texturism:

so when is the best time to write a book (or give a presentation or start a blog or…) on a subject you’re particularly interested in? while you’re learning! putting words on a page isn’t a commitment (trust me). you’ll be able to add to, edit, and refine your ideas along the way–but only if you take the time to write them down. also, there’s a certain amount of fidelity to your thinking that fades over time; write in the moment and you won’t lose the burrs and barbs that stick with readers. and, if you share what you’re learning with others along the way, all sorts of people and projects will present themselves; you’ll have more information and learning experiences than you could have imagined— all while you’re curious and enthusiastic, all while you’re a student of your subject.

but, if you wait until you’re an expert (which you’ll never feel like you really are), one of several things will happen: one, everything you’ve learned will seem mundane and not worth writing about. two, you’ll be so bored of the topic that writing a book on the subject will be the last thing you’d ever want to do. three, your interests will have led you to new, entirely different subjects. or four, your interests will have led you to a new perspective from which it’s no longer possible to write about the things you learned.

- stephen anderson, the pastry box project | via ninakix [emphasis mine]

"Being tender and open is beautiful. As a woman, I feel continually shhh’ed. Too sensitive. Too mushy. Too wishy washy. Blah blah. Don’t let someone steal your tenderness. Don’t allow the coldness and fear of others to tarnish your perfectly vulnerable beating heart. Nothing is more powerful than allowing yourself to truly be affected by things. Whether it’s a song, a stranger, a mountain, a rain drop, a tea kettle, an article, a sentence, a footstep, feel it all – look around you. All of this is for you. Take it and have gratitude. Give it and feel love." 

Zooey Deschanel (via naturae)

"Whatever you fight, you strengthen, and what you resist, persists." 

Eckhart Tolle (via nirvanibliss)

"All of which has led me to the conclusion that if you’re female, you can’t win for losing. When you’re young, nobody pays attention to what you have to say or the work you do because of the way you look—and when you’re old, nobody pays attention to what you have to say or the work you do because of the way you look. Whether you’re perceived as an irresistible babe or a saggy, baggy old hag, it’s all about your appearance." 

Women, Looks, and Aging: Is Beauty a Bad Investment? - The Daily Beast

"To me, it is not about getting over things and moving forward, it is about going through the sadness, taking some of it with you and being made whole because of it. I cry every time I listen to it." 

Justin Vernon’s mother on Re: Stacks (via thesearebones)

slaughterhouse90210:

“Adolescence is best enjoyed without self-consciousness, but self-consciousness, unfortunately, is its leading symptom. Even when something important happens to you, even when your heart’s getting crushed or exalted, even when you’re absorbed in building the foundations of a personality, there comes these moments when you’re aware that what’s happening is not the real story. Unless you actually die, the real story is still ahead of you. This alone, this cruel mixture of consciousness and irrelevance, this built-in hollowness, is enough to account for how pissed off you are.”
― Jonathan Franzen, The Discomfort Zone

(Source: leilockheart)

slaughterhouse90210:

“No one ever admits that a mother’s greatest heartbreak is when she begins to see her child as the embodiment of her own worst self. Literally, it is as if her worst self—that shameful part she’s able, most days, to quarantine—has been loosed upon the world and refuses any longer to take orders from her.”
—Heidi Julavits, The Vanishers

"I have lots of things to teach you now, in case we ever meet,
concerning the message that was transmitted to me under a pine tree
in North Carolina on a cold winter moonlit night. It said that
Nothing Ever Happened, so don’t worry. It’s all like a dream.
Everything is ecstasy, inside. We just don’t know it because of our thinking-minds.
But in our true blissful essence of mind is known that everything is alright
forever and forever and forever. Close your eyes, let your hands
and nerve-ends drop, stop breathing for 3 seconds, listen to the silence
inside the illusion of the world, and you will remember the lesson
you forgot, which was taught in immense milky way soft cloud innumerable worlds
long ago and not even at all. It is all one vast awakened thing. I call it the golden eternity.
It is perfect. We were never really born, we will never really die. It has nothing to do
with the imaginary idea of a personal self, other selves, many selves everywhere:
Self is only an idea, a mortal idea. That which passes into everything is one thing.
It’s a dream already ended. There’s nothing to be afraid of and nothing to be glad about.
I know this from staring at mountains months on end. They never show any expression,
they are like empty space. Do you think the emptiness of space will ever crumble away?
Mountains will crumble, but the emptiness of space, which is the one universal essence
of mind, the vast awakenerhood, empty and awake, will never crumble away because
it was never born." 

