About a month ago I finished reading “Three things you need to know about rockets,” a memoir by Jessica Fox, and for the first time in a while I tore through the book and dogeared close to every other page. These are a couple of my favorite quotes/passages.. but the entire story is definitely worth the read.
“The artist’s life cannot be otherwise than full of conflicts, for two forces are at war within him; on the one hand, the common human longing for happiness, satisfaction and security in life and on the other, a ruthless passion for creation which may go so far as to override every personal desire… There are hardly any exceptions to the rule that a person must pay dearly for the divine gift of creative fire.” — Carl Jung
“When you choose one way out of many, all the ways you don’t take are snuffed out like candles, as if they’d never existed. At that moment all of Will’s choices existed at once. But to keep them all in existence meant doing nothing. He had to choose, after all.” — Philip Pullman, The Amber Spyglass
“it occurred to me,” I continued tentatively, “that the Holy Grail is not the treasure but the dream, like the carrot before the horse. It’s the impulse that gets you off the couch and propels your journey. The problem arises when you don’t allow your dream to change. In that case, if you seek it, hopefully you won’t find it.”
“Why?”
“Well, that would be a mid-life cries, wouldn’t it? You finally get what you want, but didn’t realize that the journey to getting it has informed who you are, so the grail you once dreamed about, that was supposed to bring perfect happiness — whether a car, house with a white picket fence or dream job — is, not likely, not going to make the current you feel fulfilled.”
The Hindu concept of Dharma came to mind, what I understood to mean that we each have a responsibility to follow our own path — unique to ourselves, our interests and talents — for by doing so we give the space and opportunity for others to do the same.
(Conversation copy omitted)
By leaving to follow my dream, I was making room for someone else to follow theirs.
The back cover is a bit cliche/wanderlusty BUT I love that kind of stuff. “A book for anyone who has ever thought “What if” — a true story about a woman who dared to follow her dreams..” perf.