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Of course, in fairness, I must remind you of this: that we writers are the most lily-livered of all craftsmen. We expect more, for the most peewee efforts, than any other people.

Brenda Ueland

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Brenda Ueland
Age: 93 †
Born: 1891
Born: October 24
Died: 1985
Died: March 5
Journalist
People
Remind
Efforts
Writers
Expect
Craftsmen
Effort
Lily
Courses
Craftsman
Course
Lilies
Must
Fairness

More quotes by Brenda Ueland

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I learned...that inspiration does not come like a bolt, nor is it kinetic, energetic striving, but it comes into us slowly and quietly and all the time, though we must regularly and every day give it a little chance to start flowing, prime it with a little solitude and idleness.
Brenda Ueland
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Everybody is talented because everybody who is human has something to express.
Brenda Ueland
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Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force. When we really listen to people there is an alternating current, and this recharges us so that we never get tired of each other. We are constantly being re-created.
Brenda Ueland
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Consistency is the horror of the world.
Brenda Ueland
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If you write, good ideas must come welling up into you so that you have something to write. If good ideas do not come at once, or for a long time, do not be troubled at all. Wait for them. Put down little ideas no matter how insignificant they are. But do not feel, any more, guilty about idleness and solitude.
Brenda Ueland
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You have to hold your audience in writing to the very end-much more than in talking, when people have to be polite and listen to you.
Brenda Ueland
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We start out in our lives as little children, full of light and the clearest vision.
Brenda Ueland
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People who try to boss themselves always want (however kindly) to boss other people. They always think they know best and are so stern and resolute about it they are not very open to new and better ideas.
Brenda Ueland
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Why should we all use our creative power....? Because there is nothing that makes people so generous, joyful, lively, bold and compassionate, so indifferent to fighting and the accumulation of objects and money.
Brenda Ueland
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Who are the people, for example, to whom you go for advice? Not to the hard, practical ones who can tell you exactly what to do, but to the listeners that is, the kindest, least censorious, least bossy people you know. It is because by pouring out your problem to them, you then know what to do about it yourself.
Brenda Ueland
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Families are great murderers of the creative impulsive, particularly husbands.
Brenda Ueland
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it is only by expressing all that is inside that purer and purer streams come. ... Pour out the dull things on paper too-you can tear them up afterward-for only then do the bright ones come. If you hold back the dull things, you are certain to hold back what is clear and beautiful and true and lively.
Brenda Ueland
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Sometimes I think of life as a process where everybody is discouraging and taking everybody else down a peg or two.
Brenda Ueland
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...writing is not a performance but a generosity.
Brenda Ueland
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Everyone knows how people who laugh easily create us by their laughter,--making us think of funnier and funnier things.
Brenda Ueland
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And the true listener is much more beloved, magnetic than the talker, and he is more effective and learns more and does more good
Brenda Ueland
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The only good teachers for you are those friends who love you, who think you are interesting, or very important, or wonderfully funny.
Brenda Ueland
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Science and vivisection make no appeal to a theological idea, much less a political one. You can argue with a theologian or a politician, but doctors are sacrosanct. They know you do not. Science has its mystique much more powerful than any religion active today.
Brenda Ueland
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Write a true, careless, slovenly impulsive, honest diary every day of your life.
Brenda Ueland
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We should all know this: that listening, not talking, is the gifted and great role, and the imaginative role.
Brenda Ueland