It was only a sunny smile, and little it cost in the giving, but like morning light it scattered the night and made the day worth living.
Interpretation
A simple act of kindness can brighten someone's day and have a profound impact on their life.
This quote emphasizes the importance of small gestures, like a smile, in creating positive change in the world. Fitzgerald likens a smile to morning light that dispels darkness, suggesting that such simple acts can bring joy and make life more enjoyable for both the giver and the receiver.
In practice
In a speech about the importance of kindness, I would quote Fitzgerald to emphasize a small act's transformative power.
Don't be so anxious about it,' she laughed. 'I'm not used to being loved. I wouldn't know what to do; I never got the trick of it.' She looked down at him, shy and fatigued. 'So here we are. I told you years ago that I had the makings of Cinderella.' He took her hand; she drew it back instinctively and then replaced it in his. 'Beg your pardon. Not even used to being touched. But I'm not afraid of you, if you stay quiet and don't move suddenly.
The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.
It was about then [1920] that I wrote a line which certain people will not let me forget: "She was a faded but still lovely woman of twenty-seven."
The words seemed to bite physically into Gatsby.
But you can love more than just one person, can't you?
A sudden gust of rain blew over them and then another - as if small liquid clouds were bouncing along the land. Lightning entered the sea far off and the air blew full of crackling thunder. The table cloths blew around the pillars. They blew and blew and blew. The flags twisted around the red chairs like live things, the banners were ragged, the corners of the table tore off through the burbling billowing ends of the cloths.
You ask me what I'd like to do that I haven't done and I say 'Nothin'!' I haven't any mountains to climb or oceans to swim. I've been an extremely blessed individual. ... I'm not clamorin' for more trinkets. If I were to die tomorrow, I could say I've had a good life.
Make peace with your body, it's not manmade, there are no flaws, there are no mistakes.
The only reason you are happy is because you choose to be happy. Happiness is a choice, and so is suffering.
Surely everyone is aware of the divine pleasures which attend a wintry fireside; candles at four o'clock, warm hearthrugs, tea, a fair tea-maker, shutters closed, curtains flowing in ample draperies to the floor, whilst the wind and rain are raging audibly without.
If you recall the happiest moments in your life, they are all from when you were doing something for somebody else.
I have always said and felt that true enjoyment can not be described.
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