Memoir Quotes

“Tell the truth, or someone will tell it for you.”
― Stephanie Klein, Straight Up and Dirty

“In life you'll meet a lot of jerks. If they hurt you, tell yourself that it's because they're stupid. That will help keep you from reacting to their cruelty. Because there is nothing worse than bitterness and vengeance... Always keep your dignity and be true to yourself.”
― Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood

“Yesterday was surreal. At times K was almost back to herself…funny…interested and relatively mobile. She was tactile and we kissed…she whispered naughty comments into my ear…achingly beautiful…I love her so much”
― Peter B. Forster, More Than Love, A Husband's Tale

“I feel about Photoshop the way some people feel about abortion. It is appalling and a tragic reflection on the moral decay of our society…unless I need it, in which case, everybody be cool.”
― Tina Fey

“There is strange comfort in knowing that no matter what happens today, the Sun will rise again tomorrow.”
― Aaron Lauritsen, 100 Days Drive: The Great North American Road Trip

“I'm often asked what I think about as I run. Usually the people who ask this have never run long distances themselves. I always ponder the question. What exactly do I think about when I'm running? I don't have a clue.”
― Haruki Murakami, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

“Suicide is a form of murder— premeditated murder. It isn’t something you do the first time you think of doing it. It takes some getting used to. And you need the means, the opportunity, the motive. A successful suicide demands good organization and a cool head, both of which are usually incompatible with the suicidal state of mind.

It’s important to cultivate detachment. One way to do this is to practice imagining yourself dead, or in the process of dying. If there’s a window, you must imagine your body falling out the window. If there’s a knife, you must imagine the knife piercing your skin. If there’s a train coming, you must imagine your torso flattened under its wheels. These exercises are necessary to achieving the proper distance.

The debate was wearing me out. Once you've posed that question, it won't go away. I think many people kill themselves simply to stop the debate about whether they will or they won't. Anything I thought or did was immediately drawn into the debate. Made a stupid remark—why not kill myself? Missed the bus—better put an end to it all. Even the good got in there. I liked that movie—maybe I shouldn’t kill myself.

In reality, it was only part of myself I wanted to kill: the part that wanted to kill herself, that dragged me into the suicide debate and made every window, kitchen implement, and subway station a rehearsal for tragedy.”
― Susanna Kaysen

“Remember that you own what happened to you. If your childhood was less than ideal, you may have been raised thinking that if you told the truth about what really went on in your family, a long bony white finger would emerge from a cloud and point to you, while a chilling voice thundered, "We *told* you not to tell." But that was then. Just put down on paper everything you can remember now about your parents and siblings and relatives and neighbors, and we will deal with libel later on.”
― Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird

“Each of us is a book waiting to be written, and that book, if written, results in a person explained.”
― Thomas M. Cirignano, The Constant Outsider: Memoirs of a South Boston Mechanic

“Just a middle-age man with all the privilege that unasked for gift affords. When in truth it seems, we see suffering as the province of children, mothers, wives and lovers. Broken, struck by the hand of a man’s blind ambition, brutish strength. What of the gentle-man with the soft voice…”
― Peter B. Forster, More Than Love, A Husband's Tale

“I am forever engaged in a silent battle in my head over whether or not to lift the fork to my mouth, and when I talk myself into doing so, I taste only shame. I have an eating disorder.”
― Jena Morrow, Hollow: An Unpolished Tale

“Imagine your worst day, multiply it by a hundred, and pray to your God
that you never experience what some of the people in this war zone go
through, everyday, without any hope of it getting better. Ever. Compared
to these people, every day, no matter how bad, is the best day ever. I
know nothing about pain, nothing about suffering and hopefully never will.”
― Hendri Coetzee, Living the Best Day Ever

“The struggles we endure today will be the ‘good old days’ we laugh about tomorrow.”
― Aaron Lauritsen, 100 Days Drive: The Great North American Road Trip

“No amount of me trying to explain myself was doing any good. I didn't even know what was going on inside of me, so how could I have explained it to them?”
― Sierra D. Waters, Debbie.

