Anne Lamott
Anne Lamott
Anne Lamottis an American novelist and non-fiction writer...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNon-Fiction Author
Date of Birth10 April 1954
CitySan Francisco, CA
CountryUnited States of America
snacks long enlightenment
The road to enlightenment is long and difficult, and you should try not to forget snacks and magazines.
jobs book suffering
Human lives are hard, even those of health and privilege, and don't make much sense. This is the message of the Book of Job: Any snappy explanation of suffering you come up with will be horseshit.
relationship giving-up past
Forgiveness is giving up all hope of having had a better past.
safe stuck ifs
If we stay where we are, where we're stuck, where we're comfortable and safe, we die there... When nothing new can get in, that's death.
jesus struggle thinking
Sometimes I think that Jesus watches my neurotic struggles, and shakes his head and grips his forehead and starts tossing back mojitos.
recovery circus towns
You can get the monkey off your back, but the circus never leaves town
faith light return
Faith includes noticing the mess, the emptiness and discomfort, and letting it be there until some light returns.
dream pain heart
Some people have a thick skin and you don’t. Your heart is really open and that is going to cause pain, but that is an appropriate response to this world. The cost is high, but the blessing of being compassionate is beyond your wildest dreams.
mother kindness laughter
Intelligence, goodness, humanity, excitement, serenity. Over time, these are the things that change the musculature of your face, as do laughter, and animation, and especially whatever peace you can broker with the person inside. It's furrow, pinch, and judgement that make us look older - our mothers were right. They said that if you made certain faces, they would stick, and they do. But our mothers forgot that faces of kindness and integrity stick as well.
nuts tribes reason
... the reason life works at all is that not everyone in your tribe is nuts on the same day. [pp. 65-66]
prayer honesty kids
It's funny: I always imagined when I was a kid that adults had some kind of inner toolbox full of shiny tools: the saw of discernment, the hammer of wisdom, the sandpaper of patience. But then when I grew up I found that life handed you these rusty bent old tools - friendships, prayer, conscience, honesty - and said 'do the best you can with these, they will have to do'. And mostly, against all odds, they do.
song memories writing
You are going to feel like hell if you never write the stuff that is tugging on the sleeves in your heart--your stories, visions, memories, songs: your truth, your version of things, in your voice. That is really all you have to offer us, and it's why you were born.
grateful thinking light
It is unearned love--the love that goes before, that greets us on the way. It's the help you receive when you have no bright ideas left, when you are empty and desperate and have discovered that your best thinking and most charming charm have failed you. Grace is the light or electricity or juice or breeze that takes you from that isolated place and puts you with others who are as startled and embarrassed and eventually grateful as you are to be there.
grief home breathing
But you can’t get to any of these truths by sitting in a field smiling beatifically, avoiding your anger and damage and grief. Your anger and damage and grief are the way to the truth. We don’t have much truth to express unless we have gone into those rooms and closets and woods and abysses that we were told not go in to. When we have gone in and looked around for a long while, just breathing and finally taking it in – then we will be able to speak in our own voice and to stay in the present moment. And that moment is home.