Terry Tempest Williams, When Women Were Birds: Fifty-four Variations On Voice Quotes
Creativity involves breaking out of established patterns in order to look at things in a different way.
the unexpected action of deep listening can create a space of transformation capable of shattering complacency and despair.
There are two important days in a woman's life: the day she is born and the day she finds out why.
A shadow is never created in darkness. It is born of light. We can be blind to it and blinded by it. Our shadow asks us to look at what we don’t want to see
Choosing with integrity means finding ways to speak up that honor your reality, the reality of others, and your willingness to meet in the center of that large field. It’s hard sometimes.
Agitation gives birth to creation.
What is evolution if not creative adaptation and the progression of our own souls?
Most of all, differences of opinion are opportunities for learning.
Water is nothing if not ingemination, an encore to the tenacity of life.
CONVERSATION is the vehicle for change.
Word by word, the language of women so often begins with a whisper.
There is an art to writing, and it is not always disclosure. The act itself can be beautiful, revelatory, and private.
Beauty is transformed over time, and not without destruction.
WHAT ARE THE CONSEQUENCES when we go against our instincts? What are the consequences of not speaking out? What are the consequences of guilt, shame, and doubt?
When silence is a choice, it is an unnerving presence. When silence is imposed, it is censorship.
To withhold words is power. But to share our words with others, openly and honestly, is also power.
We mask our needs as the needs of others.
Not everything is meant for all to hear.
Women piece together their lives from the scraps left over for them.
My voice is born repeatedly in the fields of uncertainty.
If so, then it was also here where I came to know I can survive what hurts. I believed in my capacity to stand back up and run into the waves again and again, no matter the risk.
A pencil is a wand and a weapon. Be careful. Protect yourself. It can be glorious.
The courage to continue before the face of despair is the recognition in those eyes of darkness we find our own night vision. Women blessed with death-eyes are fearless.
Each of us has one. Each voice is distinct and has something to say. Each voice deserves to be heard. But it requires the act of listening.
My grandmother simply shook her head and said, "You know what you saw. The bird doesn't need to be counted, and neither do you.
Can you be inside and outside at the same time?I think this is where I live.I think this is where most women live.I know this is where writers live.Inside to write. Outside to glean.
Did I have the courage to forge a path
Finding one’s voice is a process of finding one’s passion.
We know the quality of another’s heart through her voice.
Once you know that you have a voice, ” Louis said, “it’s no longer the voice that matters, but what is behind the voice.
I am a woman with wings, ' I once wrote and will revise these words again. 'I am a woman with wings dancing with other women with wings.' In a voiced community, we all flourish.
There is comfort in keeping what is sacred inside us not as a secret, but as a prayer.
But harboring regrets is making love to the past, and there is no movement here.
When it comes to words, rather than using our own voice, authentic and unpracticed, we steal someone else's to shield our fear.
Listening over and over to the voices through a family of instruments allowed us to recognize and appreciate the dignity and uniqueness of each living thing in the meadow and forest.
It is not possible to satisfy women, " a friend said. "We are disturbed if we have children too young. Disturbed if we have then later. Disturbed if we don't have children at all.
When I look in the mirror, I see a woman with secrets. When we don’t listen to our intuition, we abandon our souls. And we abandon our souls because we are afraid if we don’t, others will abandon us.
words are much stronger than I am.
To write, ” Marguerite Duras remarked, “is also not to speak. It is to keep silent. It is to howl noiselessly.
I have found what I need most to heal a broken bond is time together—the very thing I avoid is the thing most desired.
When I said, “I am my mother, but I’m not, ” I was saying my path would be my own.