Closet Inspiration Quotes

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If a bullet should enter my brain, let that bullet destroy every closet door.
Harvey Milk
There are times when solitude is better than society, and silence is wiser than speech. We should be better Christians if we were more alone, waiting upon God, and gathering through meditation on His Word spiritual strength for labour in his service. We ought to muse upon the things of God, because we thus get the real nutriment out of them. . . . Why is it that some Christians, although they hear many sermons, make but slow advances in the divine life? Because they neglect their closets, and do not thoughtfully meditate on God's Word. They love the wheat, but they do not grind it; they would have the corn, but they will not go forth into the fields to gather it; the fruit hangs upon the tree, but they will not pluck it; the water flows at their feet, but they will not stoop to drink it. From such folly deliver us, O Lord. . . .
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
In going where you have to go, and doing what you have to do, and seeing what you have to see, you'll dull and blunt the instrument you write with. But I would rather have it bent and dull and know I had to put it to the grindstone again and hammer it into shape and put a whetstone to it, and know that I had something to write about, than to have it bright and shining and nothing to say, or smooth and well-oiled in the closet, but unused.
Ernest Hemingway
Out of the closets and into the museums, libraries, architectural monuments, concert halls, bookstores, recording studios and film studios of the world. Everything belongs to the inspired and dedicated thief…. Words, colors, light, sounds, stone, wood, bronze belong to the living artist. They belong to anyone who can use them. Loot the Louvre! A bas l’originalité, the sterile and assertive ego that imprisons us as it creates. Vive le vol-pure, shameless, total. We are not responsible. Steal anything in sight.
William S. Burroughs
We doubt in others, what is in fact in ourselves. The skeletons in your own closet are the things that scare you the most about others; people who come from a background of lying are suspicious of lying in others and so on and so forth. The most trusting of people, are not people who have never been betrayed or who have never felt pain; but the most trusting of people are those who in themselves do not find those things worthy of that blame. We see the world through the eyes of the condition of our own souls.
C. JoyBell C.
She wanted to have him hold her and tell her all the demons were pretend, that there was no monster in her closet, that everything would be okay. But that was a lie. The demon was in her head, telling her she was too fat. She had to get the demon out. But she couldn't do it by herself.
Jackie Morse Kessler (Hunger (Riders of the Apocalypse, #1))
So what do you do when you are stuck? The first thing I do when I am stuck is pray. But I’m not talking about a quick, Help me Lord, Sunday’s a comin’ prayer. When I get stuck I get up from my desk to head for my closet. Literally. If I‘m at the office I go over to a corner that I have deemed my closet away from home. I get on my knees and remind God that this was not my idea, it was His… None of this is new information to God… Then I ask God to show me if there is something He wants to say to prepare me for what He wants me to communicate to our congregation. I surrender my ideas, my outline and my topic. Then I just stay in that quiet place until God quiets my heart… Many times I will have a breakthrough thought or idea that brings clarity to my message. . . Like you, I am simply a mouthpiece. Getting stuck is one way God keeps me ever conscious of that fact.
Andy Stanley (Communicating for a Change: Seven Keys to Irresistible Communication)
Young friends, whose string-and-tin-can phone extended from island to island, had to pay out more and more string, as if letting kites go higher and higher. They had more and more to tell each other, and less and less string. The boy asked the girl to say "I love you" into her can, giving her no further explanation. And she didn't ask for any, or say "That's silly," or "We're too young for love," or even suggest that she was saying "I love you" because he asked her to. Instead she said, "I love you." The words traveled through the long, long string. The boy covered his can with a lid, removed it from the string, and put her love for him on a shelf in his closet. Of course, he never could open the can, because then he would lose its contents. It was enough just to know it was there.
Jonathan Safran Foer (Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close)
Clean out your mind closet. Clean out resentment and hatred. Clean out regrets and secrets. Now fill it with love, joy and respect.
