The body says what words cannot.
Martha GrahamRead
What people in the world think of you is really none of your business.
Interpretation
It's essential to prioritize your own self-perception over the opinions others have of you.
This quote by Martha Graham emphasizes the importance of self-acceptance and the idea that external judgments should not dictate your sense of self-worth. It suggests that focusing on what others think can lead to unnecessary anxiety and distract from personal growth and authenticity.
In practice
During a motivational workshop about self-esteem.
The body says what words cannot.
Nobody cares if you can't dance well.
Movement never lies. It is a barometer telling the state of the soul's weather to all who can read it.
No artist is pleased. There is no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is only a strange, divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than the others.
The body is your instrument in dance, but your art is outside that creature, the body.
There is a vitality, a life force, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique, and if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium, and be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is, not how it compares with other expression. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open.
You're so caught up in grumbling, complaining, and seeing what's wrong that you have no energy or time to appreciate what's good.
He who replies to words of doubt doth put the light of knowledge out.
We're not that much smarter than we used to be, even though we have much more information - and that means the real skill now is learning how to pick out the useful information from all this noise.
Sometimes it is harder to deprive oneself of a pain than of a pleasure.
It's not the honors and the prizes and the fancy outsides of life which ultimately nourish our souls. It's the knowing that we can be trusted, that we never have to fear the truth, that the bedrock of our very being is good stuff.
Expertise in one field does not carry over into other fields. But experts often think so. The narrower their field of knowledge the more likely they are to think so.
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