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The World Just Feels Different For Those Of Us Who Come Alive After Dark. It's More Fragile And Unreal, A Replica Of The One Everyone Else Inhabits.
-Jodi Picoult
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The World Just Feels

Jodi Picoult
...
The World Just Feels Different For Those Of Us Who Come Alive After Dark. It's More Fragile And Unreal, A Replica Of The One Everyone Else Inhabits.

Understanding the Quote: "the world just feels different for those of us who come alive..."

This quote by Jodi Picoult reflects deeply on the theme of dark. It connects to the universal human journey of purpose, motivation, and reflection. Often categorized under Dark, Different, Alive, the quote offers insight, emotional clarity, and intellectual inspiration to readers worldwide.

Whether you’re a student exploring new ideas, a leader trying to motivate your team, or someone seeking direction in life — this quote provides value. It resonates because it’s more than words — it’s a bridge between experience and wisdom. It shows how Jodi Picoult interprets life's core challenges and triumphs.

Lessons From the Quote

This quote teaches resilience and focus. It reminds readers that no matter where they stand in life, reflection and self-awareness lead to growth. Each word has meaning, and when studied, it becomes clear how impactful thoughtful language can be.

About Jodi Picoult

Jodi Picoult is celebrated for insightful thoughts on dark and different. Their legacy lives on through writings that guide, comfort, and inspire. Discover more on their profile page.

Actionable Takeaways

  • Reflect on how this quote applies to your current life path.
  • Share the message with someone who needs inspiration.
  • Write your thoughts on this quote in a journal or blog post.
  • Use it as a daily affirmation or reminder.

Closing Thoughts

Quotes like this endure because they capture universal truths. They comfort us in solitude and empower us in groups. Carry this quote forward — live by its wisdom, share its message, and keep its essence alive.

