The wish to pray is a prayer in itself.
Truth is meant to save you first, and the comfort comes afterwards.
When writing of oneself one should show no mercy. Yet why at the first attempt to discover one's own truth does all inner strength seem to melt away in floods of self-pity and tenderness and rising tears?
...the most dangerous shortsightedness consists in underestimating the mediocre.
Hope is a risk that must be run.
I know the compassion of others is a relief at first. I don't despise it. But it can't quench pain, it slips through your soul as through a sieve. And when our suffering has been dragged from one pity to another, as from one mouth to another, we can no longer respect or love it.