The question
What lesson has mattered most in your life?Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
Verbatim recurring item in The Guardian Q&A; two fully readable publisher-hosted respondent pages establish institutional recurrence.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
To believe my eyes and not my ears.
The Q&A, The Guardian, 6 January 2024 source ↗
To keep trying to listen to yourself.
Showing up is at least 90% of it.
One’s created sense of self is not who you are. The present moment is all we have.
I remember the moment when my overwhelming uneasiness yielded. Seven words from Samuel Beckett, a writer I’ve not even read that well, learned long ago as an undergraduate, began to repeat in my head, and the seemingly impassable sea of uncertainty parted: “I can’t go on. I’ll go on.” I took a step forward, repeating the phrase over and over: “I can’t go on. I’ll go on.” And then, at some point, I was through.
My friend Fritha Goodey wouldn’t have committed suicide.
I once walked up to Harriet Walter while she was having lunch on her own because I thought I knew her, and then when I got up to the table I realised I didn’t know her, I just recognised her because she was Harriet Walter.
Knowledge seeping into adventure, with a thin layer of giddiness, hysterical laughter and loss of control.
Not marrying the person I wanted to marry, but now I think it’s probably good that I didn’t.
Being lost and no one wanting to find me.
I try too hard not to get things wrong.
Pauline McLynn, Barack Obama, Shinya Yamanaka, Andrew Ridgeley, Daphne Guinness, Oliver Sacks
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