"You gotta stop using your wishbone where your backbone oughta be"

"There are no beautiful surfaces without terrible depths." (Friedrich Nietsche)

No surface is beautiful without some sort of a struggle.

Or so I've heard.

say what the fuck you want.

"If you're a real artist, have no fear. Say what the fuck you want. Do what you want. Make what you want. And if it's meant to be, the people will stand up..."

- Kanye West (this is all I got from that ten minute rant during a recent concert at Bowery Ballroom in New York)

Yeezy sometimes you get it so right...

"You must write every single day of your life. You must lurk in libraries to sniff books like perfumes and wear books like hats upon your crazy head. May you be in love everyday for the next 20,000 days. And out of that love, remake a world." -Ray Bradbury

why search anymore.

"You are what you want to become. Why search anymore? You are a wonderful manifestation. The whole universe has come together to make your existence possible. There is nothing that is not you. The kingdom of God, the Pure Land, nirvana, happiness, and liberation are all you."

- Thich Nhat Hanh

yiddish| #5

[begin thoughtful quote]

"So I'm going out there.

And I'm going to do the best I can.

People are going to get in my way.

Things are going to bring me down.

But I'm going to keep going.

I'm going to reach as far as I can, for everything I've ever wanted.

And I'm not going to give up.

Because that's what you do when your dreams are more important than your fears.

You go out there and ignore the odds.

You focus on one thing -

That your dreams come true."

- K. Boulden

[end thoughtful quote]

Like my man Buzz Lightyear once said:

To infinity and beyond.

all that is gold does not glitter| j.r.r. tolkien.

"All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.
From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
A light from the shadows shall spring;
Renewed shall be blade that was broken,
The crownless shall be king."

[via]

the truth according to j.d.

"Among other things, you'll find that you're not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and even sick of human behavior. You're by no means alone on that score, you'll be excited and stimulated to know. Many, many men have been just as trouble morally and spiritually as you are right now. Happily, some of them kept records of their troubles. You'll learn from them." (J.D. Salinger)

I posted this quote on the day J.D. Salinger died back in January.
I posted it again today because I needed it.
I'm reading Isabelle Eberhardt right now because I think she's one of those people that kept a record of her struggle.
I hope this helps you as much as it's helping me.

"Your destiny isn't tied to anyone that left."

"To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get use to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty in its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all to watch. To try and understand. To never looking away. And never, never to forget" - Arundhati Roy

a sun drenched tomorrow.

"Now more than ever do I realize that I shall never be content with a sedatary life, and that I shall always be haunted by thoughts of a sun drenched elsewhere." - Isabelle Eberhardt

Couldn't have said it better myself.

"Don't get impatient when it takes too long. And drink it all even when it tastes too strong." - Drake (Light Up)

the tension of opposites.

"Life is a series of pulls back and forth. You want to do one thing, but you are bound to something else. Something hurts you, yet you know it shouldn't. You take certain things for granted, even when you know you should never take anything for granted. A tension of opposites, like a pull on a rubber band. And most of us live somewhere in the middle." (Tuesdays with Morrie)

try a little harder why dontcha?

"I will always be proud that even when it looks like I can't, even when I feel like I can't, I'm always pushing a little harder just to see if maybe I can." (Kathrine Reutter)

This always seems to get me out of a bind.

i forgot how much i loved this.

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start telling them,
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,
It's the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my steps,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal Woman,
That's me. (Maya Angelou)

"Don't be discouraged. It's often the last key in the bunch that opens the lock..." (Unknown)

blood + sweat.

"Remember what they say; there's no shortcut to a dream. It's all blood and sweat and life is what you manage in between. But what you don't know, is you're to young and eager to love..." - Broken Bells (October)

live. breath. be.

"Fake it until you make it. Act good until you are good. Practice confidence until you're confident, be patient even when it's killing you. Consider yourself interesting until you truly believe you are, and eventually you won't be faking it anymore...you'll be living it. (Janice Dickinson)

deny reality.

"I've always been a rebel. I never do things the way they're suppose to be done. Either I go in the opposite direction or create a new direction for myself, regardless of what the rules are or what society says."

- Grace Jones [via: Jennifer Farris]

rework the system.

via [rework]