Debasish Mridha
We will not win our rights by staying quietly in our closets
Harvey Milk
The monster is only scary while it is in the closet. Once in the light, you can see its many flaws and weaknesses. And often, we end up laughing, at what we shield our eyes from no more.
Tom Althouse (The Frowny Face Cow)
This is an organic religion. A religion of the people from heart to heart; a faith that finds the presence of the Divine within life, and nature, and ourselves. We don't have teachers and books because we are our own teachers, and our book is the sacred book of the Earth. We believe that we can connect with the God and Goddess and hear their voices, receive their inspiration directly and take responsibility for our own actions, without the intermediary of a pope or rabbi. We have a loose set of beliefs and morals and a ritual structure that is common to all Wiccans, but there is room for creativity and deep mystical experiences. This is a faith with roots as old as the earth. --Meri Fowler
Arin Murphy-Hiscock (Out of the Broom Closet: 50 True Stories of Witches Who Found and Embraced the Craft)
the tail of a comet can extend millionsof miles into space, always in the opposite direction of the sun, blown by the solar breeze. A comets tail is the closet thing to nothing that anything can be. I love that. The closest thing to nothing.
Kelly Easton (The Life History of a Star)
Society is a machine of machines, a system that runs on precondition, customs, rules and laws that are either expressed openly or maintained in the closet, one, like the one in the United States that is constantly changing to accommodate some variations of the machinated selves and its affections as in race, gender, sexual orientations etc which are also mostly preconditions of the machine. Again, I ask. Who are you?
Dew Platt (Failure&solitude)
Fathers of the fatherless children, your sons and daughters crave your presence and your support. They want you in their lives more than you will ever know. There isn’t such a thing as a part-time father; your children shouldn’t be treated as toys that you can throw in the closet when you are tired or when the going gets rough. Your sons and daughters are human; they should feel loved and nothing less at all times. You say you love your children, but actions speak louder than words; stand up and be a father to your sons and daughters.
Charlena E. Jackson (Dear fathers of the fatherless children)
I have a picture of the Pont Neuf on a wall in my apartment, but i know that Paris is really on the closet shelf, in the box next to the sleeping bag, with the rest of my diaries.
Thomas Mallon
Many treat friendships and other human connections as if they are things they can store in a closet where they can come back one day and find them unaltered. Alas, human connections do not survive with this mentality.
Louis Yako
Writing can take you to places you’ve never been, introduce you to people you’ve never met, take you back to when you first saw those shadows in your room, when you first heard the sounds mumbling ever so softly from your closet, and it can show you what uttered them. It can scare the hell out of you, and that’s when you know it’s good.
J.D. Barker
Dear Fathers of the Fatherless Children: Do you know your sons and daughters are AMAZING? They are full of life and they are truly a blessing. Your sons and daughters need you in their lives. How is it possible that at the beginning of the day when you open your eyes, your children are not on your priority list? Fathers of the fatherless children, your sons and daughters crave your presence and your support. They want you in their lives more than you will ever know. There isn’t such a thing as a part-time father; your children shouldn’t be treated as toys that you can throw in the closet when you are tired or when the going gets rough. Your sons and daughters are human; they should feel loved and nothing less at all times. You say you love your children, but actions speak louder than words; stand up and be a father to your sons and daughters. Fathers of the fatherless children, open your eyes and know your presence is very critical. Be your son’s hero and let him know he can conquer the world. Be your daughter's first knight in shining armor. Be a part of your son’s and daughter’s success instead of their pain.
Charlena E. Jackson (Dear fathers of the fatherless children)
Well, yes, there were quite a lot of books throughout, tumbling out of haphazardly placed bookshelves, stacked beneath chairs, beside beds, even in the bottoms of a closet or two. But I was never a "collector." My love of books is a love of what they contain; they hold knowledge as a pitcher holds water, as a dress contains the mystery of a woman's exquisite body. Their physicality matters--do not speak to me of storing books as bytes!--but they should not inspire fetishistic devotion.
