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Quote by Elin Hilderbrand

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Winter Stroll

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Author

Elin Hilderbrand
Elin Hilderbrand

Elin Hilderbrand is an American author known for her heartwarming family novels. Her works are typically set in Massachusetts and tell stories about love, family, and friendship. more

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“John Bowlby understood that our need for someone to share our lives with is part of our genetic makeup and has nothing to do with how much we love ourselves or how fulfilled we feel on our own. He discovered that once we choose someone special, powerful and often uncontrollable forces come into play. New patterns of behavior kick in regardless of how independent we are and despite our conscious wills. Once we choose a partner, there is no question about whether dependency exists or not. It always does. An elegant coexistence that does not include uncomfortable feelings of vulnerability and fear of loss sounds good but is not our biology. What proved through evolution to have a strong survival advantage is a human couple becoming one physiological unit, which means that if she’s reacting, then I’m reacting, or if he’s upset, that also makes me unsettled. He or she is part of me, and I will do anything to save him or her; having such a vested interest in the well-being of another person translates into a very important survival advantage for both parties.”

IndependenceBiologyAttachmentSurvival InstinctConciousnessCo Dependency
Book:Attached: The New Science of Adult Attachment and How It Can Help You Find—and Keep—Love
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“in 1775 there arose a remarkable civic society that aimed to end slavery itself. The society was formed not by Johnson, nor in Johnson’s vaunted London, nor indeed anywhere in Britain proper, but rather in Philadelphia, the host city of the Continental Congress. Two of the society’s early leaders were Benjamin Franklin and Benjamin Rush, who both, in the summer of 1776, added their names to the American Declaration of Independence.”

Independence
Book:The Words That Made Us: America's Constitutional Conversation, 1760-1840
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“However, there was one crucial difference between the narrator and myself: the narrator, as you mentioned, stayed true to her beliefs, even when no one would listen to them, and even though her husband did not approve of her writing, she still kept writing all her thoughts about that resting cure in her diary. On the other hand, I always thought I was hopeless, and although I was aware that my desires and my cousin’s and uncle’s desires are polar opposites, I never internally believed that my thoughts were well-justified, like you and the narrator have done. I even had an empty journal with me, and I was tempted to write down all my thoughts, but I felt so ashamed of my own beliefs that I could not write them down at all---another difference between me and the narrator. But now, you gave this lesson for the C.I.L. where the main character stayed true to herself and was unafraid of writing down her thoughts and experiences---she wrote spontaneously and unreluctantly, while I suffered from severe writer’s block.”

FreedomIndependenceSubmissionThe Yellow Wallpaper
Book:The Reformation
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“Yes, it would be easier if I made all the decisions.” Lucky met Snap’s eye. “Easier for you. But do you want to be led by the nose all your life, as though you were living with longpaws, like a Leashed Dog?” He turned to give Sunshine a hard look. “Is that what you’ve fought and survived for—to let others boss you around? You want me to tell you what to think, what to eat, when to sleep, when to wake up? Even if it means you hardly eat at all? Even if you sleep in the draft and wake up freezing cold?”

LeadershipIndependenceDecisionsFree Will
Book:The Endless Lake
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