner Life.
The biggest takeaway from a memoir is that you have to play fair. Within the first draft, I was writing very angrily because I had a lot of resentment and a lot to process. Through revision is where a lot of learning happened and a lot of forgiveness happened.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.