Quotations

"Without darkness, nothing comes to birth, As without light, nothing flowers."

— May Sarton, Belgian-American poet, born 1912

"Loneliness is the poverty of self; solitude is the richness of self."

— May Sarton, Belgian-American poet, born 1912

"I always forget how important the empty days are, how important it may be sometimes not to expect to produce anything, even a few lines in a journal. A day when one has not pushed oneself to the limit seems a damaged damaging day, a sinful day. Not so! The most valuable thing one can do for the psyche, occasionally, is to let it rest, wander, live in the changing light of a room."

— May Sarton, Belgian-American poet, born 1912

"One thing is certain, and I have always known it - the joys of my life have nothing to do with age. They do not change. Flowers, the morning and evening light, music, poetry, silence, the goldfinches darting about."

— May Sarton, Belgian-American poet, born 1912

"There is only one day left, always starting over: it is given to us at dawn and taken away from us at dusk."

— Jean-Paul Sartre, French philosopher, born 1905

"Only the guy who isn't rowing has time to rock the boat."

— Jean-Paul Sartre, French philosopher, born 1905

"The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary."

— Vidal Sassoon, English-American hairdresser, born 1928

"Last year I gave several lectures on Intelligence and Musicality among Animals. Today I am going to speak to you about Intelligence and Musicality among Critics. The subject is much the same, with some modifications, of course."

— Erik Satie, French composer, born 1866

"There is no greater violence than to deny the dreams of our children."

— Kailash Satyarthi, Indian activist, born 1954

"A good marriage is a contest of generosity."

— Diane Sawyer, American journalist, born 1945

"I read once, which I loved so much, that this great physicist who won a Nobel Prize said that every day when he got home, his dad asked him not what he learned in school but his dad said, 'Did you ask any great questions today?' And I always thought, what a beautiful way to educate kids that we're excited by their questions, not by our answers and whether they can repeat our answers."

— Diane Sawyer, American journalist, born 1945

"One day you're the statue. One day you're the pigeon."

— Diane Sawyer, American journalist, born 1945

"Faith is what I call a mind-move, a radical shift in awareness. The expression 'a leap of faith' is so true. Faith is not something we can arrive at by a careful, step-by-step process. It is not something we can square with our intellect. Faith does not make sense, nor does it feel safe. It is what takes us further after the questions that can be answered logically have been exhausted. To have faith, we must let go. Faith is like swimming the backstroke, reaching above and behind is into an unknown we cannot see. Faith is like driving forward with only the rearview mirror as a guide."

— Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, American rabbi, born 1914

"Dialogue does not happen when we are adversaries."

— Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, American rabbi, born 1914