“You can always tell a voice is fear when it asks you to leave instead of show up” (pg 17).
“We’re transformed when we sing songs together. We’re transformed when someone shares their story. We’re transformed when we care for others” (pg 28).
“What needed to die in your dream, your envisioned ideal, was a version of you without vulnerabilities . . . the you that was in there was someone without weaknesses. A version of you that is tough as nails, unwaveringly confident, knows everything, never makes a mistake, has no regrets, is able to do anything on your own, never has a moment of self-doubt, figured it all out early on, is the best of the best in your field . . . vulnerability is our relationship to our weaknesses” (pg 35).
First Argument : Nothing is Going to Change
“ We really don’t see anything as it is now. We only see now through the lens of the past” and “how we see the world is rarely the same thing as how the world actually is” (pg 46, 47).
“Familiarity kills wonder and stands in the way of the ever-evolving future” (pg 55).
Ostranenie: “To defamiliarize yourself with knowing something” . . . to ask, “What don’t I know?”
Out of our own wreckage and failure, become a gift to others - story of the wrecked ship (pg 69)
The Second Argument : You Suck and are Ugly
“Exposer to highly idealized representations of peers on social media elicits feelings of envy and the distorted belief that others lead happier, more successful lives” (pg 102).
“You suck at being someone else” (pg 110).
“Everything that exists was created by the slow, daily work of contribution” (pg 111).
“Once it became a possibility for one person, it became a possibility for many more” (pg 133)
Third Argument : Dying is Better than Living
“We don’t have to end our lives completely, but we can kill off the parts of it that remind us of how disappointed we are in the way life turned out” (pg 163).
“Regrets are defined as a sense of loss, a disappointment in some kind of action or lack of action. The reason regrets are so poignant is that they point to our deepest longings - the path of desire that has been put in us to walk, the path we stopped walking because of fear, disappointment, unworthiness, or brokenheartedness” (pg 168)
“Nobody escapes being wounded. We are all wounded people, whether physically, emotionally, mentally, or spiritually. The main question is not ‘How can we hide our wounds?’ so we don’t have to be embarrassed, but ‘How can we put our woundedness in the service of others?’ When our wounds cease to be a source of shame, and become a source of healing, we have become wounded healers” (pg 176).
“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive” (pg 187).
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