Diane Ackerman Quotes

Quotes about:

• I don't want to get to the end of my life and find that I lived just the length of it. I want to have lived the width of it as well.

  Diane Ackerman

  Inspirational, Life, Motivational

  51 Copy quote

• I swear I will not dishonor my soul with hatred, but offer myself humbly as a guardian of nature, as a healer of misery, as a messenger of wonder, as an architect of peace.

  Diane Ackerman

  Commitment, Compassion, Hatred

  Diane Ackerman (2011). “I Praise My Destroyer: Poems”, p.3, Vintage

  25 Copy quote

• It began in mystery, and it will end in mystery, but what a savage and beautiful country lies in between.

  Diane Ackerman

  Life, Beautiful, Country

  Diane Ackerman (2011). “A Natural History of the Senses”, p.309, Vintage

  26 Copy quote

• The heart is a museum, filled with the exhibits of a lifetime's loves.

  Diane Ackerman

  Heart, Museums, Lifetime

  "A Natural History of Love". Book by Diane Ackerman, 1994.

  18 Copy quote

• If a mind is just a few pounds of blood, urea, and electricity, how does it manage to contemplate itself, worry about its soul, do time-and-motion studies, admire the shy hooves of a goat, know that it will die, enjoy all the grand and lesser mayhems of the heart ?

  Diane Ackerman

  Heart, Blood, Worry

  18 Copy quote

• Who would deduce the dragonfly from the larva, the iris from the bud, the lawyer from the infant? ...We are all shape-shifters and magical reinventors. Life is really a plural noun, a caravan of selves.

  Diane Ackerman

  Nature, Self, Irises

  Diane Ackerman (2002). “Cultivating Delight: A Natural History of My Garden”, G K Hall & Company

  46 Copy quote

• We are defined by how we place our attention.

  Diane Ackerman

  Attention, Defined

  4 Copy quote

• We can't enchant the world, which makes its own magic; but we can enchant ourselves by paying deep attention

  Diane Ackerman

  Magic, Attention, World

  Diane Ackerman (2004). “An Alchemy of Mind: The Marvel and Mystery of the Brain”, p.49, Simon and Schuster

  7 Copy quote

• Wonder is the heaviest element on the periodic table. Even a tiny fleck of it stops time.

  Diane Ackerman

  Healing, Elements, Tables

  Diane Ackerman (2011). “The Rarest of the Rare: Vanishing Animals, Timeless Worlds”, p.27, Vintage

  20 Copy quote

• For the longest time I didn't realize I was creative - I just thought I was strange.

  Diane Ackerman

  Creativity, Creative, Strange

  6 Copy quote

• No matter how politely one says it, we owe our existence to the farts of blue-green algae.

  Diane Ackerman

  Blue, Algae, Green

  Diane Ackerman (2004). “An Alchemy of Mind: The Marvel and Mystery of the Brain”, p.232, Simon and Schuster

  24 Copy quote

• Words are such small things, like confetti in the brain, and yet they are color and clarify everything, they can stain the mind or warp the feelings.

  Diane Ackerman

  Color, Feelings, Brain

  Diane Ackerman (2011). “One Hundred Names for Love: A Memoir”, p.149, W. W. Norton & Company

  23 Copy quote

• American writer
  1803-1882
  Play is our brain's favorite way of learning.

  Diane Ackerman

  Play, Brain, Way

  14 Copy quote

• Look at your feet. You are standing in the sky. When we think of the sky, we tend to look up, but the sky actually begins at the earth. We walk through it, yell into it, rake leaves, wash the dog, and drive cars in it. We breathe it deep within us. With every breath, we inhale millions of molecules of sky, heat them briefly, and then exhale them back into the world.

  Diane Ackerman

  Dog, Thinking, Sky

  Diane Ackerman, Dave Thurlow, C. Ralph Adler (1999). “Soul of the Sky: Exploring the Human Side of Weather”

  19 Copy quote

• When I set a glass prism on a windowsill and allow the sun to flood through it, a spectrum of colors dances on the floor. What we call "white" is a rainbow of colored rays packed into a small space. The prism sets them free. Love is the white light of emotion.

  Diane Ackerman

  Love Is, Space, Glasses

  Diane Ackerman (2011). “A Natural History of Love: Author of the National Bestseller A Natural History of the Senses”, p.16, Vintage

  15 Copy quote

• We live on the leash of our senses. There is no way in which to understand the world without first detecting it through the radar-net of our senses.

  Diane Ackerman

  Music, Silence, Listening

  16 Copy quote

• I don't want to be a passenger in my own life.

  Diane Ackerman

  Life, Knowing Who You Are, Want

  "On extended wings". Book by Diane Ackerman, 1985.

  16 Copy quote

• In the absence of touching and being touched, people of all ages can sicken and grow touched starved. Touch seems to be as essential as sunlight.

  Diane Ackerman

  People, Touching, Age

  5 Copy quote

• The senses don't just make sense of life in bold or subtle acts of clarity, they tear reality apart into vibrant morsels and reassemble them into a meaningful pattern.

  Diane Ackerman

  Meaningful, Reality, Tears

  Diane Ackerman (2011). “A Natural History of the Senses”, p.14, Vintage

  8 Copy quote

• We would lie on coral sand, below sugary stars, watching Cassiopeia mount her throne and the Great Bear wash its paws in the South. I would say, "I have a secret to tell you." And, folding me in your arms, boyish and sly, you would answer: "Whisper it into my mouth.

  Diane Ackerman

  Stars, Lying, Secret

  Diane Ackerman (2011). “Jaguar of Sweet Laughter: New and Selected Poems”, p.102, Vintage

  6 Copy quote

• I am a great fan of the universe, which I take literally: as one. All of it interests me, and it interests me in detail.

  Diane Ackerman

  Fans, Details, Interest

  11 Copy quote

• When I go biking, I repeat a mantra of the day's sensations: bright sun, blue sky, warm breeze, blue jay's call, ice melting and so on. This helps me transcend the traffic, ignore the clamorings of work, leave all the mind theaters behind and focus on nature instead. I still must abide by the rules of the road, of biking, of gravity. But I am mentally far away from civilization. The world is breaking someone else's heart.

  Diane Ackerman

  Heart, Blue, Ice

  12 Copy quote

• Human beings are sloshing sacks of chemicals on the move.

  Diane Ackerman

  Moving, Chemicals, Humans

  Diane Ackerman (2004). “An Alchemy of Mind: The Marvel and Mystery of the Brain”, p.69, Simon and Schuster

  7 Copy quote

• Look in the mirror. The face that pins you with its double gaze reveals a chastening secret. You are looking into a predator's eyes. Most predators have eyes set right on the front of their heads, so they can use binocular vision to sight and track their prey.

  Diane Ackerman

  Eye, Mirrors, Sight

  "A Natural History of the Senses". Book by Diane Ackerman, 1990.

  6 Copy quote

• Success produces success, just as money produces money.

  Diane Ackerman

  Success, Positive Attitude, Produce

  6 Copy quote

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