Tasneem

“The more I got to know people, the more I realized we were all just a bunch of frightened idiots walking around in the dark, bumping into each other and panicking for no reason at all.
So I started turning on a light.
I stopped thinking of people as mobs. Hordes. Faceless masses. I tried, really hard, to stop assuming I had people figured out, especially before I’d ever even spoken to them. I wasn’t great at this—and I’d probably have to work at it for the rest of my life—but I tried. I really did. It scared me to realize that I’d done to others exactly what I hadn’t wanted them to do to me: I made sweeping statements about who I thought they were and how they lived their lives; and I made broad generalizations about what I thought they were thinking, all the time.”
― Tahereh Mafi, A Very Large Expanse of Sea

“My parents loved us, but I wasn't always sure they liked us”
― Tahereh Mafi, A Very Large Expanse of Sea

“Not knowing the right thing to do is not an excuse for not doing anything.”
― Julie Buxbaum, Tell Me Three Things

“I mean, I wasn't fine. I would be fine. But I wasn't there yet.”
― Tahereh Mafi, A Very Large Expanse of Sea