The mind is like a richly woven tapestry in which the colors are distilled from the experiences of the senses, and the design drawn from the convolutions of the intellect.
Interpretation
The mind is shaped by experiences and understanding, forming a complex and intricate structure.
Carson McCullers' quote likens the mind to a tapestry, suggesting that just as a tapestry is composed of various colors and designs, our intellect and understanding are shaped by diverse sensory experiences and cognitive processes. This metaphor highlights the complexity of human thought and the importance of every experience in contributing to our unique perception of the world.
In practice
In a lecture on the importance of experiences in shaping our personalities.
Wherever you look there’s meanness and corruption. This room, this bottle of grape wine, these fruits in the basket, are all products of profit and loss. A fellow can’t live without giving his passive acceptance to meanness. Somebody wears his tail to a frazzle for every mouthful we eat and every stitch we wear—and nobody seems to know. Everybody is blind, dumb, and blunt-headed—stupid and mean.
There's nothing that makes you so aware of the improvisation of human existence as a song unfinished. Or an old address book.
She was afraid of these things that made her suddenly wonder who she was, and what she was going to be in the world, and why she was standing at that minute, seeing a light, or listening, or staring up into the sky: alone.
The trouble with me is that for a long time I have just been an I person. All people belong to a We except me. Not to belong to a We makes you too lonesome.
Because in some men it is in them to give up everything personal at some time, before it ferments and poisons--throw it to some human being or some human idea. They have to.
Once you have lived with another, it is a great torture to have to live alone.
Be patient with everyone, but above all with yourself. I mean do not be disheartened by your imperfections, but always rise up with fresh courage
The advice that is wanted is commonly not welcome and that which is not wanted, evidently an effrontery.
To demand that others should provide you textbook prognoses is like asking a strange woman to give birth to your baby. There are insights that can be born only of your own pain, and they are the most precious.
I like old men. They can be wonderful bastards because they have nothing to lose. The only people who can be themselves are babies and old bastards.
If you limit your actions in life to things that nobody can possibly find fault with, you will not do much!
People only see what they are prepared to see. If you look for what is good and what you can be grateful for you will find it everywhere.
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