Quotessence
Home / Authors / Cheryl Strayed
Cheryl Strayed

Cheryl Strayed Quotes

Novelist

Filter quotes by topic

AllIfsPeopleWayWritingThinkingKnowsCheryl StrayedHardMotherAdvice

Famous Cheryl Strayed Quotes

“I receive a lot of letters like yours. Most go on in length, describing all sorts of maddening situations and communications in bewildered detail, but in each there is the same question at its core: Can I convince the person about whom I am crazy to be crazy about me? The short answer is no. The long answer is no.”

PersonsLongAnswersSituationCrazyCommunicationGoes OnLettersDetailsCoreConvinceLengthDescribingBeing CrazyBewilderedI Am Crazy
Book:Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Someone Who’s Been There
Create image

“The narratives we create in order to justify our actions and choices become in so many ways who we are. They are the things we say back to ourselves to explain our complicated lives. Perhaps the reason you've not yet been able to forgive yourself is that you're still invested in your self-loathing. Perhaps not forgiving yourself is the flip side of your stealing-this-now cycle. Would you be a better or worse person if you forgave yourself for the bad things you did? If you perpetually condemn yourself for being a liar and a thief, does that make you good?”

IfsWayPersonsDoeStillsSelfReasonAbleActionOrderChoicesSidesForgivingComplicatedStealingNarrativeWho We AreJustifyCyclesLiarsBad ThingsThievesOur ActionsFlipLoathingSelf LoathingForgive YourselfNot ForgivingComplicated Life
Author:Cheryl Strayed
Create image

“Small things such as this have saved me: how much I love my mother — even after all these years. How powerfully I carry her within me. My grief is tremendous but my love is bigger. So is yours. You are not grieving your son’s death because his death was ugly and unfair. You’re grieving it because you loved him truly. The beauty in that is greater than the bitterness of his death.”

YearsMotherLove IsGriefGreaterSonBiggerUglySavedGrievingBitternessUnfairSmall ThingsYour SonI Love My Mother
Author:Cheryl Strayed
Create image

“Your assumptions about the lives of others are in direct relation to your naïve pomposity. Many people you believe to be rich are not rich. Many people you think have it easy worked hard for what they got. Many people who seem to be gliding right along have suffered and are suffering. Many people who appear to you to be old and stupidly saddled down with kids and cars and houses were once every bit as hip and pompous as you.”

PeopleThinkingBelieveHardSeemsKidsSufferingHouseEasyBitsRichCarDirectRelationHipsAssumptionBeautiful ThingsLives Of OthersPompousGlidingPomposity
Book:Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Someone Who’s Been There
Create image

“When you meet a man in the doorway of a Mexican restaurant who later kisses you while explaining that this kiss doesn’t “mean anything” because, much as he likes you, he is not interested in having a relationship with you or anyone right now, just laugh and kiss him back. Your daughter will have his sense of humor. Your son will have his eyes.”

MenMeanEyeLaughingSonRight NowKissingDaughterLikesHis EyesRestaurantsSense Of HumorNot InterestedMexicanExplainingDoorwaysYour DaughterYour Son
Book:Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Someone Who’s Been There
Create image

“One Christmas at the very beginning of your twenties when your mother gives you a warm coat that she saved for months to buy, don’t look at her skeptically after she tells you she thought the coat was perfect for you. Don’t hold it up and say it’s longer than you like your coats to be and too puffy and possibly even too warm. Your mother will be dead by spring. That coat will be the last gift she gave you. You will regret the small thing you didn’t say for the rest of your life. Say thank you.”

GivingLooksLastsMotherPerfectRegretMonthsSpringTwentiesWarmSavedCoatsSmall ThingsRest Of Your LifeSaying Thank YouYou Will Regret
Author:Cheryl Strayed
Create image

“You will learn a lot about yourself if you stretch in the direction of goodness, of bigness, of kindness, of forgiveness, of emotional bravery. Be a warrior for love.”

IfsLoveKindnessLearningEmotionalGoodnessForgivenessBraveryWarriorNovelistsChanging The WorldAbout YourselfEssayistsFighting For Love
Book:Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Someone Who’s Been There
Create image

“Most things will be okay eventually, but not everything will be. Sometimes you'll put up a good fight and lose. Sometimes you'll hold on really hard and realize there is no choice but to let go. Acceptance is a small, quiet room.”

