When you are Real, shabbiness doesn't matter.
Interpretation
Being true to oneself is more important than outward appearances.
The quote suggests that authenticity and being genuine define value far more than superficial traits or material conditions. When someone embraces their true self, external factors like shabbiness or societal norms become less significant, highlighting the essence of personal integrity and self-acceptance.
In practice
In a graduation speech to encourage students to embrace their true selves.
Real isn't how you are made. It's a thing that happens to you. Sometimes it hurts, but when you are Real you don't mind being hurt. It doesn't happen all at once. You become. Once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand. Once you are Real you can't become unreal again. It lasts for always.
Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real." "Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit. "Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt.
He didn't mind how he looked to other people, because the nursery magic had made him Real, and when you are Real shabbiness doesn't matter.
When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.
Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand.
Our ancestor was an animal which breathed water, had a swim-bladder, a great swimming tail, an imperfect skull & undoubtedly was an hermaphrodite! Here is a pleasant genealogy for mankind.
[P]erhaps you notice how the denial is so often the preface to the justification.
I reject any religious doctrine that does not appeal to reason and is in conflict with morality.
There are no beautiful surfaces without a terrible depth.
I am marooned on a Crag of Superiority in an ocean of soldiers.
What's fascinating to me is the way that multiple stories go into creating any world - a fictional world, but certainly the world that we live in as well. Of course, I cannot control that world. I can just control the fictional world.
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