Whatever it is that pulls the pin, that hurls you past the boundaries of your own life into a brief and total beauty, even for a moment, it is enough.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that experiencing moments of profound beauty can transcend the struggles of life, making those moments worthwhile.
Jeanette Winterson's quote reflects the idea that while life may often constrain us with boundaries and limitations, there are brief moments of beauty that can elevate our experiences. These moments, even if fleeting, hold significant value and can provide a sense of fulfillment and transcendence that makes the hardships of life more bearable.
In practice
This quote can be used in a motivational speech about finding joy in everyday moments.
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.
I remember being in Japan when Destiny's Child put out 'Independent Women,' and women there were saying how proud they were to have their own jobs, their own independent thinking, their own goals. It made me feel so good, and I realized that one of my responsibilities was to inspire women in a deeper way.
Be surprised by joy, be surprised by the little flower that shows its beauty in the midst of a barren desert, and be surprised by the immense healing power that keeps bursting forth like springs of fresh water from the depth of our pain.
Never underestimate your ability to make someone else's life better - even if you never know it.
The urge to explore has propelled evolution since the first water creatures reconnoitered the land. Like all living systems, cultures cannot remain static; they evolve or decline. They explore or expire. . . . Beyond all rationales, space flight is a spiritual quest in the broadest sense, one promising a revitalization of humanity and a rebirth of hope no less profound than the great opening out of mind and spirit at the dawn of our modern age.
Sail on ship of state, sail on, I union, strong and great! Humanity with all its fears, with all its hopes of future years, is hanging on thy fate!
If you want to reach every person in the audience, it's not about being bigger, it's about going deeper.
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