Girl Unobserved

"

I honour the place in you in which the entire universe dwells. I honour the place in you which is of love, of truth, of light, and of peace. When you are in that place in you, and I am in that place in me, we are one.

Namaste.

"

—

Ancient Sanskrit Blessing

"I want to taste and glory in each day, and never be afraid to experience pain; and never shut myself up in a numb core of nonfeeling, or stop questioning and criticizing life and take the easy way out. To learn and think: to think and live; to live and learn: this always, with new insight, new understanding, and new love."

— Sylvia Plath, The Unabridged Journals

"I believe a strong woman may be stronger than a man, particularly if she happens to have love in her heart. I guess a loving woman is indestructible."

—

John Steinbeck, East of Eden

I’m still slowly but surely reading through this book. It really is beautiful, and from it I’ve found my new favorite quote about women.

"And this I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. And this I would fight for: the freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected. And this I must fight against: any idea, religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual. This is what I am and what I am about."

— John Steinbeck, East of Eden

"At a certain age, we have already been struck by love; it no longer develops alone, according to its own mysteries and fateful laws while our hearts stand by startled and passive. We come to its assistance … Recognizing one of its symptoms, we recall, we bring back to life the others. Since we possess its song engraved in its totality within us, we do not need for a woman to tell us the beginning—filled with admiration inspired by beauty—to find the continuation."

—

Marcel Proust. Nouvelle Revue Française (1913). Remembrance of Things Past, vol. I, Swann’s Way, p. 196, Pléiade (1954).

I wish I’d develop the ability to read Proust. He’s so hard to understand.

"He smiled understandingly-much more than understandingly. It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life. It faced—or seemed to face—the whole external world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor. It understood you just as far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself."

— F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby