Quote

A nun I know once told me she kept begging God to take her character defects away from her. After years of this prayer, God finally got back to her: I'm not going to take anything away from you, you have to give it to Me.

Anne Lamott

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Anne Lamott
Age: 70
Born: 1954
Born: April 10
Novelist
Writer
San Francisco County
California
Giving
Told
Going
Prayer
Years
Away
Character
Nun
Give
Begging
Anything
Defects
Back
Kept
Take
Finally

More quotes by Anne Lamott

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The real payoff is the writing itself, that a day when you have gotten your work done is a good day, that total dedication is the point.
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'Help' is a prayer that is always answered.
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Lies cannot nourish or protect you. Only freedom from fear, freedom from lies, can make us beautiful, and keep us safe.
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We all know we're going to die what's important is the kind of men and women we are in the face of this.
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I don't want something special. I want something beautifully plain.
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This is one thing they forget to mention in most child-rearing books, that at times you will just lose your mind. Period.
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What’s the difference between you and God? God never thinks he’s you.
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I think this is how we are supposed to be in the world-present and in awe.
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Jealousy is such a direct attack on whatever measure of confidence you’ve been able to muster. But if you continue to write, you are probably going to have to deal with it, because some wonderful, dazzling successes are going to happen for some of the most awful, angry, undeserving writers you know-people who are, in other words, not you.
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My main problem is that over and over again, I try to get all my characters to say stuff that I think is so witty or erudite you know, so that everybody will go.
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For me, Jesus is my cleft in the rock. He is my safest friend, my safe totally loving accepting big brother.
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...[T]here should be a real sense of your imagination and your memories walking and woolgathering, tramping the hills, romping all over the place. Trust them. Don't look at your feet to see if you are doing it right. Just dance.
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Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere. Start by getting something—anything—down on paper. What I’ve learned to do when I sit down to work on a shitty first draft is to quiet the voices in my head.
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Prayer means that, in some unique way, we believe we're invited into a relationship with someone who hears us when we speak in silence.
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Mattie sat at the table, obsessing, orbiting around herself. She was sick of her worried, hostile mind. It would have killed her long before, she felt, if it hadn't needed the transportation.
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Writing is about hypnotizing yourself into believing in yourself, getting some work done, then unhypnotizing yourself and going over the material coldly.
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When we search for something larger than our own selves to hook into, we can come through whatever life throws at us.
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And she is going to dance, dance hungry, dance full, dance each cold astonishing moment, now when she is young and again when she is old.
Anne Lamott
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I don't see myself as a deep philosopher. The things I write about tend to be what we all have to face, or consider, or experience, that I talk about with my friends and brothers. It's universal stuff, told in my own voice, my own details and truth, which is all I have to offer.
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Mothers are supposed to listen and, afterward, to respond with some wisdom and perspective, but these things were not my mother's strong suit.
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