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Quote by Michael Dean Russell Jr.

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Michael Dean Russell Jr.

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“He found himself pacing, stoopshouldered, up and down the tiny limits of his cabin, and checked himself furiously. The iron-​nerved captain of his dreams would not allow himself to work himself into this sort of fever, even though his professional reputation was to be at stake in four hours' time. He must show the ship that he, too, could face uncertainty with indifference.”

“And then, God help me, on my first morning, in the first few minutes of my first morning, I felt that this alien northern countryside was friendly, that I’d turned a corner and that this summer of 1920, which was to smoulder on until the first leaves fell, was to be a propitious season of living, a blessed time. I told myself that I didn’t care how long the job took me – what was left of July, August, September, even October. I was going to be happy, live simply, spend as little as paraffin, bread, vegetables and a bit of bully-beef now and then might cost me.”

“When we don’t think we’re worth much, we find ways to make our world small. We don’t allow ourselves to hope because we’ve already excepted failure. And this pattern of thinking often determines the outcome of our most important choices. But Sam, I have to tell you that doubt and confidence are both acts of faith. They’re both predictions of our capabilities. We either tell ourselves that we can or that we can’t. And these beliefs are a self-fulfilling prophecy, because we validate our doubts by giving up just as much as we are embolden ourselves by refusing to give in. The only way you can break this cycle is to be brave. You have to ignore your doubts and risk failure. You have to try to achieve something that seems unachievable. This is the best recipe for confidence. And confidence is how we get how we start giving ourselves permission to take up more space in the world, to want more for ourselves, and to feel as though we deserve it.”

“She loved herself when she could. She regretted nothing but her limp (not the limp itself, but how it came to be). The world tried to make her feel some other way, though. It had tried to make her bitter about herself. It had tried to turn her own thinking against her. It had tried to make her gaze upon her reflection and judge what she saw as repulsive. She did none of these things. . . When she felt her shape, it evoked in her another outlawed quality: confidence. None of this was visible to the naked eye. It was a silent rebellion, but it was the very privacy of it that she enjoyed most. Because there was precious little of that here—privacy, joy, take your pick.”