Julia Glass (The Widower's Tale)
Be courteous, kind, and forgiving. Be gentle and peaceful each day. Be warm and human and grateful, And have a good thing to say. Be thoughtful and trustful and childlike, Be witty and happy and wise. Be honest and love all your neighbors, Be obsequious, purple, and clairvoyant. Be pompous, obese, and eat cactus. Be dull and boring and omnipresent. Criticize things you don’t know about. Be oblong and have your knees removed. Be sure to stop at stop signs, And drive fifty-five miles an hour. Pick up hitchhikers foaming at the mouth, And when you get home get a master’s degree in geology. Be tasteless, rude, and offensive. Live in a swamp and be three-dimensional. Put a live chicken in your underwear. Go into a closet and suck eggs.
Steve Martin
If you got talent, showcase it. It's no good hidden in your closet.
Sreedhar P Iyer (The Enigmatic Expanse)
We buy items that we only half like because they are on sale or a “good deal.” •We wear clothes that are so uncomfortable we need to take them off as soon as we get home. •We keep items that stopped fitting years ago just in case they fit again someday. •We wear shoes that we can hardly walk in and that leave our feet covered in blisters. •We force ourselves to wear pieces that we feel only so-so about because they were expensive and we don’t want to let that “investment” go to waste. •We wear worn-out, scruffy pieces around the house and hope nobody is going to stop by unannounced. •We wear clothes that ride up and tug in all the wrong places. •We wear outfits that don’t make us feel confident or inspired because we simply don’t have anything better in our wardrobe.
Anuschka Rees (The Curated Closet: A Simple System for Discovering Your Personal Style and Building Your Dream Wardrobe)
When you work hard, the temptation is to come home and just plotz (which is Jewish for “relax,” or maybe “die,” depending on the context)—to throw your dirty clothes on the floor or hide a mess behind closet doors. This is not a new story.
Barbara "Cutie" Cooper (Fall in Love for Life: Inspiration from a 73-Year Marriage)
So maybe you're asexual. But that is not all bad! I know it feels bad. You're pretty much in you're own version of the closet trying to figure it out. I've been there. I thought my liking boys was a phase I would grow out of if I just ignored it. ...but I want to tell you, as someone who thought they were broken and everyone was staring at them and knew that you, that are not broken. Plus you might [be somewhere else on the sexuality spectrum]...or [you might] only be interested in sex with people once you know them, and have a bond with them [Demisexual]. Or maybe you're only turned on by a very particular kind of sex or fetish that you haven't discovered. But as long as everyone is consenting, there's nothing wrong with your desire, or you're not having desire! We're all wired differently.
Lev A.C. Rosen (Jack of Hearts (and Other Parts))
Myself I have to live with myself and so I want to be fit for myself to know. I want to be able as days go by, always to look myself straight in the eye; I don't want to stand with the setting sun and hate myself for the things I've done. I don't want to keep on a closet shelf a lot of secrets about myself and fool myself as I come and go into thinking no one will ever know the kind of person I really am, I don't want to dress myself up in sham. I want to go out with my head erect I want to deserve all men's respect; but here in the struggle for fame and pelf I want to be able to like myself. I don't want to look at myself and know I'm bluster and bluff and empty show. I never can hide myself from me; I see what others may never see; I know what others may never know, I never can fool myself and so, whatever happens I want to be self respecting and conscience free.
Edgar A. Guest
You may feel like your future is slipping from your grasp, that if you don’t rush now to greet your dreams you might lose out on them, but please wait. If you are coming from an unsupportive environment with regards to your sexual orientation, the best thing to do is to establish your independence. Make sure you have a support network of loving and loyal friends. Make sure you have somewhere to live. Make sure you have an income to sustain you. Place a premium on your life. Always, always place a premium on your life. When all these elements have been configured and your psychic compass is at the ready, go forth in the knowledge that you’ve created a self-preserving future for yourself. Go forth in the knowledge that you have a safe space to call home. Go forth in the knowledge that not only are you kicking ass but you are kicking ass on a major scale. Go forth in the knowledge that not only are you winning at life but you have already won.
