To this day, these are some of the most formative and grounding words I have ever read:
“You know, the challenge is to stay. The challenge is to be present with that pain. As my mother was dying, I sat with her. You know, as my brother was dying, we sat with him. And there are moments of very dark humor. Anyone who has sat with the dying knows that. There’s moments of excruciating pain where you think, “If I could take this from you, I would. Why isn’t it me?” But then just there’s those silences.
And I think it’s the silences that I find my greatest strength, whether it’s the silence between someone you love or whether it’s the silences in the natural world, in the desert, or whether it’s the reflective moments when you have your pen to paper saying how can I take this anger and not have it be a polemic?”
– Terry Tempest Williams
callie daniels-howell 