We seem so frightened today of being alone that we never let it happen. Even if family, friends, and movies should fail, there is still the radio or televsion to fill up the void... We can do our housework with soap-opera heroes at our side... Now instead of planting our solitude with our own dream blossoms, we choke the space with continuous music, chatter, and companionship to which we do not even listen. It is simply there to fill the vacuum. When the noise stops there is no inner music to take its place. We must re-learn to be alone.

Only love can be divided endlessly and still not diminish.

It is only in solitude that I ever find my own core.

Why is life speeded up so? Why are things so terribly, unbearably precious that you can't enjoy them but can only wait breathless in dread of their going?

I can conceive of 'falling in love' over and over again. But 'marriage,' this richness of life itself, I cannot conceive of having again - or with anyone else. In this sense 'marriage' seems to me indissoluble.

What a commentary on our civilization, when being alone is considered suspect; when one has to apologize for it, make excuses, hide the fact that one practices it—like a secret vice!

Woman's normal occupations in general run counter to creative life, or contemplative life, or saintly life.