There are two barriers that often prevent communication between the young and their elders. The first is middle-aged forgetfulness of the fact that they themselves are no longer young. The second is youthful ignorance of the fact that the middle aged are still alive.
- Jessamyn West
Fact, Middle, Still, Barriers
We want the facts to fit the preconceptions. When they don't it is easier to ignore the facts than to change the preconceptions.
- Jessamyn West
Want, Fit, Than, Preconceptions
If you want a baby, have a new one. Don't baby the old one.
- Jessamyn West
New, Want, Old, Old One
A broken bone can heal, but the wound a word opens can fester forever.
- Jessamyn West
Anger, Broken, Wound, Opens
Teaching is the royal road to learning.
- Jessamyn West
Learning, Road, Teaching, Royal Road
In my time and neighborhood (and in my soul) there was only one standard by which a woman measured success: did some man want her?
- Jessamyn West
Measured, Standard, Which, Neighborhood
If you train people properly, they won't be able to tell a drill from the real thing. If anything, the real thing will be easier.
- Jessamyn West
Real, Will, Tell, Train
Writing is a solitary occupation. Family, friends, and society are the natural enemies of the writer. He must be alone, uninterrupted, and slightly savage if he is to sustain and complete an undertaking.
- Jessamyn West
Slightly, Occupation, Savage
Memory is a magnet. It will pull to it and hold only material nature has designed it to attract.
- Jessamyn West
Memory, Pull, Material, Designed
Sleeplessness is a desert without vegetation or inhabitants.
- Jessamyn West
Desert, Without, Inhabitants, Vegetation
A religious awakening which does not awaken the sleeper to love has roused him in vain.
- Jessamyn West
Love, Religious, Which, Sleeper
Talent is helpful in writing, but guts are absolutely necessary.
- Jessamyn West
Talent, Writing, Necessary, Helpful
The basic essential of a great actor is that he loves himself in acting.
- Jessamyn West
Actor, Himself, Loves, Essential
The West is color. Its colors are animal rather than vegetable, the colors of earth and sunlight and ripeness.
- Jessamyn West
Color, Sunlight, Rather, Vegetable
A big iron needle stitching the country together.
- Jessamyn West
Big, Country, Iron, Needle
A taste for irony has kept more hearts from breaking than a sense of humor, for it takes irony to appreciate the joke which is on oneself.
- Jessamyn West
Humor, Sense Of Humor, Which, Hearts
Faithfulness to the past can be a kind of death above ground. Writing of the past is a resurrection; the past then lives in your words and you are free.
- Jessamyn West
Death, Faithfulness, Lives, Resurrection
Only a fool would refuse to enter a fool's paradise when that's the only paradise he'll ever have a chance to enter.
- Jessamyn West
Chance, Ever, Refuse, Enter
Nothing is so dear as what you're about to leave.
- Jessamyn West
Nothing, Leave, About, Dear
In their sympathies, children feel nearer animals than adults.
- Jessamyn West
Children, Than, Nearer, Sympathies
It is very east to forgive others their mistakes; it takes more grit and gumption to forgive them for having witnessed your own.
- Jessamyn West
Forgiveness, Very, Having, Witnessed
A rattlesnake that doesn't bite teaches you nothing.
- Jessamyn West
Nothing, Bite, Teaches, Rattlesnake
We can love an honest rogue, but what is more offensive than a false saint?
- Jessamyn West
Love, Offensive, Saint, Rogue
I've done more harm by the falseness of trying to please than by the honesty of trying to hurt.
- Jessamyn West
Honesty, More, Harm, Please
The sick soon come to understand that they live in a different world from that of the well and that the two cannot communicate.
- Jessamyn West
Understand, Communicate, Different World
The source of one's joy is also often the source of one's sorrow.
- Jessamyn West
Joy, Often, Also, Sorrow
Fiction reveals truths that reality obscures.
- Jessamyn West
Imagination, Fiction, Truths
The past is really almost as much a work of the imagination as the future.
- Jessamyn West
Work, History, Almost, Past
You read a book from beginning to end. You run a business the opposite way. You start with the end, and then you do everything you must to reach it.
- Jessamyn West
Business, Beginning, Read, Opposite
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