American author (1954- )
If you want to make God laugh, tell her your plans.
ANNE LAMOTT
Bird by Bird
My natural tendency is to complicate everything--and then to spray words and ideas onto everything afterwards. I've had to develop the habit of keeping things simple.
ANNE LAMOTT
interview, Friends Journal, Jan. 30, 2013
I thought, That's it, I'm going to throw myself under the wheels of the car. I'm going to run over my own head. But I couldn't even do that because I couldn't get up any speed. If you ran over your head in this gridlock, you probably wouldn't even end up dead, and your hair would be all f***ed up.
ANNE LAMOTT
Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith
My father was a writer, so I grew up writing and reading and I was really encouraged by him. I had some sort of gift and when it came time to try to find a publisher I had a little bit of an "in" because I had his agent I could turn to, to at least read my initial offerings when I was about 20. But the only problem was that they were just awful, they were just terrible stories and my agent, who ended up being my agent, was very, very sweet about it, but it took about four years until I actually had something worth trying to sell.
ANNE LAMOTT
interview, Big Think, Apr. 6, 2010
Then the singing enveloped me. It was furry and resonant, coming from everyone's very heart. There was no sense of performance or judgment, only that the music was breath and food.
ANNE LAMOTT
Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith
You can either practice being right or practice being kind.
ANNE LAMOTT
Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith
I am all the ages I've ever been.
ANNE LAMOTT
Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith
My father really taught me that you really develop the habit of writing and you sit down at the same time every day, you don't wait for inspiration. You sit down, it helps your subconscious understand that it's time to start writing and to relax down into that well of dream material and memory and imagination. So, I sit down at the exact same time every day. And I let myself write really awful first drafts of things. I take very short assignments; I will capture for myself in a few words what I'm going to be trying to do that morning, or in that hour. Maybe I'm going to write a description of the lake out in Inverness in West Marin, where I live. And so I try to keep things really small and manageable. I have a one-inch picture frame on my desk so I can remember that that's all I'm going to be able to see in the course of an hour or two, and then I just let myself start and it goes really badly most mornings; as it does for most writers.
ANNE LAMOTT
interview, Big Think, Apr. 6, 2010
My gratitude for good writing is unbounded; I'm grateful for it the way I'm grateful for the ocean.
ANNE LAMOTT
Bird by Bird
I very rarely read the responses to my Salon pieces, because (as you may have noticed) the trolls can be SO evil. So violent in their hostility to me and my work. OK, wait, wait, wait. That's a lie. I do read the responses--and get mesmerized, like cobra hypnosis. But I laugh (mostly) at the trolls, and think about what tiny little weenies they must have. (They seem to be mostly men.) And then ALL these smart, funny people leap to my defense, which is medicine, and fills me with love and thankfulness.
ANNE LAMOTT
Salon, Nov. 3, 2014
You don't always have to chop with the sword of truth. You can point with it too.
ANNE LAMOTT
Bird by Bird
You fall so deeply in love with your grandbaby. It's so so so much easier than being a parent, because you really don't have much responsibility. And just when you are at the end of your rope with exhaustion, the parents take the baby away. So it's the best of both worlds.
ANNE LAMOTT
"Q&A: Anne Lamott", San Diego Magazine, Jan. 27, 2014
Very few writers really know what they are doing until they've done it.
ANNE LAMOTT
Bird by Bird
The road to enlightenment is long and difficult, and you should try not to forget snacks and magazines.
ANNE LAMOTT
Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith
We all often feel like we are pulling teeth, even those writers whose prose ends up being the most natural and fluid. The right words and sentences just do not come pouring out like ticker tape most of the time.
ANNE LAMOTT
Bird by Bird
The three things I cannot change are the past, the truth, and you.
ANNE LAMOTT
Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers
My heart was broken and my head was just barely inhabitable.
ANNE LAMOTT
Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith
Joy is the best makeup.
ANNE LAMOTT
Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith
Lighthouses don't go running all over an island looking for boats to save; they just stand there shining.
ANNE LAMOTT
Bird by Bird
Part of me loves and respects men so desperately, and part of me thinks they are so embarrassingly incompetent at life and in love. You have to teach them the very basics of emotional literacy. You have to teach them how to be there for you, and part of me feels tender toward them and gentle, and part of me is so afraid of them, afraid of any more violation.
ANNE LAMOTT
Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year