One thing you have to give up is attaching importance to what people see in you.

Jeanne Moreau

amen, amen, amen.

I think happiness is what makes you pretty. Period. Happy people are beautiful. They become like a mirror and they reflect that happiness.

Drew Barrymore

(as always, via one of my favorite tumblrs).

among other things, you'll find that you're not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and sickened by 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 troubled morally and spiritually as you are right now. happily, some of them kept records of their troubles. you'll learn from them--if you want to. just as someday, if you have something of offer, someone will learn something from you. it's a beautiful reciprocal arrangement. and it isn't education. it's history. it's poetry.

the catcher in the rye
j. d. salinger

i, with a deeper instinct, choose a man who compels my strength, who makes enormous demands on me, who does not doubt my courage or my toughness, who does not believe me naive or innocent, who has the courage to treat me like a woman.

anais nin

you cannot protect yourself from sadness without protecting yourself from happiness. 

jonathan safran foer, extremely loud and incredibly close






(sometimes i wish i had this etched on the palm of my hand so i could carry it as a constant reminder--so i could literally wrap my fist around it).