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poems are small moments of enlightenment

Natalie Goldberg

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Natalie Goldberg
Age: 76
Born: 1948
Born: January 4
Author
Novelist
Writer
Brooklyn
New York
Poems
Enlightenment
Small
Moments

More quotes by Natalie Goldberg

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Our job as writers is to listen, to come home to the four corners of the earth.
Natalie Goldberg
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We walk through so many myths of each other and ourselves we are so thankful when someone sees us for who we are and accepts us.
Natalie Goldberg
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Life is not orderly. No matter how we try to make it so, right in the middle of it we die, lose a leg, fall in love, or drop a jar of applesauce.
Natalie Goldberg
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I think book publishing is fun, but I also know I've been very lucky.
Natalie Goldberg
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The difference between neurosis and wisdom is struggle.
Natalie Goldberg
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It is odd that we never question the feasibility of a football team practicing long hours for one game yet in writing we rarely give ourselves the space for practice.
Natalie Goldberg
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We never graduate from first grade. Over and over, we have to go back to the beginning.
Natalie Goldberg
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In writing practice, there's no direction. You enter your own mind and follow it where it takes you. We have a great need to connect with our own mind and our own true self. And all of us have a story to tell.
Natalie Goldberg
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This is the practice school of writing. Like running, the more you do it, the better you get at it.
Natalie Goldberg
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I told all kinds of stories about going to Japan, about playing ball with my father... I wanted to record my life in case it was going to end soon. So, I wrote that and it was very comforting to have that practice in the afternoons in my living room. I just wrote about my life.
Natalie Goldberg
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The muscles of writing are not so visible, but they are just as powerful: determination, attention, curiosity, a passionate heart.
Natalie Goldberg
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Understand that writing is like an athletic activity. To play tennis well, you expect to keep practicing, but for some reason with writing, you think you should come out fresh the first time.
Natalie Goldberg
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You'll lose your reader if you are vague, not clear, and not present. We love details, personal connections, stories.
Natalie Goldberg
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I came out with a book called The True Secret of Writing: Connecting Life with Language. It's a book that describes how writing is a practice and how my teaching is part of that practice. I direct the writing and create books but underneath, there's always the river of practice happening. No good, no bad. Just do it.
Natalie Goldberg
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It’s much better to be a tribal writer, writing for all people and reflecting many voices through us, than to be a cloistered being trying to find one peanut of truth in our own individual mind. Become big and write with the whole world in your arms.
Natalie Goldberg
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I had cancer for fourteen months and wrote a memoir about the experience.
Natalie Goldberg
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Don't let yourself be thrown away....Continue on no matter what....Continue to make a positive effort for the good.
Natalie Goldberg
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Watch yourself. Every minute we change. It is a great opportunity. At any point, we can step out of our frozen selves and our ideas and begin fresh.
Natalie Goldberg
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To encounter a fine book and have time to read it is a wonderful thing.
Natalie Goldberg
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I have students that I tell, If your book doesn't sell or you can't publish it, write another book. Quit sitting around. The publishing world is a business, but it's not any big deal. An editor is not your guru. Your agent is not your guru.
Natalie Goldberg