Quote

Choose your tools carefully, but not so carefully that you get uptight or spend more time at the stationery store than at your writing table.

Natalie Goldberg

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Natalie Goldberg
Age: 76
Born: 1948
Born: January 4
Author
Novelist
Writer
Brooklyn
New York
Choose
Uptight
Writing
Carefully
Time
Store
Stores
Table
Tables
Tools
Spend
Stationery

More quotes by Natalie Goldberg

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We should notice that we are already supported at every moment. There is the earth below our feet and there is the air, filling our lungs and emptying them. We should begin from this when we need support.
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Because I've been doing my practice for so long, I knew what to do even under really hard circumstances.
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The problem is we think we exist.
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You live and then you die, I thought. It's good to have some good times.
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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.
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Learning to write is not a linear process. There is no logical A-to-B-to-C way to become a good writer. One neat truth about writing cannot answer it all. There are many truths. To do writing practice means to deal ultimately with your whole life.
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When you write what you know, you stay in control. One of the first things I encourage my writing students to do is to lose control - say what they want to say, break structure.
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Poetry has never been a favorite American pastime.
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When you are not writing, you are a writer too. It doesn't leave you.
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This is the practice school of writing. Like running, the more you do it, the better you get at it.
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Poetry is a dumb Buddha who thinks a donkey is as important as a diamond.
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While I had cancer, I wrote these twenty-two personal essays about how I lived my life backed by Zen and writing.
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To encounter a fine book and have time to read it is a wonderful thing.
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I love and care about literature, and great writers are our teachers. You're studying their mind when you read their work.
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Clarity and perseverance are difficult in American society because the basis of capitalism is greed and dissatisfaction.
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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.
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Kill the idea of the lone, suffering artist. Don't make it any harder on yourself.
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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.
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We shouldn't forget that the universe moves with us, is at our back with everything we do.
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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.
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