Diriye Osman
The nutritionist said I should eat root vegetables. Said if I could get down thirteen turnips a day I would be grounded, rooted. Said my head would not keep flying away to where the darkness lives. The psychic told me my heart carries too much weight. Said for twenty dollars she’d tell me what to do. I handed her the twenty. She said, “Stop worrying, darling. You will find a good man soon.” The first psycho therapist told me to spend three hours each day sitting in a dark closet with my eyes closed and ears plugged. I tried it once but couldn’t stop thinking about how gay it was to be sitting in the closet. The yogi told me to stretch everything but the truth. Said to focus on the out breath. Said everyone finds happiness when they care more about what they give than what they get. The pharmacist said, “Lexapro, Lamicatl, Lithium, Xanax.” The doctor said an anti-psychotic might help me forget what the trauma said. The trauma said, “Don’t write these poems. Nobody wants to hear you cry about the grief inside your bones.” But my bones said, “Tyler Clementi jumped from the George Washington Bridge into the Hudson River convinced he was entirely alone.” My bones said, “Write the poems.
Andrea Gibson (The Madness Vase)
Magazine and television advertisements have me subconsciously believing that a sexy airbrushed image can sell a lot more canned tomatoes than without this image. Who’s to say that a dolled up vagina can’t buy me love? Yet this is what we teach our daughters through these images. It’s the makeup, manicures, pedicures, closet full of clothes, the size of our boobs, the perfection of our skin and shininess of our hair – this is what secures us love. We teach our sons to love women who look a certain way. We teach our men to support this belief system, and it’s constantly reinforced by false advertisements. It’s like that one cheesy but lovable song we can’t stop playing. We may forget about it for a while, but the minute we hear it again, it’s on repeat a few hundred times. “How can we be lovers if we can’t be friends?” you may ask. This is a question for Michael Bolton and whoever wrote the lyrics to it.
Sadiqua Hamdan (Happy Am I. Holy Am I. Healthy Am I.)
Passing the dark, low fields just south of Harrows, Smoke saw a scarecrow that reminded him, in shape, of his mother. Inspired by it, he imagined her burning. He imagined the dresses from her closet … the curls in her blond hair … the rims of her glasses … all of it and everything blistering, bending, burning. The fire he imagined for her was blue and smelled like childhood. And childhood reminded him of the children he once knew; he imagined a girl named Merrily melted to the shape of a chair, another, Henry, sitting upon her in a classroom. He'd like to burn them all. Every face he'd ever seen. Excited now, Smoke saw the mothers of these former schoolmates rushing from their homes, desperate feet pattering on the porch boards, able to discern the smell of their own child burning above all others. Smoke would be there when they came. He'd be there with a piece of meat on a stick. Dinner over childhood's fire. Hey, Ma! This meat only gets better the longer it cooks! Moved, Smoke imagined more. Men in suits bursting into flame upon exiting church. Families sitting down to eat burnt food, blackened bread, ashen meals upon scalding-hot plates. Come on, Billy! Eat your fire! EAT YOUR FIRE!
Josh Malerman (Unbury Carol)
As a young wife and mother living in a pre-Pinterest world, I used to glue-gun bows and small pieces of minutia together methodically. I was an insomniac proudly penning thank you notes longer than the Declaration of Independence to every person who had even sent me a card. I was reorganizing my linen closet, ironing placemats, straight-ironing my hair, and never saying no to any person that asked me for a favor. And, I forgot to mention, I didn’t really like myself. I felt like a fuzzy, carbon copy of myself. I felt the passion, the conviction, and the grit somewhere inside of me yet a bunch of preconceived ideas somehow got in the way.
