True beauty, the kind that doesn't fade or wash off, takes time. It takes incredible endurance. It is the slow drip that creates the stalactite, the shaking of the Earth that creates mountains, the constant pounding of the waves that breaks up the rocks and smooths the rough edges. And from the violence, the furor, the raging of the winds, the roaring of the waters, something better emerges, something that would have otherwise never existed.

There isn't heartache if there hasn't been joy. I wouldn't feel loss if there hadn't been love.

But maybe you see beauty in me because you are beautiful, not because I am.

Sometimes the things we want to be rescued from can save us.

Someone told me once that to create true art you must be willing to bleed and let others watch.

This is just me. Get used to it.

Usually redemption implies rescue - being saved. What were you being saved from?' he inquired, his voice carefully neutral. 'Ugliness.