The dream is too often about myself. To correct this; and to forget one’s own sharp absurd little personality, reputation and the rest of it, one should read; see outsiders; think more; write more logically; above all be full of work; and practise anonymity. Silence in company…
Virginia Woolf
via Crashinglybeautiful
I don't know, Elizabeth. It didn't work so well for her.
ReplyDeleteMs. Moon -- Despite the terrible depressions and eventual suicide, she lived an amazing life: many, many novels and essays and rich in family and love with both men and women. I don't think it was too bad, barring the filling one's pockets with stones and willfully drowning oneself --
ReplyDeleteI'm with you, Elizabeth. Incredible insights and wisdom--those are unrelated to the depression.
ReplyDeleteSharp and absurd I'm okay with, but there is no way your personality can be described as 'little'.
ReplyDeleteI'm fine with it all, except the "silence in company."
ReplyDeleteAll good advice. But who can obey?
ReplyDeleteI agree with you, Elizabeth. The more I read ABOUT Woolf, and not just her books, the more I find her a most intriguing and mesmerising person. Thanks for that quote. Any of us can find themselves there, in the middle of the water, drowning, drowning, drowning...
ReplyDeleteGreetings from London.
Of course you are right. I admire her tremendously, doing all that she did while suffering what must have been horrible depression.
ReplyDeleteBless her.
It truly is terrifically important to get out of one's own head. Especially if you suffer from depression. I can remember my therapist telling me that writing was good, but that sometimes I ought to just take the dog for a walk or go to the grocery store and remind myself that life is not as heavy as my brain made it out to be.
ReplyDeleteSilence in company is what I try to get away from. Maybe it has to do with trying to do the opposite of what you are inclined to do.
ReplyDeleteAnd it seems unfair that her death is what many think of.
The fact that this advice couldn't apply more completely to me is a bit worrying, considering her probable state of mind when she wrote it.
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I love that you always make me think.
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