We burned with love for ourselves, all of us, starters of the fire we suffered- our love was the affliction for which only our love was the cure.
Jonathan Safran FoerRead
The bruises go away, and so does how you hate, and so does the feeling that everything you receive from life is something you have earned.
Interpretation
Pain and resentment are temporary, and they fade over time.
In this quote, Jonathan Safran Foer reflects on the transient nature of emotional pain and negative emotions like hatred. He suggests that, much like physical bruises, these feelings will diminish, highlighting the idea that our perception of life and the value of what we receive may change as we move past hurt and resentment.
In practice
During a speech about personal growth after hardship.
We burned with love for ourselves, all of us, starters of the fire we suffered- our love was the affliction for which only our love was the cure.
Memory was supposed to fill the time, but it made time a hole to be filled. Each second was two hundred yards, to be walked, crawled. You couldn't see the next hour, it was so far in the distance. Tomorrow was over the horizon, and would take an entire day to reach.
She was not crying Which surprised me very much But I understand now That she had found places For her melancholy That were behind more masks Than only her eyes
What do babies dream of? She must be dreaming of the before-life, just as I dream of the afterlife.
A few weeks after the worst day, I started writing lots of letters. I don't know why, but it was one of the only things that made my boots lighter.
What is being awake if not interpreting our dreams, or dreaming if not interpreting our wake?
Tired of lying in the sunshine, staying home to watch the rain You are young and life is long, and there is time to kill today And then one day you find, ten years has got behind you No one told you where to run, you missed the starting gun.
Growing up, if I hadn't had sports, I don't know where I'd be. God only knows what street corners I'd have been standing on and God only knows what I'd have been doing, but instead I played hockey and went to school and stayed out of trouble.
Sometimes I would almost rather have people take away years of my life than take away a moment.
I like living, breathing better than working... Each second, each breath is a work which is inscribed nowhere, which is neither visual nor cerebral. It's a kind of constant euphoria.
Life cannot be cut off quickly. One cannot be dead until the things he changed are dead. His effect is the only evidence of his life. While there remains even a plaintive memory, a person cannot be cut off, dead. And he thought, βItβs a long slow process for a human to die. We kill a cow, and it is dead as soon as the meat is eaten, but a manβs life dies as a commotion in a still pool dies, in little waves, spreading and growing back toward stillness.
I'd rather take coffee than compliments just now.
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