Fiona Valpy > Quotes

“Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass, it’s about learning to dance in the rain.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Beekeeper's Promise

“you have a choice. You can either let the pain overwhelm you, defining your life from that point on – perhaps even ending it or, at best, consigning you to a living death – or you can find a way to bear it, to carry it with you and still go on living.”
― Fiona Valpy, Sea of Memories

“Being mindful. Rather than having a mind that’s full,”
― Fiona Valpy, The Beekeeper's Promise

“you can’t always choose what life throws at you. But you always have a choice in how you deal with it.”
― Fiona Valpy, Sea of Memories

“You smell of honey and sunshine. Even after all that. The darkness of this world can't dim the light that shines from you, Eliane.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Beekeeper's Promise

“So, is it wrong to dream, to want the things we don’t have?’ ‘No, my darling, never give up your dreams. But just make sure they don’t distract you too much from the good things that there are in your day-to-day life, even if that life is by no means perfect. Because there always are good things”
― Fiona Valpy, Sea of Memories

“For most of my life, I have dwelt in a sort of no man’s land where loneliness has been an easier option than trying to fit in.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“I think the biggest mistake I made was not to see that the imperfect reality was worth so much more than the perfect dream.”
― Fiona Valpy, Sea of Memories

“So, if we cling on to life so hard and value it so much, how deep do depression and despair have to drag someone before they reach a place where they can’t bear to go on?”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“It is the loss of those you love that is unbearable.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“Do you remember what I told you? About the philosophy behind this? That something which is unique has its own beauty that can never be destroyed; that it’s always worth mending, even when it’s broken; and that the fractures and the scars become part of the beauty too, making the piece even more remarkable, even more precious.” And then she said, “Heal your heart, Ella. Let Angus help you. Mend your marriage with veins of the purest gold and remake it, better and stronger than before.” And we did. Because, you see, Kendra, I fell in love with your grandfather all over again. Caroline was right: our love was worth mending. In the end, we made the scars part of the beauty of our marriage.’ She”
― Fiona Valpy, Sea of Memories

“I see now that it’s one of the paradoxes of life that if we love it so much that we are frightened of losing it, it can make us live a half-life, too scared to get out there and live whole-heartedly because we have too much to lose. In the same way, I think I protect myself in relationships, too scared to love whole-heartedly because then there would be too much to lose there too.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“Go to your fields and your gardens, and you shall learn that it is the pleasure of the bee to gather honey of the flower, But it is also the pleasure of the flower to yield its honey to the bee. For to the bee a flower is a fountain of life, And to the flower a bee is a messenger of love.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Beekeeper's Promise

“But you see, Kendra dear, you have a choice. You can either let the pain overwhelm you, defining your life from that point on – perhaps even ending it or, at best, consigning you to a living death – or you can find a way to bear it, to carry it with you and still go on living. As you well know yourself, you can’t always choose what life throws at you. But you always have a choice in how you deal with it.”
― Fiona Valpy, Sea of Memories

“You know, I used to think of myself as a tiny drop in the ocean of life. But I’ve come to see that I am not a drop in the ocean: I’m an entire ocean in one tiny drop. There is no answer to your question, Zoe. Some things are impossible to move on from – instead, you have to find a way to live with them. The secret is to open your heart, even as it breaks. Because that’s when you discover that you have the capacity to contain it all – the pain and the love, the dark and the light. Just like the ocean. Finding the strength to do so can be quite a challenge, and it takes time. But, in the end, it’s facing up to the truth that will set you free.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Storyteller of Casablanca

“So, if we cling on to life so hard and value it so much, how deep do depression and despair have to drag someone before they reach a place where they can’t bear to go on? It”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“And it dawns on me that perhaps there are very many different ways to keep someone alive in your heart.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“Until now, I have allowed the legacy of trauma to imprison my spirit.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“In the midst of winter, I found that there was within me an invincible summer. Retour à Tipasa, Albert Camus (1952)”
― Fiona Valpy, The Beekeeper's Promise

“What is this world where human beings can be the perpetrators of such inhumanity against their own kind?”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“But if we leave out some of the important bits of the truth – or choose to ignore them – then surely we are living a lie? And that is no way to live at all, is it?”
― Fiona Valpy, The Storyteller of Casablanca

“When that photograph was taken, those three young women – full of hopes and dreams – had their lives ahead of them. It seems to me that they epitomise a love for life. They weren’t to know, on that May morning, just how far that love was going to be tested. And then I think of my mother. How deep do depression and despair have to drag a person until, at last, they reach a place where they can’t bear to go on? Claire and Vivi showed how much the human spirit can endure: brutality, cruelty, inhumanity – all of these can be borne. It is the loss of those you love that is unbearable.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“Do you wish you’d done anything differently?’ I ask. ‘Of course. With hindsight we always see things so much more clearly. But at the time we muddle through, trying to make the best decisions we can, but making all sorts of mistakes along the way. I think the biggest mistake I made was not realising that there are so many different kinds of love. And that there is room for them all. No one excludes the others.”
― Fiona Valpy, Sea of Memories

“You can’t let terror win. It becomes all the more important to resist the urge to give in to fear.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“life is not about finding yourself – it’s about creating the person you want to be.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Sky Beneath Us

“I’ve read that the currents of trauma run deep in families. They can be inherited, passed down the generations from one to the next, ruining lives as they go. Perhaps that’s what happened to my mother. But I won’t let it happen to me. Now that I understand where that trauma came from, I can see it for what it is. And by finding the courage to turn and face it, I have the opportunity to stop it in its tracks.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“Life can seem so very tenuous sometimes. But perhaps that fragility is why we treasure it so. And perhaps it is our profound love of life that makes us so terrified of losing it.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“Some things are impossible to move on from – instead, you have to find a way to live with them. The secret is to open your heart, even as it breaks. Because that’s when you discover that you have the capacity to contain it all – the pain and the love, the dark and the light. Just like the ocean. Finding the strength to do so can be quite a challenge, and it takes time. But, in the end, it’s facing up to the truth that will set you free.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Storyteller of Casablanca

“I’m not just searching for who they are. I’m trying to find out who I am, too.”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift

“How can I escape the same fate? In a world that seems filled with fear and panic, what can I do to stop the cycle repeating itself? Do I carry that same fragility in my own genetic make-up? Am I helpless, or is it possible for me to retake control of my life?”
― Fiona Valpy, The Dressmaker's Gift