My gratitude for good writing is unbounded; I’m grateful for it the way I’m grateful for the ocean. — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
For me, being a writer is not an altered state. It's very ponderous, and very - it's like being a shoemaker. — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“But you can't teach writing, people tell me. And I say, 'Who the hell are you, God's dean of admissions?” — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation. They deepen and widen and expand our sense of life: they feed the soul. — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“If you don't know where to start, remember that every single thing that happened to you is yours and you get to… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
Needless to say, there was no one around remotely fitting the description of a normal person: I was at a writing conference. — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
I'd wanted to be a writer my whole life. But when I finally made it, I felt like a greyhound catching the… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“We are a species that needs and wants to understand who we are. Sheep lice do not seem to share this longing,… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
Writing is how I communicate my deepest beliefs, and what I hope are helpful observations about our dual citizenship, as children of… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
Writing is about hypnotizing yourself into believing in yourself, getting some work done, then unhypnotizing yourself and going over the material coldly. — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
I get to tell my truth. I get to seek meaning and realization. I get to live fully, wildly, imperfectly. That's why… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere. Start by getting something—anything—down on paper. What I’ve… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
This is our goal as writers, I think; to help others have this sense of--please forgive me--wonder, of seeing things anew, things… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
I try to write the books I would love to come upon that are honest, concerned with real lives, human hearts, spiritual… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“I heard a preacher say recently that hope is a revolutionary patience; let me add that so is being a writer. Hope… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“writing has so much to give, so much to teach, so many surprises. that thing you had to force yourself to do--the… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“No one has expressed it better than a great novelist I heard once on a talk show who said something like "You… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“I try to write the books I would love to come upon, that are honest, concerned with real lives, human hearts, spiritual… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
E.L. Doctorow said once said that 'Writing a novel is like driving a car at night. You can see only as far… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
I quit my last real job, as a writer at a magazine, when I was twenty-one. That was the moment when I… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
Try to write in a directly emotional way, instead of being too subtle or oblique. Don't be afraid of your material or… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“Throughout my childhood I believed that what I thought about was different from what other kids thought about. It was not necessarily… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“Books help us understand who we are and how we are to behave. They show us what community and friendship mean/ they… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“I don't know why I get jealous, since you don't make money or get any attention for it, but I guess it's… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
When you're conscious and writing from a place of insight and simplicity and real caring about the truth, you have the ability… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
One of the gifts of being a writer is that it gives you an excuse to do things, to go places and… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
We all often feel like we are pulling teeth, even those writers whose prose ends up being the most natural and fluid.… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
I went to Goucher College in Maryland for the best possible reasons - to learn - but then I dropped out at… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
You simply keep putting down one damn word after the other, as you hear them, as they come to you. You can… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation. It's like singing on a boat during a terrible storm at sea. You can't… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
You own everything that happened to you. Tell your stories. If people wanted you to write warmly about them, they should have… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
For me and most of the other writers I know, writing is not rapturous. In fact, the only way I can get… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
The difference between a writer who toughs it out and one who doesn't is that you push through the parts where you… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“There’s no point in writing hopeless novels. We all know we’re going to die; what’s important is the kind of men and… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
I used to tell my writing students that they must write the books they wished they could come upon - because then… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
There are moments when I am writing when I think that if other people knew how I felt right now, they’d burn… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
There are a lot of us, some published, some not, who think the literary life is the loveliest one possible, this life… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
“In general…there’s no point in writing hopeless novels. We all know we’re going to die; what’s important is the kind of men… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
We are a species that needs and wants to understand who we are. Sheep lice do not seem to share this longing,… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
We write to expose the unexposed. If there is one door in the castle you have been told not to go through,… — Anne Lamott Copy Share Image
I guess he'll have to figure out someday that he is supposed to have this dark side, that it is part of what it… — Anne Lamott Copy Share
Why couldn't Jesus command us to obsess over everything, to try to control and manipulate people, to try not to breathe at all, or… — Anne Lamott Copy Share
Your problem is how you are going to spend this one odd and precious life you have been issued. Whether you're going to spend… — Anne Lamott Copy Share
And yet, I do believe there is ultimately meaning in the chaos, and also in the doldrums. What I resist is not the truth… — Anne Lamott Copy Share
Raising a child, whether or not it is yours, is like Nautilus of the heart and soul. — Anne Lamott Copy Share
“I heard a preacher say recently that hope is a revolutionary patience; let me add that so is being a writer. Hope begins in… — Anne Lamott Copy Share
“I think perfectionism is based on the obsessive belief that if you run carefully enough, hitting each stepping-stone just right, you won't have to… — Anne Lamott Copy Share
We are going to die, as is everyone we adore - I hate this! But the question is, how do we live as women… — Anne Lamott Copy Share
“You will go through your life thinking there was a day in second grade that you must have missed, when the grown-ups came in… — Anne Lamott Copy Share
“You begin to string words together like beads to tell a story. You are desperate to communicate, to edify or entertain, to preserve moments… — Anne Lamott Copy Share
“You lose the known package of your nice organized self almost instantly here. Overeating is one way back, the way it is at funerals… — Anne Lamott Copy Share