Ann Brasco
Since her separation she had slowly, cautiously--perhaps even unconsciously--performed a kind of striptease, unpeeling the veils of convention which had surrounded her. During the 1980s she had been defined only by her fashions, seen merely as a glamorous clothes horse, a royal adjunct, a wife and mother. Since the separation, however, her regal wardrobe, which defined her royal mystique, had been left in the closet. Indeed, her decision, inspired by Prince William, to hold an auction of her royal wardrobe for Aids charities in New York in the summer of 1997 was a very public farewell to that old life. She no longer wanted to be seen as just a beautiful model for expensive clothes. Moreover, during her days as a semi-detached royal she had deliberately stripped away other trappings of monarchy, her servants, her ladies-in-waiting, her limousines and, most controversially, her bodyguards. The casting off of her royal title was one giant step on that journey. She had spent much time grieving a failed relationship, lost hopes and broken ambitions. She had once said: ‘I had so many dreams as a young girl. I hoped for a husband to look after me, he would be a father figure to me, he would support me, encourage me, say “Well done” or “That wasn’t good enough”. I didn’t get any of that. I couldn’t believe it.’ The days of betrayal, anguish and hurt lay in the past. Now it was time to move on, to make the most of her position and her personality. Opportunity beckoned. As the Princess admitted: ‘I have learned much over the last years. From now on I am going to own myself and be true to myself. I no longer want to live someone else’s idea of what and who I should be.’ ‘I am going to be me.
Andrew Morton (Diana: Her True Story in Her Own Words)
First of all, it takes thought to pray. The intellect teaches us we ought to pray. By serious thinking beforehand the mind prepares itself for approaching a throne of grace. Thought goes before entrance into the closet and prepares the way for true praying. It considers what will be asked for in the closet hour. True praying does not leave to the inspiration of the hour what will be the requests of that hour. As praying is asking for something definite of God, so, beforehand, the thought arises—“What shall I ask for at this hour?” All vain and evil and frivolous thoughts are eliminated, and the mind is given over entirely to God, thinking of him, of what is needed, and what has been received in the past. By every token, prayer, in taking hold of the entire man, does not leave out the mind. The very first step in prayer is a mental one. The disciples took that first step when they said unto Jesus at one time, “Lord, teach us to pray.
E.M. Bounds (The Essentials of Prayer)
Secrecy is contrary to Christianity. Jesus did not found a secret society. When falsely accused of many things before the Sanhedrin, and when the high priest demanded to know His doctrine, Christ specifically stated: "I spoke openly to the world; I always taught in the synagogue and in the temple where the Jews always resort, and in secret have I said nothing."' Moreover, He warned His disciples against secret doctrines and practices with these words: "For nothing is secret that shall not be made manifest.... Therefore whatever you have spoken in darkness shall be heard in the light, and that which you have spoken in the ear in closets shall be proclaimed upon the housetops."29 The Bible declares that the "hidden things" are to be reproved and brought to light,' and that anything done in secret will receive special attention in the judgment.31 As for secret revelations beyond those given in Scripture, the Bible clearly rejects this idea by repeated affirmations of its sufficiency and completeness. For example: All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect [mature, complete, lacking nothing], thoroughly furnished unto all good works.32 According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue... .33 If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book.
Ed Decker (The God Makers: A Shocking Expose of What the Mormon Church Really Believes)
Trust him. And when you have done that, you are living the life of grace. No matter what happens to you in the course of that trusting - no matter how many waverings you may have, no matter how many suspicions that you have bought a poke with no pig in it, no matter how much heaviness and sadness your lapses, vices, indispositions, and bratty whining may cause you - you believe simply that Somebody Else, by his death and resurrection, has made it all right, and you just say thank you and shut up. The whole slop-closet full of mildewed performances (which is all you have to offer) is simply your death; it is Jesus who is your life. If he refused to condemn you because your works were rotten, he certainly isn't going to flunk you because your faith isn't so hot. You can fail utterly, therefore, and still live the life of grace. You can fold up spiritually, morally, or intellectually and still be safe. Because at the very worst, all you can be is dead - and for him who is the Resurrection and the Life, that just makes you his cup of tea.” ― Between Noon & Three: Romance, Law & the Outrage of Grace
Father Robert Farrar Capon
your life mustn't be a closet for dirty laundry coz you will have a smelly and messy life...Yeah no matter how much you trying to clean up,the smell won't go away until you put away the "dirty laundry
Duinkie Tracey Ncitha
I like clothes, Megan. I've like clothes since I was a toddler playing in my mother's closet back in the Master's quarters in New York. I liked them long before i knew anything about gender or sexuality, or that a penis could be used for anything other than taking a tinkle. And I'm not going to stop being interested in fashion just because some bigot thinks that me enjoying couture is a reaffirmation of a worn out stereotype.