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Topic
Dark
Different
Alive
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He Is Dark And Quiet And Completely Different From Me, Which Is Exactly Why I Should Put Distance Between Us. But It Is Also The Reason I Find Him So Fascinating.
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Able
Never Forget
I Know Mark,' I Reply. 'and I Don't Like Him.' 'but I Do. And Part Of Being Social Means Being Civil To Someone You Don't Like.' 'that's Stupid. It's A Huge World. Why Not Just Get Up And Walk Away?' 'because That's Rude,' Jess Explains. 'i Think It's Rude To Stick A Smile On Your Face And Pretend You Like Talking To Someone When In Reality You'd Rather Be Sticking Bamboo Slivers Under Your Fingernails.
Stupid
Mean
Reality
I Wondered How Long It Took For A Baby To Become Yours, For Familiarity To Set In. Maybe As Long As It Took A New Car To Lose That Scent, Or A Brand-new House To Gather Dust. Maybe That Was The Process More Commonly Described As Bonding: The Act Of Learning Your Child As Well As You Know Yourself.
Baby
Children
Parenting
After All, How Many Of Us Had Tried To Forget Something Traumatic...only To Find It Printed On The Back Of Our Eyelids, Tattooed On Our Tongues?
Tongue
Forget
Tattooed
Do You Fix A Wheel That Isn't Broken, Or Do You Wait Until The Cart Collapses?
Broken
Waiting
Wheels
The Letters Are Mixed Up. U And I Should Be Together.
Together
Letters
Should
Love Doesn't Follow The Rules... Nothing Is Worth Having So Much As Something Unattainable.
Unattainable
You May Be Real, But You're Still Stuck In A Book.
Real
Book
May
Identification Is Not The Same As Knowing Someone Through And Through.
Knowing
Identification
Knowing Someone
When Heaven Breaks, Who Fixes It?
Heaven
Break
Maybe Mothers - Consciously Or Subconsciously - Repelled Their Daughters In Different Ways.
Daughter
Mother
Different
When You [lose Someone], It Feels Like The Hole In Your Gum When A Tooth Falls Out. You Can Chew, You Can Eat, You Have Plenty Of Other Teeth, But Your Tongue Keeps Going Back To That Empty Place, Where All Nerves Are Still A Little Raw
Fall
Empty Places
Teeth
I Have No Idea What Andrew Might Have Done, And I Do Not Ask. She Believes That I Can Fix This, And Like Always, That's Enough To Make Me Think That I Can. "i'll Take Care Of It,: I Say, When What I Really Mean Is: I'll Take Care Of You.
Believe
Mean
Thinking
There Are Some Dreams That Get Stuck Between Your Teeth When You Sleep, So That When You Open Your Mouth To Yawn Awake They Fly Right Out Of You.
Dream
Sleep
Teeth
Time Is An Optical Illusion- Never Quite As Soild Or Strong As We Think It Is
Strong
Thinking
Optical Illusions
Some Women Are Meant To Change The World, While Others Are Meant To Hold It Together. And Then There Are Those Of Us Who Simply Don't Want To Be In It, Because We Know No Matter How Much We Struggle, We Can't Comfortably Fit.
Women
Struggle
Together
I've Never Been In Love, But I've Always Imagined It--weirdly--like Some Sort Of Oxiclean Commercial. The Tv Host Shows A Scene From An Ordinary Day, And Then Takes A Big Old Sponge Soaked In Love And Swipes Away The Stains. Suddenly That Same Scene Is Missing All The Mistakes, All The Loneliness. The Colors Are Like Jewels, Ten Times Richer Than They Were Before. The Music Is Louder And Clearer. "love," The Host Will Say, "makes Life A Little Brighter.
Mistake
Loneliness
Ordinary Days
My Whole Life Was About Her, What If Her Whole Life Wasn’t All About Me?
What If
Whole Life
Whole
I'm Not Saying You Did The Wrong Thing. I'm Not Even Saying It Wasn't Something I'd Thought Of Doing, Myself. But Even If It Was The Just Thing To Do, Or The Fitting Thing, It Still Wasn't The Right Thing.
Fitting
Things To Do
Stills
Do You Know How, When You Are On The Verge Of A Breakdown, The World Pounds In Your Ears; A Rush Of Blood, Of Consequence? Do You Now How It Feels When The Truth Cuts Your Tongue To Ribbons, And Still You Have To Speak It?
Cutting
Blood
Ears
People Always Say That, When You Love Someone, Nothing In The World Matters. But That's Not True, Is It? You Know, And I Know, That When You Love Someone, Everything In The World Matters A Little Bit More.
Love
Life
People
It's Disappointing To Know That Someone Can See Right Through You.
Disappointing
Knows
There Is A Reason The Word Belonging Has A Synonym For Want At Its Center; It Is The Human Condition.
Want
Reason
Human Condition
I'm Too Much Of A Coward To Kill Myself. And Too Much Of A Coward To Live
Coward
Too Much
I Realize How Quickly Lies Compound. They Cover Like A Coat Of Paint, One On Top Of The Other, Until You Cannot Remember What Color You Started With.
Lying
Color
Coats
It's Like Picking Up An Unfamiliar Piece Of Sheet Music & Starting To Stumble Through It, Only To Realize It Is A Melody You'd Once Learned By Heart, One You Can Play Without Even Trying.
Heart
Play
Trying
What I Want, More Than Anything, Is To Turn Back Time A Little. To Become The Kid I Used To Be, Who Believed Whatever My Mother Said Was One Hundred Percent True And Right Without Looking Hard Enough To See The Hairline Crack.
Mother
Kids
Cracks
When You’re Hurting Deeply, You Go Inward.
Hurt
Inward
The Ability To Find Sparks May Be Buried So Deep In You That You Stop Believing There's A God. Until Someone Comes Along, With So Much Light In Her That You Can't Help But See Your Own, And When You're Together,that Light Grows Even Brighter.
Believe
Light
Together
