Melanie Biehle

“The world today does not understand, in either man or woman, the need to be alone. How inexplicable it seems. Anything else will be accepted as a better excuse. If one sets aside time for a business appointment, a trip to the hairdresser, a social engagement, or a shopping expedition, that time is accepted as inviolable. But if one says: I cannot come because that is my hour to be alone, one is considered rude, egotistical, or strange. What a commentary on our civilization, when being alone is considered suspect; when one has to apologize for it, make excuses, hide the fact that one practices it--like a secret vice!”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea

“To ask how little, not how much, can I get along with. To say—is it necessary?—when I am tempted to add one more accumulation to my life, when I am pulled toward one more centrifugal activity.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea: 70th Anniversary Edition

“Only when one is connected to one’s own core is one connected to others, I am beginning to discover. And, for me, the core, the inner spring, can best be refound through solitude.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea: 70th Anniversary Edition

“What release to write so that one forgets oneself, forgets one's companion, forgets where one is or what one is going to do next--to be drenched in work as one is drenched in sleep or the sea.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea