The truth is I am inventing the maybe. I can only make the choices I make, so why torture myself with what I might have done, when all I can handle is what I have done? The Maybe Islands are hostile to human life.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of living in the present and accepting one's choices without regret.
In this quote, Jeanette Winterson reflects on the concept of embracing one's decisions and the futility of contemplating alternate paths that were never taken. By acknowledging that one can only act upon the choices they have made, she urges us to focus on the present reality rather than being tormented by 'what ifs,' suggesting that the pursuit of endless possibilities can be detrimental rather than liberating.
In practice
This quote could be shared during a motivational talk about personal growth.
What is remembered is not a deed in stone but a metaphor. Meta = above. Pheren = to carry. That which is carried above the literalness of life. A way of thinking that avoids the problems of gravity. The word won't let me down. The single word that can release me from all that unuttered weight.
Reading things that are relevant to the facts of your life is of limited value. The facts are, after all, only the facts, and the yearning passionate part of you will not be met there. That is why reading ourselves as a fiction as well as fact is so liberating. The wider we read the freer we become.
I have a list of titles that I leave at the [library] desk, because they are bound to be written some day, and it's best to be ahead of the queue.
Woolf wanted to say dangerous things in Orlando but she did not want to say them in the missionary position.
In that house, you will find my heart. You must break in, Henri, and get it back for me.' Was she mad? We had been talking figuratively. Her heart was in her body like mine. I tried to explain this to her, but she took my hand and put it against her chest. Feel for yourself.
History is a string full of knots, the best you can do is admire it, and maybe tie it up a bit more. History is a hammock for swinging and a game for playing.
There is an hour of the afternoon when the plain is on the verge of saying something. It never says, or perhaps it says it infinitely, or perhaps we do not understand it, or we understand it and it is untranslatable as music.
No matter who or what we are, God restores us to right standing with Himself only by means of the death of Jesus Christ.
Apathy is a rational reaction to a system that no longer represents, hears or addresses the vast majority of people.
When machines fail, when technology fails, when the conventional religion fails, people have got to have something. Even a zombin lurching through the night can seem pretty cheerful compared to the existential comedy/horror of the ozone layer dissolving under the combined assult of a million flurocarbon spray cans of deoderant." - The Mist
I didn't know I was a slave until I found out I couldn't do the things I wanted.
Scientists search for truth. Philosophers search for morality. A criminal trial searches for only one result: proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
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