Liz Hall > Recent Status Updates

"It's when women are able to step out from the shadows with their voices and their bodies that things start to shift. The gaps close. And so, at heart, Invisible Women is also a call for change. For too long we have positioned women as a deviation from standard humanity and this is why they have been allowed to become invisible. It's time for a change in perspective. It's time for women to be seen."

"People fall in love. That was his problem. People fell in love. With other people. With themselves. With possibility. With the past. With the future. With life. With objects. With ideas.... Humans led with their hearts and it took all five of their senses (six, if you count common) time to catch up."

“We live in a world where we don’t see the ramifications of what we do to others, because we don’t live with them... if we could see one another’s pain and empathize with one another, it would never be worth it to us to commit the crimes in the first place.”

“Relationships are built in the silences. You spend time with people, you observe them and interact with them, and you come to know them—and that is what apartheid stole from us: time.”

“Motherhood is like that - there is only the now. The despair of now, the relief of now.”

"I am not untidy," I objected. "I merely surround myself with a plethora of possibilities."

“Have you ever in your life come to realize that everything, absolutely everything, depends on you?”

Raymie didn’t even have to think about the answer to this question. “Yes,” she said.

Books can change minds and change worlds, open doors and open minds, and plant seeds that can grow into magical or even terrifying things. Stories are things to be loved and respected at the same time; never underestimate the power of them.

“I love thinking about other people reading the books I love, or why someone gave that book as a present — those names and messages are like tiny moments of time travel linking readers from different eras and families and even countries.”

All these things going wrong
might seem like signs
bits of story
that don’t belong
that say we’re going
the wrong way.
But if we listen to those things
to setbacks and disappointments
if we let fear or worry
stop us from trying
from turning the page
we’ll never get to meet
the Marjories of life
never find out
how great our story
could be.

Why do we think
we can know anything about a person
by how they look
what they can do
what life is like for them now?
Because it turns out
we really can’t.
The only way to know that stuff
is if someone
tells you the story.

Does my story
start with me?
Or does it start with my mom
or my grandmother
or...
Our stories all seem
to overlap.

And if you love books?
If you love books
read a great many books.
If you love to sing
sing loudly
and often.
Whatever you do
do it with all your heart.

“Anytime you get stuck, once again, ask the character what she wants now.”

“No matter how it is parsed or how much it resides in the eye of the beholder, no matter how its elements may be divided among delight, awe, surprise, or inspiration, beauty moves the heart as reason moves the mind.”