Anne Lamott Quotes

“The job of a good parent is to be dispensable. No one remembered to tell my parents that, but I know it is true. It’s not morally right to make yourself indispensable.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“I think the shadow side of being a grandparent is that the child becomes like an ATM of self-respect and completion. You can be at your worst mentally, with grudges, anxiety, and no self-esteem, then spend five minutes with the Unit and feel instantly restored.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“As a child I was always the ball bearings for my whole family; I thought I was indispensable to their survival, preventing hard metal from grinding against hard metal, so the family didn’t come to a broken, screeching, metallic halt.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“I was reminded of the Four Immutable Laws of the Spirit: Whoever is present are the right people. Whenever it begins is the right time. Whatever happens is the only thing that could have happened. And when it’s over, it’s over.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

"Life corrects harshly. Failure is the conduit." ~@ANNELAMOTT

“If something [isn't] my problem, I probably [don't] have the solution. There are no words for how much I hate, resent and resist this.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“All willingness to change comes from pain.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“It is funny how no one seems to want my always excellent advice.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“Children should not have treacherous diseases or be afraid. This should be the one rule we all agree on.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“Love and grace are bigger than the nightmare, supposedly. Without trusting this, we’re doomed and ridiculous.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“Everyone is flailing around, winging it most of the time, trying to find the way out, or through, or up, without a map. This lack of instruction manual is how most people develop compassion, and how they figure out to show up, care, help and serve.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“I’ve always thought I could use my brain and my heart to jockey everyone around to the good. But life is not jockeyable. When you try, you make people infinitely crazier than they already were, including or especially yourself.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“This family business can be so stressful—difficult, damaged people showing up to spend time with other difficult, damaged people, time that might be better used elsewhere—yet out of that, some accidental closeness, laughter, some pieced-together joy.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“Every single spiritual tradition says that you must take care of the poor, or you are so doomed that not even Jesus or the Buddha can help you.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“You’re here to love, and be loved, freely. If you find out next week that you are terminally ill—and we’re all terminally ill on this bus—what will matter are memories of beauty, that people loved you, and that you loved them.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“Hope is not about proving anything. It’s about choosing to believe this one thing, that love is bigger than any grim, bleak shit anyone can throw at us.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“I hardly know what to feel most days, except grief and bug-eyed paranoia. But my faith tells me that God has skills, ploys, and grace adequate to bring light into the present darkness, into families, prisons, governments.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“Rubble is the ground on which our deepest friendships are built.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“I don’t think that if I live to be eighty, I’m going to wish I’d spent more hours in the gym or kept my house a lot cleaner. I’m going to wish I had swum more unashamedly, made more mistakes, spaced out more, rested….So this informs how I live now.” ~@ANNELAMOTT

“I know two things now that I didn’t at 30: That when we get to heaven, we will discover that the appearance of our butts & our skin was 127th on the list of what mattered on this earth. And that I am not going to live forever. Knowing these things has set me free.” ~@ANNELAMOTT