L.C. Hibbett (The Shadow Children (Demon-Born Trilogy, #1))
Your closet space should make you excited. It should also give you peace of mind, the peace of mind that comes from knowing you can find everything at a moment’s notice, and that it’ll be in perfect shape—not wrinkled from being on the wrong hanger, or improperly folded and stuffed in the back of a drawer.
Jane Stoller (Organizing for Your Lifestyle: Adaptable Inspirations from Socks to Suitcases)
I’ve been trying to write the perfect book since high school. e results are in a large Rubbermaid tub in my closet. I don’t know what all is in there, but I do know that the tub makes a great stepping stool when I want to organize my socks on the top shelf of my closet.
Jason W. Freeman (Awkwardly Awesome: Embracing My Imperfect Best)
And every time I've set out to meet life, I've met and embraced death. I've collected all my skeletons and bones from each of those moments and have stored them inside the closet that I own. The bones that the death wouldn't touch. And I guess now I have enough of them with me to build a bridge to the paradise in which life lives.
Akshay Vasu (Reflections in a Shattered Mirror)
Questions and topics for discussion 1) What do you think it means to be a Bossypants? Do you know anyone personally that you would describe as a Bossypants and did the society you live in ever try to drown her? 2) The lessons Tina has learned from her work as a writer, a boss, a performer, and a producer are lessons that can be carried across a wide array of disciplines. (For instance, from her instructions about improv: Always speak in statements.) Which moments resonated the most for you? 3) In Chapter 4, Tina realizes that she has been guilty of holding her gay friends to a double standard—enjoying their company but still expecting them to stay in a “half-closet.” Have you ever had a moment like this? In a related question, do you think young pop stars today experience too much pressure to pretend to be a lesbian with Madonna? 4) While working at the YMCA in Chicago, Tina experienced some personal low points. But it also propelled her into pursuing her improv career. Have you ever experienced a similarly transformative period? During your transformation, did you ever spin around and pretend to be Wonder Woman? 5) What are some of your favorite SNL sketches or 30 Rock episodes? Should we just act them out? 6) Which other celebrities, besides Kim Kardashian, do you think may have been engineered by Russian scientists to sabotage our athletes? 7) Are there more specifics you would add to “The Mother’s Prayer for Its Daughter”? 8) Tina writes a love letter to Amy Poehler. Do you have friends who inspire you in the same way that Amy inspires Tina? ACTIVITY: Write a love letter to Amy Poehler and mail it to her home address (p. 291).
