Quotes – Page 3 – The Write Spot

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.
— Steve Jobs

Click here for more Steve Jobs quotes.

Map of “Steve’s Places” by Romain Moisescot, Webmaster, all about Steve Jobs.com

I love what Romain has done with his blog, especially the January 26, 2013 post, since I love catching movie gaffes.

And being a writer, of course I love stories. Here’s the story behind all about Steve Jobs.com:

“My name is Romain Moisescot and I am the webmaster of all about Steve Jobs.com. By webmaster I mean the owner, designer, developer and editor of the website, which is a one-man operation. I started it on February 24, 2006, Steve Jobs’s 51st birthday… and my 19th.

The website was named all about Steve back then, but its objective was the same as today’s: to bring you (and me) the most complete online resource about Steve Jobs. Although I had been an avid Mac user since my early teens, I had become a huge fan of the man after reading his biography by Alan Deutschman, The Second Coming of Steve Jobs, in 2004. After trying to gather more information about him, I was desperate to see that no good website was dedicated to him: so I decided to build one.”

Note from Marlene: I love this. . . love Romain’s Can-do attitude. Create and build what your heart desires.
The way I write, it’s like feeling your way in the dark. You don’t know if it’s going to catch fire — not just your imagination, but your emotions.
— Dan Coshnear

Northern California writer Dan Coshnear is the author of two collections of stories, Jobs & Other Preoccupations (Helicon Nine 2001) and Occupy & Other Love Stories (Kelly’s Cove Press 2012). Born in Baltimore in 1961, he has traveled in Europe, Canada, Mexico, Haiti, and all over the U.S., often by thumb, and once for a few thousand miles by freight train. After living on Cape Cod and in New York and San Francisco, he finally settled with his wife, Susan, in a house under some very tall trees along the Russian River in Sonoma County, California. His stories have been published in Fourteen Hills, juked, The Missouri Review, Third Coast and Zyzzyva.

About Dan’s latest publication . . . Occupy & Other Love Stories

“To occupy means to be present, to be available emotionally, to stand up for oneself, and sometimes to protest. The opposite is absence. To be rendered silent, useless, vacant because of fear or confusion or despair. Each of the stories presents a challenge, not only to an individual character but to a relationship. This short story collection from award-winning California author Daniel Coshnear includes 12 stories about occupation, featuring ordinary heroes. A thoughtful mood is reinforced with 16 full color images from Oakland artist and UC Berkeley Professor Emeritus Squeak Carnwath.”
I wrote another personal essay, in part with the column in mind but mostly with the intention of simply telling my story. There was a message I wanted to convey in the piece: one of loss and sadness, but also of triumph and survival. Because I had taken my focus off publication while writing, I went deep into storytelling mode. Much of the writing for the piece was done in subconscious writing fashion. When I finished a decent draft, I went outside to water my flower garden. I felt a certainty that hadn’t been there before. the essay was so good, so moving. I knew it would be published — if not in the target column, then certainly elsewhere.
— Rebecca Lawton

Note from Marlene: What strikes me as being important in this passage is when Becca let go of the thought of publishing, she was able to go “deep into storytelling mode.” That’s my wish for you.

Write whatever you want to write. Don’t worry about a thing. . . don’t think about publishing, don’t think about anyone looking over your shoulder. No judging. No criticizing. Just write.
Your gut may lead you astray, but it’s never wrong. If you don’t have the guts to act on something and the moment passes, you will always remember that you were a gutless wonder. In gut we trust
— Herb Caen

Herb Caen (1916–1997) was a journalist whose daily column of local goings-on and insider gossip, social and political happenings, painful puns and offbeat anecdotes appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle for nearly sixty years.

“The secret of Caen’s success [was] his outstanding ability to take a wisp of fog, a chance phrase overheard in an elevator, a happy child on a cable car, a deb in a tizzy over a social reversal, a family in distress and give each circumstance the magic touch that makes a reader an understanding eyewitness of the day’s happenings.” Wikipedia
All writing is communications; creative writing communication through revelation — it the Self escaping into the open
— E. B. White

E.B. White was a contributor to The New Yorker, co-author of The Elements of Style and author of Charlotte’s Web.
When one is freshly informed, has a serendipitous experience, one’s mood is changed, one’s heart is changed. That is why taking the time to see, hear, be present to images and language that arise from new experiences have the power to change one from one way to another.
— Joan Anderson.

A Year by the Sea, by Joan Anderson.
Being optimistic is like a muscle that gets stronger with use. Makes it easier when the tough times arrive. You have to change the way you think in order to change the way you feel.
— Robin Roberts

Robin Roberts, Everybody’s Got Something, her memoir.

Note from Marlene: Sometimes the sweetness of serendipity brings tears to my eyes. I have a list of quotes to post on Thursday Quote Day on The Write Spot Blog. This one, by Robin Roberts, was next in line when I looked in my quotes file. I booted up to post the quote and surprise! There was a post waiting for approval by marcyt, writing about cancer and doctors and well, you should read this one.

Marcyt’s post is in sync with Robin’s quote. Thank you, marcyt, for your lovely, poignant, gorgeous writing.
Facebook is destroying small talk. You open your mouth, and they say, ‘I know, I read it on Facebook.
— Adair Lara

Thursday is Quote Day on The Write Spot Blog. I like to post something interesting someone has said, or pithy or memorable. Adair Lara’s writing matches all three.

Adair Lara comments, lifted from Facebook:

“Facebook is destroying small talk. You open your mouth, and they say, ‘I know, I read it on Facebook.’” — January 24, 2014

Adair on Passwords: “I recall, children, a time when you didn’t have to spend part of each day trying to remember passwords, looking them up in your password file cleverly called something else, like sammy’s dog, putting them in wrong, having to get the password from the site which entails remembering whether you said the name of your maternal grandfather was Tom or Thom, and then having your new password being called weak or strong, and capitalizing the “H” to please them (you’ve employed a variation of the same password since you were 36) and repeating this fricking exercise ten times a day, when who cares whether somebody can get into your toon photos account or not?” — February 6, 2014

Want Adair humor in person? Take her class, information posted on Facebook, May 8, 2014:

Shouldn’t you finish that book?

You put a lot of work in on it, and then laid it aside, or got too busy at work, or lost faith in it.

Before that, though, you put a lot of time and talent into it.

You might enjoy a day at my house entirely devoted to writers with stalled projects. I’ll help you decide whether to take it up again, and providing you by the end of the day with a specific plan for doing just that –and perhaps a writing partner, or writing group, to boot. You might decide to at least try to carve some sellable essays out of it.

Also I’ll give you some killer voice exercises I’ve been developing. You will certainly enjoy meeting your fellow writers. For those who have a completed draft, we’ll talk about publishing/self-publishing.

Get ready for the workshop by: a) assembling your manuscript and reading it b) researching the competition on Amazon.

Limited to 15. $175 Sunday June 22 9-4:30 45 minutes off for lunch
Say to yourself, ‘Maybe what I have written today is messy, clumsy, raggedy, but that’s my poem for today.’ Maybe there is a neater poem buried inside it that I can work on tomorrow.
— Naomi Shihab Nye

Naomi Shihab Nye, April 2014 Writer magazine, “Mystical Jolt,” by Robert Hirschfield
“If you want to write about a ‘broken heart,’ it’s good to know what a broken heart feels like. I also believe you need to take the time and not rush things, keep it playful . . . and listen to the world around [you].”
— Jörgen Elofsson

Jörgen Elofsson, songwriter for Kelly Clarkson, excerpt from the May 2014 issue of The Writer Magazine.