253 Quotes by Clarissa Pinkola Estés

When a woman is exhorted to be compliant, cooperative, and quiet, to not make upset or go against the old guard, she is pressed into living a most unnatural life- a life that is self-blinding.. . without innovation. The world-wide issue for women is that under such conditions they are not only silenced, they are put to sleep. Their concerns, their viewpoints, their own truths are vaporized.

In any dark time, there is a tendency to veer toward fainting over how much is wrong or unmended in the world. Do not focus on that. Do not make yourself ill with overwhelm. There is a tendency to fall into being weakened by perseverating on what is outside your reach, by what cannot yet be. Do not focus there. That is spending the wind without raising the sails.

It’s not by accident that the pristine wilderness of our planet disappears as the understanding of our own inner wild nature fades.

Be proud of your scars. They have everything to do with your strength, and what you’ve endured. They’re a treasure map to the deep self.

My brain has no heart, and my heart has no brain. That’s why when I speak my mind, I appear heartless and when I do what’s in my heart I seem thoughtless.

If you have yet to be called an incorrigable, defiant woman, don’t worry, there is still time.

Go out in the woods, go out. If you don’t go out in the woods nothing will ever happen and your life will never begin.

Ritual is one of the ways in which humans put their lives in perspective, whether it be Purim, Advent, or drawing down the moon. Ritual calls together the shades and specters in people’s lives, sorts them out, puts them to rest.

It’s not the failure that holds us back but the reluctance to begin over again that causes us to stagnate.