Quotes by Thinking If you just got enough expertise and enough special techniques and read up enough, then you could shape a child into the kind of adult you wanted. There's almost this kind of competitive enterprise. That picture is the picture I think people often imply when they use the word "parenting". Alison Gopnik childrenpeoplethinking You read a bunch of books and you get a bunch of how-tos, and you take a bunch of classes and you learn a bunch of techniques. You set yourself goals and benchmarks. I think people have imported that into their experience of taking care of children. Alison Gopnik bookchildrenthinking Adults tend to think they have much free will. Kids younger than six are less sure. They may be more realistic! Alison Gopnik free-willkidsthinking Children are the most amazing thing in the universe, as far as I'm concerned. If you're worrying about how it's going to turn out, you aren't experiencing that day-to-day satisfaction of being with these incredible, extraordinary creatures. Every single one of them is the most incredible, extraordinary creature that you're ever going to want to see. I think the joy of having that deep relationship - that's the core of what being a parent is. Alison Gopnik worrychildrenthinking A lot of times students will come up to me and say, "Well, I can't write because I don't know what I think about such-and-such." And I say, "That's why you have to write." You don't wait until you know, because then who cares - it's static. Alison Hawthorne Deming waitingwritingthinking I think you have to live inside your contradictions and find a way to accept that that's the human condition - to be forced to live in contradiction. Alison Hawthorne Deming contradictionwaythinking I'm really interested in culture because it is such a powerful human force, particularly in America where we think it's all about the individual. Alison Hawthorne Deming powerfulamericathinking As deaths have accumulated I have begun to think of life and death as a set of balance scales. When one is young, the scale is heavily tipped toward the living. With the first death, the first consciousness of death, the counter scale begins to fall. Death by death, the scales shift weight until what was unthinkable becomes merely a matter of gravity and the fall into death becomes an easy step. Alison Hawthorne Deming deathfallthinking I do think that the long poem speaks for an inner need for continuity. We live in a time of so many losses, disruptions, and distractions, that the need for a sense of the ongoing is quite real. The long poem is very satisfying in offering the psyche a model of coherence. Alison Hawthorne Deming reallossthinking I'm interested in thinking about how are we contributing to the culture, what we can write that might help us deepen the culture, make us more reflective, make us more empathetic, make us feel our connectedness in other ways. Alison Hawthorne Deming writingculturethinking I'm just really interested in the interface of the individual with the collective. I think that's where the arts live. Alison Hawthorne Deming individualartthinking Sometimes it gets talked about as if life is all about the individual, and I don't think it is. I'm really interested in what writing can contribute to a kind of cultural intelligence. Alison Hawthorne Deming kindwritingthinking I do think environmental writers need to be forward thinking, not just lamenting our losses. We do need to lament; in some ways it's important to be the vessels for grief for all that's being lost on our planet. But we also need to be forward thinking. Alison Hawthorne Deming grieflossthinking I don't want people to write programmatic environmental poems, but I think sustainability should become deeply a part of the consciousness of poetry - an impulse toward compassion, empathy, and social justice. Alison Hawthorne Deming compassionwritingthinking As poets, we don't accept oppression; we are about a freedom of spirit, or whatever you want to call it. I think environmental concerns have to go to the deep place, so we speak from a place of great empathy for the planet - for the disadvantaged people, animals, places, cultures. Alison Hawthorne Deming animalpeoplethinking A lot of people who look at my photographs think it is an easy joke, but it does take a bit of thinking about. Alison Jackson doepeoplethinking Primates stand at a turning point in the course of evolution. Primates are to the biologist what viruses are to the biochemist. They can be analysed and partly understood according to the rules of a simpler discipline, but they also present another level of complexity: viruses are living chemicals, and primates are animals who love and hate and think. Alison Jolly hatesciencethinking I think that people respond to honesty in music, so I only choose songs that are the truth for me. Alison Krauss honestysongthinking I still think of myself as from Illinois. Alison Krauss illinoisstillsthinking Songs come from all over the place. You can't predict what you're going to like. You might like something that doesn't fit right now. What was working for you at one point, something you've loved for years and years, when you get together with everybody, you think, this doesn't match up with what's going on with you personally. Alison Krauss songyearsthinking«142143144145146147148149150151152»
