I don't believe in reincarnation. I feel like we're here for such an appallingly brief period of time. I believe we each get this one trip, and if we're really, really fortunate, maybe we get 70 or 80 years on Earth.
Interpretation
This quote reflects on the brevity of life and the importance of making the most of our time.
In this quote, Anthony Doerr expresses his belief in the fleeting nature of human existence and the idea that we only have one life to live. By emphasizing the limited duration of our time on Earth, he encourages us to cherish each moment and to make meaningful use of our lives, instead of taking them for granted or expecting endless chances for a do-over.
In practice
In a graduation speech to inspire students to make the most of their futures.
The easier an experience, or the more entrenched, or the more familiar, the fainter our sensation of it becomes. This is true of chocolate and marriages and hometowns and narrative structures. Complexities wane, miracles become unremarkable, and if we're not careful, pretty soon we're gazing out at our lives as if through a burlap sack.
Anyone who has spent a few nights in a tent during a storm can tell you: The world doesn't care all that much if you live or die.
I used to think...that I had to be careful with how much I lived. As if life was a pocketful of coins. You only got so much and you didn't want to spend it all in one place...But now I know that life is the one thing in the world that never runs out. I might run out of mine, and you might run out of yours, but the world will never run out of life. And we're all very lucky to be part of something like that.
Leave home, leave the country, leave the familiar. Only then can routine experience--buying bread, eating vegetables, even saying hello--become new all over again.
My sister-in-law is a painter, and I'll say, how long did it take you to paint that painting. She'll say, It took me maybe three days, but it took me all my life to get the skills to paint that painting.
The preciousness of life and the changes of weather and the beauty of seasons - all those things have always sort of dazzled me.
Lies written in ink cannot disguise facts written in blood.
Most disability charity hinges on that notion - that you need to send your money in quick before all these poor, pitiful people die. Peddling pity brings in the bucks, yo.
We are so accustomed to disguise ourselves to others that in the end we become disguised to ourselves.
Authority, power, and wealth do not change a man; they only reveal him
Chekhov is this poet of melancholy and isolation and of wishing you were somewhere else than where you are.
If your goal is to avoid pain and escape suffering, I would not advise you to seek higher levels of consciousness or spiritual evolution.
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