Anne Lamott Quotes

Nowadays, I know the true reason I read is to feel less alone, to make a connection with a consciousness other than my own.

I write because I want to end my loneliness. Books make people less alone. That, before and after everything else, is what books do. They show us that conversations are possible across distances.

All I want is for people, when they read my books, to feel companioned, to feel they're not alone in the world.

I do, indeed, close my door at times and surrender myself to a book, but only because I can open the door again and see a human face looking at me.

When you read about the lives of other people, people of different circumstances or similar circumstances, you are part of their lives for that moment. You inhabit their lives, and you feel what they're feeling, and that is compassion. If we see that reading does allow us that, we see how absolutely essential reading is.

Empathy has the power to bring together people who would otherwise never meet. It has the power to teach us and to reach us in moments of isolation when we think nobody understands.

I think we often write because we feel a loneliness, and people read for the same reason, and then they come away feeling a little less lonely.

Pain shared, my brother, is pain not doubled but halved. No man is an island

What we share may be a lot like a traffic accident but we get one another. We are survivors of each other. We have been shark to one another, but also lifeboat. That counts for something.

We were created to look at one another, weren't we?

I always hope that people feel less alone when they see a movie that I make. That some part of the story played out on the big screen will resonate for individuals in the audience in a way that gives them comfort.

Before people complain of the obscurity of modern poetry, they should first examine their consciences and ask themselves with how many people and on how many occasions they have genuinely and profoundly shared some experience with another.

There are those moments when you shake someone's hand, have a conversation with someone, and suddenly your all bound together because you share your humanity in one simple moment.

I love it if comedy reflects real life because to me it's more reassuring that we'll get through.

I think, really, that the only way a person can open their heart to someone who is so much another is really by knowing them... whether that's in a classroom, or a soccer team, or a food pantry, or any of those things. I mean, we're kind of more alike than we are different.

I sing my life. It's like I'm having group therapy 350 days a year, and the people who come to the show get that, and they're there for that - whether it's to be lifted up, or to be lifted out, or just entertained or inspired, or to feel not so alone.

Metaphorically speaking, it's easy to bump into one another on the journey from A to B and not even notice. People should take time to notice, enjoy and help each other.

I turn to books for a feeling of companionship: for somebody knowing what I have known.

I don't need to have my convictions confirmed by a show of numbers. However, being among people in front of a band leads me to believe that all is not lost, that humans, now and then, can communicate on a higher level than the political and the practical.

Sitting on a bedroom floor crying is something that makes you feel really alone. If someone's singing about that feeling, you feel bonded to that person.

I'm just trying to write things that resonate with people. And when we're all going through something together, I think you smile after that - I hope that people leave inspired after one of my shows.

Those moments onstage when you realize what you and your compatriots are doing matters - someone in that room needs to hear that story, someone needs to escape or heal or learn or breathe, and remember, we're all in this together.

People complain not because something sucks. People complain because they're looking for empathy and to feel connected with those around them. Unfortunately, complaining is maybe the least useful way to connect with other human beings.

One of my impulses in acting has always to make people feel less alone.

I feel Noah has been alone for the majority of his life and inherently searching for a family, even though he may not express that outwardly. But his encounter with Rosalee gave him hope in finding someone who thinks like him.