When silence is a choice, it is an unnerving presence. When silence is imposed, it is censorship.
Terry Tempest WilliamsRead
My voice is born repeatedly in the fields of uncertainty.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that one's true voice and expression emerge from navigating through uncertain situations.
Terry Tempest Williams reflects on how creativity and personal expression often arise amidst confusion and doubt. The 'fields of uncertainty' symbolize the struggles and challenges one faces, and it is in these moments that individuals discover their authentic voice and unique perspectives.
In practice
This quote could be used during a creative writing workshop to encourage participants to embrace their uncertainties.
When silence is a choice, it is an unnerving presence. When silence is imposed, it is censorship.
The human heart is the first home of democracy. It is where we embrace our questions: Can we be equitable? Can we be generous? Can we listen with our whole beings, not just our minds, and offer our attention rather than our opinion? And do we have enough resolve in our hearts to act courageously, relentlessly, without giving up, trusting our fellow citizens to join us in our determined pursuit-a living democracy?
Once upon a time, when women were birds, there was the simple understanding that to sing at dawn, and to sing at dusk, was to heal the world through joy. The birds still remember what we have forgotten, that the world is meant to be celebrated.
I am slowly, painfully discovering that my refuge is not found in my mother, my grandmother, of even the birds of Bear River. My refuge exists in my capacity to love. If I can learn to love death then I can begin to find refuge in change.
How do we remain faithful to our own spiritual imagination and not betray what we know in our own bodies? The world is holy. We are holy. All life is holy.
The Eyes of the Future are looking back at us and they are praying for us to see beyond our own time.
The U.N.'s impartiality allows it to negotiate and operate in some of the toughest places in the world. And time and again, studies have shown that U.N. peacekeeping is far more effective and done with far less money than what any government can do on its own.
It is not surprising that liberals believed in progress. The idea of progress justified the entire transition from feudalism to capitalism. It legitimated the breaking of the remaining opposition to the commodification of everything, and it tended to wipe away all the negatives of capitalism on the grounds that the benefits outweighed, by far, the harm.
It is incredible how as soon as a people become subject, it promptly falls into such complete forgetfulness of its freedom that it can hardly be roused to the point of regaining it, obeying so easily and willingly that one is led to say that this people has not so much lost its liberty as won its enslavement.
And sure enough, in seeking to become superhuman this foolhardy young man renders himself inhuman. The heart that he has locked away slowly shrivels and grows hair, symbolising his own descent to beasthood.
Sheer egoism... Writers share this characteristic with scientists, artists, politicians, lawyers, soldiers, successful businessmen - in short, with the whole top crust of humanity.
Should you ask me what is the first thing in religion, I should reply that the first, second, and third thing therein is humility.
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