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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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Natalie Goldberg
Age: 76
Born: 1948
Born: January 4
Author
Novelist
Writer
Brooklyn
New York
Graduates
Grade
Grades
Beginning
Back
Firsts
First
Never
Graduate

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We must remember that everything is ordinary and extraordinary. It is our minds that either open or close.
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We are important and our lives are important, magnificent really, and their details are worthy to be recorded.
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When you write, don't say, I'm going to write a poem. That attitude will freeze you right away. Sit down with the least expectation of yourself say, I am free to write the worst junk in the world.
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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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The difference between neurosis and wisdom is struggle.
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Writers end up writing about their obsessions. Things that haunt them things they can’t forget stories they carry in their bodies waiting to be released.
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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.
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I had cancer for fourteen months and wrote a memoir about the experience.
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The muscles of writing are not so visible, but they are just as powerful: determination, attention, curiosity, a passionate heart.
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It is very important to go home if you want your work to be whole. You don't have to move in with your parents again and collect a weekly allowance, but you must claim where you come from and look deep into it. Come to honor and embrace it, or at the least, accept it.
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Every moment is enormous and it is all we have.
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This is your life. You are responsible for it. You will not live forever. Don't wait.
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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.
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Writing can teach us the dignity of speaking the truth.
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In the West, a teacher imparts knowledge to a student. In the East, a teacher transmits nothing more or less than his or her Being.
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To encounter a fine book and have time to read it is a wonderful thing.
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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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I think talent is like a water table under the earth—you tap it with your effort and it comes through you.
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Over and over, we have to go back to the beginning. We should not be ashamed of this. It is good. It's like drinking water.
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I still write with pen and paper and have someone type it on a computer. But rewriting I do by hand.
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