Jack Kerouac | Selected Letters 1957-1969 (letter to his first wife, Edie, 1957)

"Have you ever had an image in your head that’s been there for years? The kind that you can’t tie to any memory, but seems to insist on being acknowledged." 

-  Rory Kurtz, in an interview with “Jess Loves Fred” (via awfullyquiet)

Best interview/story I’ve read in a while. I cannot put into words how amazing his surreal paintings are. But he did, right there. Thank you Jess :)

"

I think it’s great for two people to be together. That is a good number. I think, that to keep it alive though, you can’t spend every day together. It wears out the magic, Love means nothing to me if it’s not fortified with fierce, painful longing, brief explosive instances of furious passion and intimacy and then a sad parting for a time. In that way, you can give your life to it and still have a life of your own. I think some couples spend too much time together. They flatten out the potential for experience by constant closeness. Passion builds over time like steam. Let it rage until it’s exhausted and then leave it alone to let it build up again. Why can’t love be insane and distorted? How can it be vital if it has the same threshold as normal day-to-day experience?

Why can’t you write burning letters and let your nocturnal self smolder with desire for one who is not there? Why not let the days before you see her be excruciating and ferment in your mind so on the day you go to the airport to pick her up, you’re nearly sick with anticipation? And then when desire shows the first sign of contentment, throw it back it its cage and let it slowly build itself back into a state of starved fury. Then when you are together, it all matters. So that when you look into her eyes, you lose your balance, so that when she touches you, it feels like you have never been touched before. When she says your name, you think it was she who named you. When she has gone, you bury your face in the pillow to smell her hair and you lie awake at night remembering your face in her neck, her breathing and the amazing smell of her skin. Your eyes go wet because you want her so bad and miss her so much. Now that is worth the miles and the time. That matches the inferno of life. Otherwise you poison each other with your presence day after day as you drag each other through the inevitable mundane aspects of your lives. That is the slow death that I see slapped on faces everywhere I go. It’s part of the world’s sadness that’s more empty than cold, poorly lit rooms in cities of the American night.

" 

Henry Rollins (via mayerthorn)

(Source: prozacrock)

"Human beings are funny. They long to be with the person they love but refuse to admit it openly. Some are afraid to show even the slightest sign of affection because of fear. Fear that their feelings may not be recognized, or even worst, returned. But one thing about human beings puzzles me the most is their conscious effort to be connected with the object of their affection even if it kills them slowly within." 

Sigmund Freud (via fuckyeawecanlivelikethis)

(Source: cordisre)

"When you go out of your comfort zone and it works, there’s nothing more satisfying." 

Kristen Wiig (via magazinewineparty)

(Source: amykw)

texturism:

most of the time, important new ideas don’t succeed on the first attempt or even the first ten attempts. but then they do, and it seems to happen suddenly.. it’s hard to tell why this is. it’s probably a combination of timing (riding some fundamental shift in technology or culture), and execution (getting the product just right).

an idea getting tried over and over tends to be a positive signal (which is one reason that competition is overrated). it’s very easy when you spend lots of time around startups to get cynical. you could tweet and blog predictions that every new startup will fail and how the ideas are derivative and you’d be right 95% of the time. the hard part – and what matters for founders and investors – is figuring out the right mix of timing and execution to finally get it right.

- chris dixon, and then, suddenly, it works | via | via stenum