Tina Fey (Bossypants)
MSN GROUP: Mystery’s Lounge SUBJECT: Field Report—Life at Project Hollywood AUTHOR: Sickboy For those who don’t know, I’ve been sleeping in Papa’s closet at Project Hollywood. Today was the best day I’ve ever had here, despite all the crazy drama that has been going on. I woke up earlier than usual and went surfing in Malibu with Style and his girlfriend, who is really an amazing person. Seeing how cool they get along is really inspiring. He’s one of the few people I’ve met in the game who has something great to show for all the effort he’s put into it. The surfing was amazing. I was so happy to go because I haven’t gone yet this summer. I recommend taking up the sport to anyone who’s never tried it. As soon as you hit the water, your mind clears and it’s almost impossible to think of anything else. It’s truly a relaxing experience. Afterward, we ate at a fish stand right at the edge of the Pacific Ocean and had a great conversation about music, friends, traveling, life, and careers. When I returned to the house, I did some work. Then I watched The Last Dragon with Playboy, whom I’ve become good friends with. During the movie, Herbal and Mystery talked outside and settled their differences. Though Mystery’s still upset at Katya, he said he wouldn’t hold it against Herbal for falling in love with her. And Herbal said that if Mystery paid for the damages to his room, he’d forgive Mystery for his behavior. Thank God. It’s good to see this thing ended in a sane way. Mystery will be moving out of the house tomorrow anyway, which I think is a shame. At about 2:00 A.M., Playboy, Mystery, and I sat in the main room smoking a hookah, listening to music, and talking about our goals in life. I didn’t have a single conversation today about sarging, pickup, or the community. My day was filled with real conversations with real friends. I didn’t need to fuck some L.A. bimbo from the Saddle Ranch for validation. In fact, I didn’t do a single set all day. These are the days that make life worth living. These are also the days that I will miss when I move out of Project Hollywood. —Sickboy
Neil Strauss (The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists)
My look was inspired by Clueless star Cher Horowitz’s closet—the small white dress her daddy had refused to let her leave the house in without a coverup. I had some issues with daddies, so here I was, in a small white dress—even sans sheer cardigan—as the clouds grew heavy with rain.
Danielle Lori (The Maddest Obsession (Made, #2))
If Tivo marks the beginning of the shift from the Brand Age to the Product Age, the summer of 2020 saw the Brand Age’s end. The killing of George Floyd and subsequent protests briefly displaced the pandemic in the front and center of our national consciousness, making obvious the passing of the Brand Age into history. Seemingly every brand company did what they always do when America’s sins are pulled out from the back of the closet where we try to keep them hidden: they called up their agencies and posted inspiring words, arresting images, and black rectangles. Message: We care. Only this time, it didn’t resonate. Their brand magic fizzled. First on social media, then tumbling from there onto newspapers and evening news, activists and customers started using the tools of the new age to compare these companies’ carefully crafted brand messages with the reality of their operations. “This you?” became the Twitter meme that exposed the brand wizards. Companies who posted about their “support” for black empowerment were called out when their own websites revealed the music did not match the words. The NFL claimed it celebrates protest, and the internet tweeted back, “This you?” under a picture of Colin Kaepernick kneeling. L’Oréal posted that “speaking out is worth it” and got clapped back with stories about dropping a model just three years earlier for speaking out against racism. The performative wokeness across brands felt forced and hollow. Systemic racism is a serious issue, and a 30-second spot during The Masked Singer doesn’t prove you are serious about systemic racism. That’s always been true, about ads on any issue, but social media and the ease of access to data on the internet has made it much harder for companies to pretend.
Scott Galloway (Post Corona: From Crisis to Opportunity)
Akin to any other human being’s creations composed from inspirational toil, the textual rendering of a person depicted in personal essay writing asserts an existence independent of the author. A personal writing voice speaks to me from a secluded mental closet. Writing makes private mental musings a public act.
Kilroy J. Oldster (Dead Toad Scrolls)
Inside, Barkin moved a mop and pulled a chain to turn on the light. There was another mop in the way. He moved that mop too and sat down on a bucket. There, he began to write. Barkin, inspired, lost track of time as he wrote his speech. It took an hour. At 7:38 he emerged from the supply closet clutching perhaps the greatest first-day power speech in the history of Yawnee Valley Science and Letters Academy, at which point a student in the hallway told him his car was parked in front of the school entrance.
