We tend to defend vigorously things that in our deepest hearts we are not quite certain about. If we are certain of something we know, it doesn't need defending. Madeleine L'Engle More Quotes by Madeleine L'Engle More Quotes From Madeleine L'Engle We find what we are looking for. If we are looking for life and love and openness and growth, we are likely to find them. If we are looking for witchcraft and evil, we'll likely find them, and we may get taken over by them. Madeleine L'Engle life-and-love taken writing The discipline of creation, be it to paint, compose, write, is an effort towards wholeness. Madeleine L'Engle effort discipline writing It is the ability to choose which makes us human. Madeleine L'Engle ability-to-choose ability choices You have to write the book that wants to be written. Madeleine L'Engle writing book children To grow up is to accept vulnerability. To be alive is to be vulnerable. Madeleine L'Engle growing-up maturity alive We tend to think things are new because we've just discovered them. Madeleine L'Engle discovery thinking When we are self-conscious, we cannot be wholly aware; we must throw ourselves out first. This throwing ourselves away is the act of creativity. Madeleine L'Engle creativity self firsts Anything that's natural can't be sinful-it may be inconvenient, but it's not sinful. Madeleine L'Engle sin natural may Sometimes when we have to speak suddenly we come closer to the truth than when we have time to think. Madeleine L'Engle speak sometimes thinking Integrity, like humility, is a quality which vanishes the moment we are conscious of it in ourselves. We see it only in others. Madeleine L'Engle quality humility integrity It strikes me as somewhat odd that the people who use God's name most frequently, both in life and in literature, usually don't believe in him. Madeleine L'Engle god names believe It is an extraordinary and beautiful thing that God, in creation. . . works with the beauty of matter; the reality of things; the discoveries of the senses, all five of them; so that we, in turn, may hear the grass growing; see a face springing to life in love and laughter. . . The offerings of creation. . . our glimpses of truth. Madeleine L'Engle laughter beautiful reality I would like to travel light on this journey of life, to get rid of the encumbrances I acquire each day. . . . The most difficult thing to let go is my self, that self which, coddled and cozened, becomes smaller as it becomes heavier. I don't understand how and why I come to be only as I lose myself, but I know from long experience that this is so. Madeleine L'Engle light journey letting-go We do have to use our minds as far as they will take us, yet acknowledging that they cannot take us all the way. Madeleine L'Engle use mind way If we all knew each morning that there was going to be another morning, and on and on and on, we's tend not to notice the sunrise, or hear the birds, or the waves rolling into the shore. We'd tend not to treasure our time with the people we love. Simply the awareness that our mortal lives had a beginning and will have an end enhances the quality of our living. Perhaps it's even more intense when we know that the termination of the body is near, but it shouldn't be. Madeleine L'Engle morning bird people I believe that each work of art, whether it is a work of great genius, or something very small, comes to the artist and says, "Here I am. Enflesh me. Give birth to me." Madeleine L'Engle here-i-am believe art I am encouraged as I look at some of those who have listened to their "different drum": Einstein was hopeless at school math and commented wryly on his inadequacy in human relations. Winston Churchill was an abysmal failure in his early school years. Byron, that revolutionary student, had to compensate for a club foot; Demosthenes for a stutter; and Homer was blind. Socrates couldn't manage his wife, and infuriated his countrymen. And what about Jesus, if we need an ultimate example of failure with one's peers? Or an ultimate example of love? Madeleine L'Engle love school jesus The naked intellect is an extraordinarily inaccurate instrument. Madeleine L'Engle instruments naked mind The beginning of our happiness lies in the understanding that life without wonder is not worth living. What we lack is not a will to believe but a will to wonder. Madeleine L'Engle understanding believe lying I never want to lose the story-loving child within me, or the adolescent, or the young woman, or the middle-aged one, because all together they help me to be fully alive on this journey, and show me that I must be willing to go where it takes me, even through the valley of the shadow. Madeleine L'Engle shadow journey children