“I learned in therapy the word "No" is a complete sentence.”
― Jaycee Dugard, A Stolen Life

“You know, everybody's ignorant, just on different subjects.”
― Will Rogers

“I have had the best day ever more times that I can remember. So yes,
I believe I am ready to die if that is what is needed to live as I want to.”
― Hendri Coetzee, Living the Best Day Ever

“You are putting yourself in serious danger...'

I think that I preferred to put myself in serious danger rather than confront my shame. My shame at not having become someone, the shame of not having made my parents proud after all the sacrifices they had made for me. The shame of having become a mediocre nihilist.”
― Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis 2: The Story of a Return

“In my opinion, our health care system has failed when a doctor fails to treat an illness that is treatable.”
― Kevin Alan Lee, The Split Mind: Schizophrenia from an Insider's Point of View

“I know now that we never get over great losses; we absorb them, and they carve us into different, often kinder, creatures. ...We tell the story to get them back, to capture the traces of footfalls through the snow.”
― Gail Caldwell, Let's Take the Long Way Home: A Memoir of Friendship

“Everyone knows that Africa is not reasonable place but if we can get
across that neither are we, we strengthen the bond with the continent.
People are not conscious beings, just ask any marketer. Irrationality
of the early explorers, irrationality of the new ones, irrationality
of the place we go into. What a great canvas we have to paint on...”
― Hendri Coetzee, Living the Best Day Ever

“It's in those quiet little towns, at the edge of the world, that you will find the salt of the earth people who make you feel right at home.”
― Aaron Lauritsen, 100 Days Drive: The Great North American Road Trip

“Her lips full and inviting, she has an infectious laugh and glassy cackle in her eyes, and a 2000 volt sexual charisma that beckons me like a fluff girl on scuffed knees.”
― Brett Tate

“Your own setbacks aren’t what they first appear to be; rather than viewing them as failures, view them as learning opportunities that are the building blocks for future preparation.”
― Steve Pemberton, The Lighthouse Effect: How Ordinary People Can Have an Extraordinary Impact in the World

“I’m learning persistence and the closing of doors, the way the seasons come and go as I keep walking on these roads, back and forth, to find myself in new time zones, new arms with new phrases and new goals. And it hurts to become, hurts to find out about the poverty and gaps, the widow and the leavers. It hurts to accept that it hurts and it hurts to learn how easy it is for people to not need other people. Or how easy it is to need other people but that you can never build a home in someone’s arms because they will let go one day and you must build your own.”
― Charlotte Eriksson, Another Vagabond Lost To Love: Berlin Stories on Leaving & Arriving

“There seems to be a requirement for just so many people to be in the poor class, just as the need for a middle class exists. One class actually supports the other. The only way to get out of that cycle is to fight your way out. Never pass up an opportunity, and stick your foot into every open door, even if it’s just to see what’s inside. If there’s a possibility of seeing something you never have seen to experiencing something new. Do it. ”
― Gaylan D. Wright, Slave to the Dream: Everyone’s Dream

“Write about small, self-contained incidents that are still vivid in your memory. If you remember them, it's because they contain a larger truth that your readers will recognize in their own lives. Think small and you'll wind up finding the big themes in your family saga. ”
― William Zinsser

“What I have learned so far had been an incredible journey and adventure. I remained in my own character even when I was not well liked. I now enter a room looking for people I may like rather than for those who will like me. There are people who change their demeanor between regular people and professional people. Just try to be who you are consistently and let those closest to you see your best, along with those you work with. People around you should not be the cause of change in your personal character.”
― Gaylan D. Wright, Slave to the Dream: Everyone’s Dream

“From this point forward, you don’t even know how to quit in life.”
~ Aaron Lauritsen, ‘100 Days Drive”
― Aaron Lauritsen

“Into every sunny life a little rain must fall.”
― Elizabeth Wurtzel, Prozac Nation