I know our feelings can be so unbearable that we employ ingenious strategies – unconscious strategies – to keep those feelings away. We do a feelings-swap, where we avoid feeling sad or lonely or afraid or inadequate, and feel angry instead. It can work the other way, too – sometimes you do need to feel angry, not inadequate; sometimes you do need to feel love and acceptance, and not the tragic drama of your life. It takes courage to feel the feeling – and not trade it on the feelings-exchange, or even transfer it altogether to another person.

Yes, the past is another country, but one that we can visit, and once there we can bring back the things we need.

There's so little wonder left in the world because we've seen everything one way or another'.

To avoid discovery I stay on the run. To discover things for myself, I stay on the run.

For fate may hang on any moment and at any moment be changed.

Your weak point is the open, vulnerable place where you can always be hurt. Love, in all its aspects, opens the self so fully.

Islands are metaphors of the heart, no matter what poet says otherwise.