“A past may chase you if you try to escape from it... but once you confront it, it's just an old memory inside you. There's nothing to be afraid of.”

“Once you realise there's nothing to be afraid of when you die, there's nothing else to worry about.”

“Let me show you what life is like lived in the moment. No past, no future, just the one perfect moment you're standing in and there's no guilt and there's no shame and there's absolutely nothing to be afraid of...”

“From the book From Nature’s Patient Hands by Elizabeth Barrette (“The Nature of Poetry, and Vice Versa” section):” Walk as if nothing is chasing you. Watch as if nothing is afraid of you. Write as if you have nothing else in the universe to do.”

“I’ll tell you another secret, this one for your own good. You may think the past has something to tell you. You may think that you should listen, should strain to make out its whispers, should bend over backward, stoop down low to hear its voice breathed up from the ground, from the dead places. You may think there’s something in it for you, something to understand or make sense of.But I know the truth: I know from the nights of Coldness. I know the past will drag you backward and down, have you snatching at whispers of wind and the gibberish of trees rubbing together, trying to decipher some code, trying to piece together what was broken. It’s hopeless. The past is nothing but a weight. It will build inside of you like a stone.Take it from me: If you hear the past speaking to you, feel it tugging at your back and running its fingers up your spine, the best thing to do—the only thing—is run.”

“You will find peace not by trying to escape your problems, but by confronting them courageously. You will find peace not in denial, but in victory.”