Quotes that Inspire Me

So pleased to share some favorite writing , art, music, creativity and mindfulness quotes I’ve collected over many years. This is a new addition to my website; please come back and visit as I’ll be updating it.

I have used these quotes in teaching mindfulness, and as inspiration for my own mindfulness, writing, music, art practice, and life. And I hope you might find them inspiring and helpful!

On Mindfulness (and Creativity…)

“In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's mind there are few. ” —Shunryu Suzuki

“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeing new landscapes but in having new eyes.”—Marcel Proust

“How extraordinary it is to be here at all.” —Stephen Batchelor

“Stop worrying if your vision is new. Let others make that decision . . . they usually do.”  —Stephen Sondheim, Sunday in the Park with George.

“Guilt and regret are my familiars, and it’s a continual challenge to pry myself from their grip. This poem encounters a reprieve—a mercy strong enough to throw me into a delirious acceptance of all my past failures—for the moment. And if we write (and read) to be changed—and I do—then I trust that at least a trace of that acceptance will stay with me.”
—Ellen Bass

“I love loving something so much that you simply don’t care what other people think…”

-Mary Ruefle

On Writing…

"Content is often unsettling or painful in poems, but form is play, a residue of the fun the poet had while working.  Of course, like form and content, pain and fun want to be each other.”

—William Matthews

“I was fretting too much over that opening sentence. I decided to just start writing. Simple little words…There is a little town on a hill called Santa Victoria.” —Robert Creighton

“By making us stop for a moment, poetry gives us an opportunity to think about ourselves as human beings on this planet and what we mean to each other.” —Rita Dove

Write a little every day, without hope, without despair.” —Isak Denison.

““Write a little every day, without hope, without despair.” Isak Denison.

“How/am I supposed to know/that an old, white-haired guy/a grown-up, is watching me/ from his desk in the future/writing down every move I make.” George Bilgere, Cheap Motels of Youth (Rattle, 2024)

“I asked how can you ever be sure
that what you write is really
any good at all and he said you can’t…
you die without knowing 
whether anything you wrote was any good
if you have to be sure don’t write.”  -"Berryman” by W.S. Merwin

On Visual Art…

*“It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.” —Pablo Picasso

Other Quotes That Inspire (Me)…

“Do one thing every day that scares you.” —Eleanor Roosevelt

“I love loving something so much that you simply don't care what other people think.” —Jenni B. Baker

“We have eternity to be humble.” —Mary Ruefl

“Talent isn’t important. Anybody can have that. What’s important is work.” —Ludwig Mies van der Rohe

On Rejection

“Paper your wall w/ rejection slips.”  —John Berryman

“Anne (Sexton) actually seemed to enjoy the process of sending out material.  She had envelopes addressed to the magazines she favored, and when her poems came back in the mail, she immediately transferred them to new envelopes and sent them right out again.” —Kathleen Spivak

On Music

"If you don't live it, it won't come out your horn."  Charlie Parker

Sam Cooke said this when told he had a beautiful voice,, "Well that's very kind of you, but voices ought not to be measured by how pretty they are. Instead they matter only if they convince you that they are telling the truth." Think about that the next time you are listening to a singer. 

“Everything we hear is music.” —John Cage

“Good music is good no matter what kind of music it is”—Miles Davis

On Failure…