Augusten Burroughs Quotes

…find freedom, aliveness, and power not from what contains, locates, or protects us, but from what dissolves, reveals, and expands us.

Hope is for people who wait. And I don't want to wait no more. I'm not scared anymore. I'm not scared of myself. Of my things. Of my fear. Of absolutely nothing. And that's music.

I can still remember the afternoon, on my 15th birthday, when I opened up 'The Virgin and the Gypsy,' D.H. Lawrence's novella, in my tiny cell in boarding school, and whole worlds of possibility opened out that I had never guessed existed. The language was on fire and sang of liberation.

It is those very things that we are most afraid to do that provide the greatest liberation and growth for us.

A double-edged sword One side destroys One releases I am your Gordian knot Will you release or destroy me? Follow truth and you shall: Find me on water Purify me through fire Trapped by earth nevermore Air will whisper to you What spirit already knows: That even shattered anything is possible If you believe Then we shall both be free.

Staring at her face, she began to fancy her outer layer had begun to melt away while she wasn't paying attention, and something -- some new skeleton -- was emerging from beneath the softness of her accustomed self. With a deep, visceral ache, she wished her true form might prove to be a sleek and shining one, like a stiletto blade slicing free of an ungainly sheath. Like a bird of prey losing its hatchling fluff to hunt in cold, magnificent skies. That she might become something glittering, something startling, something dangerous.

That knowledge humbles me, melts my bones, closes my ears, and makes my teeth rock loosely in their gums. And it also liberates me. I am a big bird winging over high mountains, down into serene valleys. I am ripples of waves on silver seas. I'm a spring leaf trembling in anticipation.

When I had nothing more to lose, I was given everything. When I ceased to be who I am, I found myself. When I experienced humiliation and yet kept on walking, I understood that I was free to choose my destiny.

Transformation, liberation and celebration are the themes of all my novels.

I think theatre to some extent is always about telling stories, isn't it, and I think what I've learned is that freedom comes when you tell your story; freedom comes when you tell the truth.

The truth will set you free, but first it will make you miserable.

To dance is to be out of yourself. Larger, more beautiful, more powerful. This is power, it is glory on earth and it is yours for the taking.

The truth is cruel, but it can be loved, and it makes free those who have loved it.

Reading Poe was like a near-death experience, the kind that makes you feel fragile and free in its wake. I felt almost as though I'd scared myself alive.

The meaning I picked, the one that changed my life: Overcome fear, behold wonder.

When you sit at your desk, if you're lucky, there's a moment when you feel empowered to be someone or something else, to leap into another skin.

In the flush of love's light, we dare be brave. And suddenly we see that love costs all we are, and will ever be. Yet it is only love which sets us free.

I am not convinced the truth can make men free, but I believe it a beginning.

Theater opened up a whole new world for me. It was a freedom I'd never known before.

I really believe, when you come out of hiding, in whatever way you're hiding, you get to go out into the sunlight.

It was a huge shock. I've never had hair that short in my life! I think the rest of the cast and crew were mourning my haircut more than I was! But after a while, I felt liberated, I learned to embrace it.

The spring wakes us, nurtures us and revitalizes us. How often does your spring come? If you are a prisoner of the calendar, it comes once a year. If you are creating authentic power, it comes frequently, or very frequently.

Every renaissance comes to the world with a cry, the cry of the human spirit to be free.

I'm not interested in who am I. I'm interested in what's gone, the disinheritance, what I've been able to become or learn or fuse with or not fuse with. A certain freedom comes... I like it that way.