Like a wind crying endlessly through the universe, Time carries away the names and the deeds of conquerors and commoners alike. And all that we were, all that remains, is in the memories of those who cared we came this way for a brief moment.
Interpretation
Time erases the legacies of all people, leaving only memories in the hearts of those who remember.
This quote reflects on the nature of time and mortality, suggesting that regardless of one's achievements or status—be it conquerors or commoners—time ultimately diminishes their existence and impact. What endures beyond our lives is not our accomplishments or fame, but the memories held by those who loved and cared for us, highlighting the transient nature of life and the importance of meaningful connections.
In practice
In a eulogy, reflecting on how the deceased impacted others' lives.
People on the outside think there's something magical about writing, that you go up in the attic at midnight and cast the bones and come down in the morning with a story, but it isn't like that. You sit in back of the typewriter and you work, and that's all there is to it.
The more you know, the more unflinchingly you deny casual beliefs and Accepted Wisdom when it flies in the face of reality, the more carefully you observe the world and its people around you, the better chance you have of writing something meaningful and well-crafted.
When you're all alone out there, on the end of the typewriter, with each new story a new appraisal by the world of whether you can still get it up or not, arrogance and self-esteem and deep breathing are all you have. It often looks like egomania. I assure you it's the bold coverup of the absolutely terrified.
I think [religion] is presumptuous and I think it is silly, because it makes you believe that you are less than what you can be. As long as you can blame everything on some unseen deity, you don’t ever have to be responsible for your own behavior.
Writing is the hardest work in the world. I have been a bricklayer and a truck driver, and I tell you – as if you haven't been told a million times already – that writing is harder. Lonelier. And nobler and more enriching.
The trap into which all writers have, will, or should fall into, of writing The Great American Watchamacallit, is such an uncluttered and inviting one that from time to time I'm sure even the greatest have to pull themselves up short by the Shift key to remind themselves that it is story first that they should write.
If you have a problem with the third act, the real problem is in the first act.
Zen professes itself to be the spirit of Buddhism, but in fact it is the spirit of all religions and philosophies.
The meaning of life is that it is to be lived, and it is not to be traded and conceptualized and squeezed into a patter of systems.
We do pray for mercy, and that same prayer doth teach us all to render the deeds of mercy.
Religion is of general and public concern, and on its support depend, in great measure, the peace and good order of government, the safety and happiness of the people.
Come into the silence of solitude, and the vibration there will talk to you through the voice of God.
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