LifeSometimesHardChoicesFightingRealizingLosesRoomsAcceptanceQuietLetting GoOkayGood FightQuiet Room
Book:Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Someone Who’s Been There
Create image

“I had diverged, digressed, wandered, and become wild. I didn't embrace the word as my new name because it defined negative aspects of my circumstances or life, but because even in my darkest days—those very days in which I was naming myself—I saw the power of the darkness. Saw that, in fact, I had strayed and that I was a stray and that from the wild places my straying had brought me, I knew things I couldn't have known before.”

FactsNamesKnownDarknessSawsCircumstancesNegativeAspectEmbraceDefinedWild Places
Book:Wild: A Journey from Lost to Found
Create image

“We like to pretend that our generous impulses come naturally. But the reality is we often become our kindest, most ethical selves only by seeing what it feels like to be a selfish jackass first. It's the reason... we have to get burned before we understand the power of fire; the reason our most meaningful relationships are so often those that continued beyond the very juncture at which they came the closest to ending.”

FeelsFirstsSelfReasonRealityFireSeeingSelfishMeaningfulImpulseGenerousEthicalBurnedClosestJackassesMost MeaningfulJunctureMeaningful Relationship
Author:Cheryl Strayed
Create image

“What’s important is that you make the leap. Jump high and hard with intention and heart. Pay no mind to the vision that the commission made up. It’s up to you to make your life. Take what you have and stack it up like a tower of teetering blocks. Build your dream around that.”

MindHeartMadeImportantHardDreamPayVisionIntentionBlockYour DreamsLeapTowersUp To YouWhat's Important
Book:Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Someone Who’s Been There
Create image

“Don't lament so much about how your career is going to turn out. You don't have a career. You have a life. Do the work. Keep the faith. Be true blue. You are a writer because you write. Keep writing and quit your bitching. Your book has a birthday. You don't know what it is yet.”

KnowsWritingBookTurnsCareersBlueQuittingBeing TrueLamentKeep The Faith
Book:Brave Enough: A Mini Instruction Manual for the Soul
Create image

“I knew that if I allowed fear to overtake me, my journey was doomed. Fear, to a great extent, is born of a story we tell ourselves, and so I chose to tell myself a different story from the one women are told. I decided I was safe. I was strong. I was brave. Nothing could vanquish me.”

IfsDifferentStoriesStrongBornJourneySafeDecidedBraveDoomedOvercoming FearOne WomanMy JourneyVanquish
Book:Wild: A Journey from Lost to Found
Create image

“The obliterated place is equal parts destruction and creation. The obliterated place is pitch black and bright light. It is water and parched earth. It is mud and it is manna. The real work of deep grief is making a home there.”

RealHomeLightEarthBlackWaterGriefCreationEqualDestructionMudReal WorkBright LightsPitch BlackDeep Grief
Book:Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Someone Who’s Been There
Create image

“Of course you want someone special to love you. A majority of the people who write to me inquire about how they can get the same thing... Unique as every letter is, the point each writer reaches is the same: I want love and I'm afraid I'll never get it. It's hard to answer those letters because I'm an advice columnist, not a fortune-teller. I have words instead of a crystal ball. I can't say when you'll get love or how you'll find it or even promise that you will. I can only say you are worthy of it and that it's never too much to ask for it.”

PeopleWantWritingI CanHardCoursesAsksAnswersToo MuchSpecialAdviceLove YouPromiseUniqueLettersBallsMajorityFortuneWorthyCrystalsColumnistsCrystal BallSpecial SomeoneFortune Teller
Author:Cheryl Strayed
Create image

“Nobody will protect you from your suffering. You can't cry it away or eat it away or starve it away or walk it away or punch it away or even therapy it away. It's just there, and you have to survive it. You have to endure it. You have to live through it and love it and move on and be better for it and run as far as you can in the direction of your best and happiest dreams across the bridge that was built by your own desire to heal.”

DreamRunningMovingDesireSufferingWalksCryProtectBuiltAnd LoveEndurePositivityHealBridgesTherapyBeautiful ThingsProtect You
Book:Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Someone Who’s Been There
Create image

“You cannot convince people to love you. This is an absolute rule. No one will ever give you love because you want him or her to give it. Real love moves freely in both directions. Don’t waste your time on anything else.”

