We see it in the body, that if you just give the body enough rest and comfort, it has remarkable self-healing capacities. Well, so does the spirit.
Gail SheehyRead
I was devastated when I got the review for my first book. The book came out a couple years before the women's movement broke through, and people were putting it down, asking, 'Why does the woman in this book need to get a divorce? Why can't she just shut up and be happy?'
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote reflects the struggle for women's rights and the societal expectations placed on women during a specific time period.
Gail Sheehy's quote highlights the resistance faced by women who sought independence and self-expression in a time when societal norms dictated that they should be content with traditional roles. It emphasizes the backlash against women's desires for autonomy, illustrating a broader commentary on the social climate surrounding gender equality and personal fulfillment.
Themes
WomenDivorceHappinessIndependenceSociety
In practice
Example use cases
During a book club discussion, to highlight the themes of gender and societal expectations.
More from Gail Sheehy
All quotes βNo sooner do we think we have assembled a comfortable life than we find a piece of ourselves that has no place to fit in.
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A seasoned woman is spicy. She has been marinated in life experiences. Like a complex wine, she can be alternately sweet, tart, sparkling, mellow. She is both maternal and playful. Assured, alluring, and resourceful.
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This is something caregivers have to understand: You have to ask for help. You have to realize that you deserve to ask for help. Because you need to keep on working on your own life.
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I found that female pathfinders generally integrate characteristics commonly associated with being women - like the capacity to be intimate - with 'male' ones like ambition and courage.
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Being a pathfinder is to be willing to risk failure and still go on.
Gail SheehyRead
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What is scary to me is silly to somebody else. CG isn't scary to me. It's like comedy - comedy and horror are quite similar, in that there'll always be somebody who'll say, 'I don't think that was funny.' And it's the same with things that are meant to be scary.
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Man with all his shrewdness is as stupid about understanding by himself the mysteries of God, as an ass is incapable of understanding musical harmony.
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I place a high moral value on the way people behave. I find it repellent to have a lot, and to behave with anything other than courtesy in the old sense of the word - politeness of the heart, a gentleness of the spirit.
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I'm an atheist, and that's it. I believe there's nothing we can know except that we should be kind to each other and do what we can for people.
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Looking at the world as a whole, the drift for many decades has been not towards anarchy but towards the reimposition of slavery. We may be heading not for general breakdown but for an epoch as horribly stable as the slave empires of antiquity.
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