Bird by bird buddy. Just take it bird by bird.

— Anne Lamott

Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.

— Anne Lamott

But how?" my students ask. "How do you actually do it?" You sit down, I say. You try to sit down at approximately the same time every day. This is how you train your unconscious to kick in for you creatively. So you sit down at, say, nine every morning, or ten every night. You put a piece of paper in the typewriter, or you turn on the computer and bring up the right file, and then you stare at it for an hour or so. You begin rocking, just a little at first, and then like a huge autistic child. Furthermore, you look at the ceiling, and over at the clock, yawn, and stare at the paper again. Then, with your fingers poised on the keyboard, you squint at an image that is forming in your mind -- a scene, a locale, a character, whatever -- and you try to quiet your mind so you can hear what that landscape or character has to say above the other voices in your mind.

— Anne Lamott

But you are not your bank account, or your ambition. You're not the cold clay lump you leave behind when you die. You're not your collection of walking personality disorders. Furthermore, you are Spirit, you are love, and even though it is hard to believe sometimes, you are free. Furthermore, you're here to love, and be loved, freely. If you find out next week that you are terminally ill - and we're all terminally ill on this bus - what will matter are memories of beauty, that people loved you, and that you loved them.

— Anne Lamott

But you don't always get what you want;, you get what you get

— Anne Lamott

Certainty is missing the point entirely.

— Anne Lamott

E.L. Doctorow said once said that 'Writing a novel is like driving a car at night. You can see only as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.' You don't have to see where you're going, you don't have to see your destination or everything you will pass along the way. Furthermore, you just have to see two or three feet ahead of you. This is right up there with the best advice on writing, or life, I have ever heard.

— Anne Lamott

Everyone is flailing through this life without an owner's manual, with whatever modicum of grace and good humor we can manage.

— Anne Lamott

Every Sunday I nudge Sam in her direction, and he walks to where she is sitting and hugs her. She smells him behind the ears, where he most smells like sweet unwashed new potatoes. This is in fact what I think God may smell like, a young child's slightly dirty neck.

— Anne Lamott

First find a path, and a little light to see by. Then push up your sleeves and start helping.

— Anne Lamott