“I think the ordinary is a very under-exploited aspect of our lives because it is so familiar.” ThinkingOur LivesOrdinaryAspectFamiliar Author:Martin Parr
“Reading is essential for those who seek to rise above the ordinary. We must not permit anything to stand between us and the book that could change our lives.” BookReadingOur LivesEssentialsOrdinaryPermitRise Above Author:Jim Rohn
“Coming out of the trance of denial is painful. But crises offer us opportunities to rethink our lives. The best thing about despair is that it wakes us up. We can see the world more clearly and open to new possibilities...And we can find new joy in the ordinary.” WorldJoyOpportunityOur LivesPossibilityOffersDespairOrdinaryCrisisPainfulDenialBest ThingsComing OutTranceNew Possibilities Author:Mary Pipher
“The light has gone out of our lives... Yet I am wrong, for the light that shone in this country was no ordinary light... and a thousand years later that light will still be seen in this country and the world will see it... For that light represented the living truth.” WorldYearsStillsCountryLightGoneOur LivesAtheismThousandOrdinaryPositive AtheismThousand Years Author:Jawaharlal Nehru
“Often poetry, especially the sort of poetry I write, is concerned with looking at the borders between the sensual and the spiritual and seeing them as divided, equivocal, that mystery somehow can break in to the ordinary. And we read poetry I think in part, to gain a sense of that intimacy with things that we can't understand that are unable to be understood but that buoy up our lives.” ThinkingWritingSpiritualBreakOur LivesSeeingMysteryOrdinaryUnderstoodGainsConcernedSensualIntimacyBordersDividedBuoys Author:Kevin Hart
“Interruption, incoherence, surprise are the ordinary conditions of our life. They have even become real needs for many people, whose minds are no longer fed by anything but sudden changes and constantly renewed stimuli. We can no longer bear anything that lasts. We no longer know how to make boredom bear fruit. So the whole question comes down to this: can the human mind master what the human mind has made?” PeopleKnowsNeedsMindHumansMadeRealWholeLastsKnow HowOur LivesConditionsMastersBearsOrdinarySurpriseFruitBoredomFedsHuman MindStimulusInterruptionsIncoherenceSudden Change Author:Paul Valery
“So closely interwoven have been our lives, our purposes, and experiences that, separated, we have a feeling of incompleteness--united, such strength of self-association that no ordinary obstacles, difficulties, or dangers ever appear to us insurmountable.” Has BeensSelfFeelingsPurposeFriendshipUnitedOur LivesDangerFriendsOrdinaryDifficultyObstaclesAssociationInsurmountableIncompleteness Author:Elizabeth Cady Stanton
“Ritual consists of the external practices of spirituality that help us become more receptive and aware of the closeness of our lives to the sacred. Ritual is the act of sanctifying action - even ordinary action - so that it has meaning. I can light a candle because I need the light or because the candle represents the light I need.” NeedsI CanHelpingLightActionSpiritualityPracticeOur LivesOrdinarySacredRitualCandleClosenessReceptive Author:Christina Baldwin
“Philosophy... is indeed outrageous, inherently so. It seeks to disquiet the foundations of our lives and to offer us in recompense nothing better than itself- and this on the basis of no expert knowledge, of nothing closed to the ordinary human being, once... [one] lets himself or herself be informed by the process and ambition of philosophy.” HumansPhilosophyProcessHuman BeingsOur LivesOffersAmbitionOrdinaryBasesFoundationExpertsOutrageousRecompense Author:Stanley Cavell
“Each day the worst of our faults, our deficiencies, our crimes, the truth of our lives, is stifled under a triple layer of forgetfulness, death and the ordinary course of justice.” Life IsCoursesJusticeOur LivesWorstCrimeOrdinaryFaultsEach DayLayersForgetfulnessDeficiency Book:Three plays Source: Three plays
“I think that those of us who are ordinary disappear easily into the backdrop of life and we take things for granted. We often wake up in our lives and wonder how we got there. But the characters I create, the people I am drawn to, are quite extraordinary (and not always in wholesome ways), and they offer us the chance to understand who we really are and how we became who we are.” PeopleThinkingWayCharacterChanceWonderOur LivesOffersOrdinaryWake UpExtraordinaryDisappearGrantedWho We AreBackdropTaking Things For Granted Author:Chris Abani