I especially like that part.

I love my family (my sibs, parents, and grandparents.) Despite having a significantly different way of experiencing the world than my family members, I love each of them deeply. I think this comes from our histories together. I don’t feel as close to anyone as I do to the people I grew up with.

Eggs-effin’-zactly. I think this really cuts to the heart of the issue, much as ‘tenderness-for-incompletely-satisfied-longings’, you know?

http://www.mythic-cartography.org/2006/11/19/the-cultivation-of-tenderness-for-incompletely-satisfied-longings/

We think we need to have everything we want, but mostly we just need to WANT it, and feel it, and live it, to have a life worthy of living.

Familiar warts can actually inspire quite a bit of affection, don’t you think?

Sometimes I reminisce about places I have lived — placed I hated living — and I remember them fondly. It makes me wonder about the effect of nostalgia and how it plays into the story-building process. It at least tells me that not everything has to feel “good” in order to have a positive value in the story. Then sometimes I try to look at the conflicts I have going on currently and view them through the lens of nostalgia at the moment — a kind of now-stalgia, if you will. That way I can get a jump-start on appreciating events for their story-ness without having to wait ten years to see their value.

I just began reading this site a few weeks ago, and continue to find gems in each post. Thank you for your work.

~wildeyes