“Life changes in the instant. The ordinary instant.” Joan Didion The Year of Magical Thinking Source: The Year of Magical Thinking Life , Change
“The willingness to accept responsibility for one's own life is the source from which self-respect springs.” Joan Didion Source: "On Self-Respect", in Slouching Towards Bethlehem Life , Spring
“Life changes fast. Life changes in the instant. You sit down to dinner and life as you know it ends.” Joan Didion Life , Change
“Grief is different. Grief has no distance. Grief comes in waves, paroxysms, sudden apprehensions that weaken the knees and blind the eyes and obliterate the dailiness of life.” Joan Didion The Year of Magical Thinking Source: The Year of Magical Thinking Life
“Why do you always have to be right. Why do you always have to have the last word. For once in your life just let it go.” Joan Didion The Year of Magical Thinking Source: The Year of Magical Thinking Life
“Was there ever in anyone's life span a point free in time, devoid of memory, a night when choice was any more than the sum of all the choices gone before?” Joan Didion From the novel Run, River Life , Memory , Time , Night