Mac Barnett (The Terrible Two)
I remembered the deep sense of satisfaction, the inspired joy I once felt, when I read about some gay kid who learned to accept himself, who opened himself up to a fuller life than he ever believed possible. But Uncle Martin was not a boy; he was not some just-sprung-from-the-closet queer finally coming to the electrifying realization that his life could get better. Uncle Martin was a grown man with an adult life he had constructed in the only way he could imagine it. He had segregated the disparate elements of his happiness, stashed them in different rooms in different buildings on different streets: a home, a church, a rented five-by-ten-storage space, different dimensions that were allowed to coexist so long as they remained blissfully ignorant of each other. He had a career, friends, a relationship with the God he believed in, and a wife he cared about. He had everything to lose. Still there’s immeasurable value in being true to yourself, even if your defining moment comes late in life, and at great cost, even if your life is the final price you pay for your honesty.
Jeff McKown (Solid Ground)
Spiritual unconsciousness is like being afraid of the dark. When we are in the dark, we can’t see properly. However, we can imagine all sorts of things. The boogeyman under the bed. A creature in the closet. We can create all sorts of monsters in our mind. But that is exactly the point. They only exist in our mind. If we turn on the light, everything looks different.
H. W. Mann
Closeting your failures only prolongs your future
James D. Wilson
Closeting your failures only prolongs your success
James D. Wilson
Avoid strife for today by forgetting the strife of yesterday, We all have skeletons in the closet -- use your skeleton key to keep them there.
T.R. Bosse (The Mystery of the Trinity Revealed)
The world, it seems, is full of people like this. Closet artists and aspiring authors—people longing to do meaningful, inspiring work. There’s just one problem: They’re not doing it.
Jeff Goins (You Are A Writer (So Start Acting Like One))
Those of us troubled by language about the “extermination” of Canaanite populations may find some comfort in the fact that scholars and archaeologists doubt the early skirmishes of Israel’s history actually resulted in genocide. It was common for warring tribes in ancient Mesopotamia to refer to decisive victories as “complete annihilation” or “total destruction,” even when their enemies lived to fight another day. (The Moabites, for example, claimed in an extrabiblical text that after their victory in a battle against an Israelite army, the nation of Israel “utterly perished for always,” which obviously isn’t the case. And even in Scripture itself, stories of conflicts with Canaanite tribes persist through the book of Judges and into Israel’s monarchy, which would suggest Joshua’s armies did not in fact wipe them from the face of the earth, at least not in a literal sense.)9 Theologian Paul Copan called it “the language of conventional warfare rhetoric,” which “the knowing ancient Near Eastern reader recognized as hyperbole.”10 Pastor and author of The Skeletons in God’s Closet, Joshua Ryan Butler, dubbed it “ancient trash talk.”11
Rachel Held Evans (Inspired: Slaying Giants, Walking on Water, and Loving the Bible Again (series_title))
earching for that familiar person only makes you walk into the arms of grief....and there you smell the scent in the breeze over the alleys and desolate streets..where the leftover memories still remain. Grief does not go away from the closet or the drawers or the chair that now sits empty. Through the haunting emptiness, grief breaks into a river once again...
Jayita Bhattacharjee
Powerful I am a form of God's design! I will have whatever my mind is set on; I will be whatever my desire is to be, Around me rolls the power of universe. I stand to gaze and praise myself loud, For my greetings waits the entire nature, I have made choices out of my self-love I have held to thoughts to please my own I have taken charted plans to make beautiful way Where I live in a closet of peace with spiritual gain I have the power to change darkness into dazzling light, I have the courage to struggle for my deserving right. With my choices I ride ahead to capture vision and goals But it seems life still loves the green grasses and games, Then I fear as I deceive myself and cheat my knowing Soul, For greed of wants, desires I manipulate my Divine own. But the joke is still I achieve what I want in a better way, No one knows how happy I am to be in this humble way, Past is gone and it better leaves me alone for now, My true romance is only with my dear lovely future. I have strength of ocean within me and power of God, Who dares to break me down will never be able to at all, I am the most beautiful design created by my God, His infinite power and tender heart inherited by me...the powerful one - Harshada Pathare
Harshada Pathare