Life with most teenagers was like having a low-grade bladder infection. It hurts, but you had to tough it out.
Anne LamottRead
Being a writer is part of a noble tradition, as is being a musician – the last egalitarian and open associations. No matter what happens in terms of fame and fortune, dedication to writing is a marching-step forward from where you were before, when you didn’t care about reaching out to the world, when you weren’t hoping to contribute, when you were just standing there doing some job into which you had fallen.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Being a writer or musician connects one to a noble tradition and represents a commitment to personal and artistic growth.
In this quote, Anne Lamott emphasizes the significance of being a writer or musician as part of a rich, egalitarian tradition. She suggests that the act of dedicating oneself to the craft of writing or music is an essential step towards personal development and contributions to the world, moving beyond mere survival to actively engaging with and influencing society.
Themes
WritingMusicDedicationTraditionArtistic Growth
In practice
Example use cases
Use this quote in a speech about the importance of arts education.
More from Anne Lamott
All quotes →Or you might shout at the top of your lungs or whisper into your sleeve, "I hate you, God." That is a prayer too, because it is real, it is truth, and maybe it is the first sincere thought you've had in months.
Anne LamottRead
Your problem is how you are going to spend this one odd and precious life you have been issued. Whether you're going to spend it trying to look good and creating the illusion that you have power over people and circumstances, or whether you are going to taste it, enjoy it and find out the truth about who you are.
Anne LamottRead
It is hard to remember that you are a cherished spiritual being when you're burping up apple fritters and Cheetos.
Anne LamottRead
Gorgeous, amazing things come into our lives when we are paying attention: mangoes, grandnieces, Bach, ponds. This happens more often when we have as little expectation as possible. If you say, "Well, that's pretty much what I thought I'd see," you are in trouble. At that point you have to ask yourself why you are even here. [...] Astonishing material and revelation appear in our lives all the time. Let it be. Unto us, so much is given. We just have to be open for business.
Anne LamottRead
...because when people have seen you at their worst, you don't have to put on the mask as much.
Anne LamottRead
Similar quotes
Yes, every venture is always filled with apprehensions. But if we were to conduct ourselves continuously on that aspect, then we would lose the most important reason to be in this profession: to challenge the art of and be part of what is commonly known as our creative instincts.
Amitabh BachchanRead
Then the writing became so fluid that I sometimes felt as if I were writing for the sheer pleasure of telling a story, which may be the human condition that most resembles levitation.
Gabriel Garcia MarquezRead
Music, at its essence, is what gives us memories. And the longer a song has existed in our lives, the more memories we have of it.
Stevie WonderRead
I don't remember when exactly I read my first comic book, but I do remember exactly how liberated and subversive I felt as a result.
Edward SaidRead
Not till the poets among us can be "literalists of the imagination"-above insolence and triviality and can present for inspection, "imaginary gardens with real toads in them." shall we have it.
Marianne MooreRead
Make something, a kind of object, which as it changes or falls apart (dies as it were) or increases in its parts (grows as it were) offers no clue as to what its state or form or nature was at any previous time. Physical and Metaphysical. Obstinacy. Could this be a useful object?
Jasper JohnsRead