PeopleWantGivingRealMovingLove YouWasteAbsolutesConvinceReal LoveWant HimDon't Waste Your Time
Book:Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Someone Who’s Been There
Create image

“Their leaving made me melancholy, though I also felt something like relief when they disappeared into the dark trees. I hadn't needed to get anything from my pack; I'd only wanted to be alone. Alone had always felt like an actual place to me, as if it weren't a state of being, but rather a room where I could retreat to be who I really was.”

IfsMadeStatesWantedFeltDarkRoomsTreeNeededLeavingReliefMelancholyPacksRetreatDark Trees
Book:Wild: A Journey from Lost to Found
Create image

“Each night the black sky and the bright stars were my stunning companions; occasionally Id see their beauty and solemnity so plainly that I'd realize in a piercing way that my mother was right. That someday I WOULD be grateful and that in fact I was grateful now, that I felt something growing in me that was strong and real.”

WayRealFactsWould BeMotherNightStrongStarsFeltBlackRealizingGrowingSkyGratefulSomedayCompanionBe GratefulStunningPiercingsSolemnityBright Star
Author:Cheryl Strayed
Create image

“You don't have to get a job that makes others feel comfortable about what they perceive as your success. You don't have to explain what your plan to do with your life. You don't have to justify your education by demonstrating its financial rewards. You don't have to maintain an impeccable credit score. Anyone who expects you to do any of those things has no sense of history of economics or science or the arts.”

LifeFeelsArtJobsSuccessScienceEducationPlansComfortableEconomicsRewardsFinancialCreditPerceiveScoreJustifySugarExpectingApprovalExplainingGreat JobDemonstratingEssayistsImpeccableCredit Scores
Book:Brave Enough: A Mini Instruction Manual for the Soul
Create image

“I can't say when you'll get love or how you'll find it or even promise you that you will. I can only say you are worthy of it and that it's never too much to ask for it and that it's not crazy to fear you'll never have it again, even though your fears are probably wrong. Love is our essential nutrient. Without it, life has little meaning. It's the best thing we have to give and the most valuable thing we receive. It's worthy of all the hullabaloo.”

GivingLittlesI CanAsksLove IsToo MuchCrazyPromiseEssentialsValuableWorthyBest ThingsNutrientsValuable ThingsWrong Love
Book:Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Someone Who’s Been There
Create image

“There's no way to know what makes one thing happen and not another. What leads to what. What destroys what. What causes what to flourish or die or take another course. But I was pretty certain as I sat there that tonight that if it hadn't been for Eddie, I wouldn't have found myself on the PCT. And though it was true that everything I felt for him sat like a boulder in my throat, this realization made the boulder sit ever so much lighter. He hadn't loved me well in the end, but he'd loved me well when it mattered.”

IfsKnowsWayWellsMadeEndsHappensCertainDiesCoursesFoundFeltCausesOne ThingThings HappenRealizationSatTonightThroatLightersBoulders
Author:Cheryl Strayed
Create image

“If, as a culture, we don’t bear witness to grief, the burden of loss is placed entirely upon the bereaved, while the rest of us avert our eyes and wait for those in mourning to stop being sad, to let go, to move on, to cheer up. And if they don’t — if they have loved too deeply, if they do wake each morning thinking, I cannot continue to live — well, then we pathologize their pain; we call their suffering a disease. We do not help them: we tell them that they need to get help.”

IfsThinkingNeedsWellsHelpingEyePainMovingSufferingCultureWaitingLossGriefMorningBearsLetting GoDiseaseBurdenWitnessMourningCheerLive WellCheer UpBeing SadAvert
Author:Cheryl Strayed
Create image

“Nobody's going to do your life for you. You have to do it yourself, whether you're rich or poor, out of money or raking it in, the beneficiary of ridiculous fortune or terrible injustice. And you have to do it no matter what is true. No matter what is hard. No matter what unjust, sad, sucky things befall you. Self-pity is a dead-end road. You make the choice to drive down it. It's up to you to decide to stay parked there or to turn around and drive out.”

LifeInspirationalEndsSelfMatterHardTurnsChoicesDecisionPoorMoneyRichTerribleSadNo Matter WhatFortuneInjusticeRidiculousDrivingPityLive LifeStayingUnjustUp To YouSelf PityDo It YourselfDead EndsPower Of ChoiceRich Or PoorBeneficiariesStay Motivated
Book:Brave Enough: A Mini Instruction Manual for the Soul
Create image