Banana Yoshimoto Quotes

“I realized that the world did not exist for my benefit. It followed that the ratio of pleasant and unpleasant things around me would not change. It wasn't up to me. It was clear that the best thing to do was to adopt a sort of muddled cheerfulness.”

“Fate is a ladder on which you cannot afford to miss a single rung. To skip out on even one step would mean you'll never make it to the top.”

“That's the advantage of insomnia. People who go to be early always complain that the night is too short, but for those of us who stay up all night, it can feel as long as a lifetime. You get a lot done”

“In the uncertain ebb and flow of time and emotions much of one's life history is etched in the senses.”

“Everything that had happened was shockingly beautiful, enough to make you crazy.”

“Recognizing how totally ignorant you are is the only honest way to deal with people who've been through something traumatic.”

“People aren't overcome by situations or outside forces. Defeat comes from within.”

“I really believe that no matter how old people get, they tend to change in certain ways depending on how people treat them - they change their colors.”

“Truly great people emit a light that warms the hearts of those around them. When that light has been put out, a heavy shadow of despair descends.”

“Truly happy memories always live on, shining. Over time, one by one, they come back to life.”

“What was important wasn't the fireworks, it was that we were together this evening, together in this place, looking up into the sky at the same time.”

“Why is it that everything I eat when I’m with you is so delicious?’ I laughed. ‘Could it be that you’re satisfying hunger and lust at the same time?”

“Every time I look into his eyes I just want to take the ice cream or whatever I've got in my hand and rub it into his face. That's how much I like him.”

“No matter where you are, you're always a bit on your own, always an outsider.”

“But I have my life, I’m living it. It’s twisted, exhausting, uncertain, and full of guilt, but nonetheless, there’s something there.”

“No matter what, I want to continue living with the awareness that I will die. Without that, I am not alive.”

“It was so gorgeous it almost felt like sadness.”

“Again and again I will suffer; again and again I will get back on my feet. I will not be defeated. I won't let my spirit be destroyed.”

“This world of ours is piled high with farewells and goodbyes of so many different kinds, like the evening sky renewing itself again and again from one instant to the next-and I didn’t want to forget a single one.”

“When someone tells you something big, it's like you're taking money from them, and there's no way it will ever go back to being the way it was. You have to take responsibility for listening.”

“Once you've recognized your own limits, you've raised yourself to a higher level of being, since you're closer to the real you…”

“Everything in life has some good in it. And when something awful happens, the goodness stands out even more--it's sad, but that's the truth.”

“The sky was incredibly far away, and beautiful enough to make a person wonder why our hearts are never so free.”

“I was happy. I loved the night, I loved t so much it almost hurt. In the night everything seemed possible. I wasn't sleepy at all.”

“This is what it means to be loved… when someone wants to touch you, to be tender…”

“Why is it we have so little choice? We live like the lowliest worms. Always defeated - defeated we make dinner, we eat, we sleep. Everyone we love is dying. Sill, to cease living is unacceptable.”

“It was at once a miracle and the most natural thing in the world.”

“When things get really bad, you take comfort in the placeness of a place.”

“If you don’t say what you’re thinking, you end up lying when you really need to speak up.”

“Nothing exists in this world but me and my bed…” (p. 141).”

“Why were we so far apart, even when we were together? It was a nice loneliness, like the sensation of washing your face in cold water.”

“You have the nicest window, you know? None of the others can even compete. It´s not flashy like the others, or bleary – your window gives of this nice, quiet light.”

“it'll be this kind of deep blue”she said. “The kind of color that somehow sucks your eyes and your ears and all your words —the color of a completely closed-in night”

“And when something awful happens, the goodness stands out even more…”

“Over and over, we begin again.”

“It didn't matter whether he was nearby or far away. His image would drift up into your mind just when you least expected it, shocking you, making your chest pound. Making your heart ache.”

“Inching one's way along a steep cliff in the dark: on reaching the highway, one breathes a sigh of relief. Just when one can't take any more, one sees the moonlight. Beauty that seems to infuse itself into the heart: I know about that”

“She was still there inside me now, just as she always was: a life put on hold, a memory I didn't know how to handle.”

“I felt how important the simplest things were, like feeling proud, finding something funny, stretching yourself, retreating into yourself.”