Real love moves freely in both directions. Don't waste your time on anything else. — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
I write to find what I have to say. I edit to figure out how to say it right. — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
But compassion isn't about solutions. It's about giving all the love that you've got. — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“We aren't poor," my mother said, again and again. "Because we're rich in love.” — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“We have to be whole people to find whole love, even if we have to make it up for a while.” — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“There was the woman I was before my mom died and the one I was now, my old life sitting on the… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“No one can touch that love or alter it or take it away from you. Your love for your son belongs only… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“Very nice," said Rick after a while. "Very nice," he repeated, with more emphasis the second time. "What is?" I asked, turning… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
The story of human intimacy is one of constantly allowing ourselves to see those we love most deeply in a new, more… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“They realized that, in fact, the lie wasn't safe. That it threatened their existence more profoundly than the truth did.” — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“He felt like a brother of mine, but not at all like my actual brother. He seemed like someone I'd always know… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“If love were an animal, what species would it be and could you train it? Love would be two animals: a hummingbird… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“The best thing you can possibly do with your life is to tackle the motherfucking shit out of love.” — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“To witness the way they leaned into each other and laced their fingers together and tugged each other tenderly down the paved… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“We need books, and Cheryl’s books in particular, because we are all, in the private kingdom of our hearts, desperate for the… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
Small things such as this have saved me: how much I love my mother—even after all these years. How powerfully I carry… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“My love for him was indisputable, but my allegiance to him wasn’t. We were no longer married, and as I settled alongside… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
So release yourself from that. Don't be strategic or coy. Strategic and coy are for jackasses. Be brave. Be authentic. Practice saying… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“She understands that attention is the first and final act of love, and that the ultimate dwindling resource in the human arrangement… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“Bring the man you aspire to be, the one who already has the love he longs for. Play every piece of yourself… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
We are savages insides. We all want to be the chosen, the beloved, the esteemed. There isn't a person reading this who… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“Withholding love distorts reality. It makes the people who do the withholding ugly and small-hearted. It makes the people from whom things… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“Love is the feeling we have for those we care deeply about and hold in high regard. It can be light as… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“I was twenty-two, the same age she was when she'd been pregnant with me. She was going to leave my life at… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“Oh, the dream. The goddamned man + baby dream. Written by the High Commission on Heterosexual Love and Sexual Reproduction and practiced… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
I can't say when you'll get love or how you'll find it or even promise you that you will. I can only… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“It is not so incomprehensible as you pretend, sweet pea. Love is the feeling we have for those we care deeply about… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“There’s a poem by Adrienne Rich I first read twenty years ago called “Splittings” that I thought of when I read your… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“The people who squawk the loudest about such things have almost never had to get over anything. Or at least not any… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“We were her kids, her comrades, the end of her and the beginning. We took turns riding shotgun with her in the… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“One ends a romantic relationship while remaining a compassionate friend by being kind above all else. By explaining one’s decision to leave… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“I was her daughter, but more. I was Karen, Cheryl, Leif. Karen Cheryl Leif. KarenCherylLeif. Our names blurred into one in my… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“Aside from the people I love, there is little I value more than my education.” — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“You go on by finding a channel for your love and another for your rage.” — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
Love is our essential nutrient. Without it, life has little meaning. It's the best thing we have to give and the most… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
My mother's last word to me clanks inside me like an iron bell that someone beats at dinnertime: love, love, love, love,… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
I could go back in the direction I had come from, or I could go forward in the direction I intended to… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share Image
“She understands that attention is the first and final act of love, and that the ultimate dwindling resource in the human arrangement isn’t cheap… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
“The most terrible and beautiful and interesting things happen in life. For some of you, those things have already happened. Whatever happens to you… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
Of course you want someone special to love you. A majority of the people who write to me inquire about how they can get… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
It's still true that literary works by women, gays, and writers of color are often framed as specific, rather than universal, small rather than… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
“Don’t listen to those people who suggest you should be “over” your daughter’s death by now. The people who squawk the loudest about such… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
“. . . there was the actual doing it, quickly followed by the grim realization of what it meant to do it, followed by… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
He was the most ordinary man in all the world, and yet in her memory he'd become luminous, like the prince in a fairy… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
Love is our essential nutrient. Without it, life has little meaning. It's the best thing we have to give and the most valuable thing… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
“I never believed the boys were angry. I believed they were hurt and anger was the safest manifestation of their sorrow. It was the… — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
“It’s wrong that this is required of you. It’s wrong that your son died. It will always be wrong.” — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
“Your ultimatum is simple. It’s fair. And it’s stating your own intentions, not what you hope theirs will be.” — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
“We aren't poor," my mother said, again and again. "Because we're rich in love.” — Cheryl Strayed Copy Share