To Me, A Good Event Is Governed By The Audience.
Events
Audience
I Don't Know The First Thing About Holding Together A Family, Especially One That Resembles An Heirloom Vase, Shattered But Glued Back Together For Its Beauty, And No One Mentions That You Can See The Cracks As Plain As Day.
Together
Cracks
Vases
There's No Way To Convince Her That Just Because You Put Half. Planet Between You And Someone Else, You Can't Drive That Person Out Of Your Thoughts. Believe Me. I've Tried.
Believe
Half
Way
When A Freedom Is Taken Away From You, I Suppose, You Recognize It As A Privilege, Not A Right.
Taken
Privilege
Away From You
It Feels Like A Punch. Tears Fill My Eyes, And I Wonder How I Could Be Upset Over Losing Something I Never Had.
Eye
Upset
Tears
If You Read A Book That's Fiction And You Get Caught In The Characters And The Plot, And Swept Away, Really, By The Fiction Of It - By The Non-reality - You Sometimes Wind Up Changing Your Reality As Well. Often, When The Last Page Is Turned, It Will Haunt You.
Book
Character
Reality
You Don't Make Peace Only With G-d. You Make It With People. Sin Isn't Global. It's Personal. If You Do Wrong To Someone, The Only Way To Fix That Is To Go To That Same Person And Do Right By Him.
People
Way
Sin
She Became Whoever She Needed To Be To Survive,but She Never Let Anyone Else Define Her.
Needed
Summertime, I Think, Is A Collective Unconscious. We All Remember The Notes That Made Up The Song Of The Ice Cream Man; We All Know What It Feels Like To Brand Our Thighs On A Playground Slide That's Heated Up Like A Knife In A Fire; We All Have Lain On Our Backs With Our Eyes Closed And Our Hearts Beating Across The Surface Of Our Lids, Hoping That This Day Will Stretch Just A Little Longer Than The Last One, When In Fact It's All Going In The Other Direction.
Song
Heart
Eye
People Changed. Even The People You Thought You Knew As Well As You Knew Yourself.
People
Changed
Wells
You Know How Every Now And Then, You Have A Moment Where Your Whole Life Stretches Out Ahead Of You Like A Forked Road, And Even As You Choose One Gritty Path You've Got Your Eyes On The Other The Whole Time, Certain That You're Making A Mistake.
Mistake
Eye
Path
If You Want To Know Someone's Story, They Have To Tell It Aloud. But Every Time, The Telling Is A Little But Different. It's New, Even To Me.
Littles
Different
Stories
I Am Alice In Wonderland', Josie Thought. 'watch Me Fall.
Fall
Watches
Wonderland
You Don't Make A Friend," Jacob Said With A Scowl. "it's Not Like They Come With Directions Like You'd Find On A Box Of Macaroni And Cheese.
Cheese
Like You
Boxes
An Apology With A Defense Built In Isn't Much Of An Apology
Apology
Defense
Built
Turn Around, And The People You Thought You Knew Might Change. Your Little Boy Might Now Live Half A World Away. Your Beautiful Daughter Might Be Sneaking Out At Night. Your Ex-husband Might By Dying By Degrees. This Is The Reason That Dancers Learn, Early On, How To Spot While Doing Pirouettes: We All Want To Be Able To Find The Place Where We Started.
Beautiful
Daughter
Husband
There Is No Cosmic Scale On Which You Can Weigh Your Actions; You Learn Too Late What Choices Ruin The Fragile Balance.
Choices
Balance
Too Late
No Child Really Chooses His Religion; It Is Just The Luck Of The Draw Which Blanket Of Beliefs You Are Wrapped In.
Children
Luck
Belief
I Imagined What It Would Be Like To Hold A Butterfly In Your Hands Something Bejeweled And Treasured And To Know That Despite Your Devotion It Was Dying By Degrees.
Butterfly
Hands
Dying
Perhaps He D Always Known That The Truth Of A Person Lies In The Heart.
Lying
Heart
Persons
You Came Back Fighting And Furious At Me. You Told Me You'd Been Looking For Mermaids, And I Interrupted You. [...] I Said That Next Time, You Had To Take Me With You." "was There A Next Time?" "well, You Tell Me, You Don't Need Water To Feel Like You're Drowning, Do You?
Fighting
Water
Mermaid
Be Kind To Others Before You Take Care Of Yourself; Make Whoever You're With Feel Like They Matter.
Care
Matter
Be Kind
Crazy Girls Did This, Girls Who Walked Like Zombies Through Ya Novels. But. Trixie Felt The Sting Of The Skin As It Split, The Sweet Welling Rise Of Blood. It Hurt, Though Not As Much As Everything Else Idd.
Girl
Sweet
Hurt
Ross Believed In Past Lives. Moreover, He Believed That The Person You Fell In Love With In Each Life Was The Same Person You Fell In Love With In The Life Before, And The One Before That. Sometimes, You Might Miss Her - She'd Be Reborn In Post-world War I Generation, And You Wouldn't Come Back Until The Fifties. Sometimes, Your Paths Would Cross And You Wouldn't Recognize Each Other. Get It Right - That Is: Fall Madly, Truly, Deeply - And Perhaps There'd Be An Eternity Carved Out Solely For The Two Of You.
War
Fall
Past
Just Because Fate Had Thrown Another Obstacle In My Way Didn't Mean I Had To Give Up My Dreams.
Dream
Giving Up
Mean
If You Didn't Remember Something Happening, Was It Because It Never Had Happened? Or Because You Wished It Hadn't?
Loss
Remember Something
Happened
The Night Is Falling Down Around Us. Meteors Rain Like Fireworks, Quick Rips In The Seam Of The Dark... Every Second, Another Streak Of Silver Glows: Parentheses, Exclamation Points, Commas - A Whole Grammar Made Of Light, For Words Too Hard To Speak.
Rip
Rain
Fall
Witness Testimony Is Always Flawed. It's Better Than Circumstantial Evidence, Sure, But People Aren't Camcorders; They Don't Record Every Action And Reaction, And The Very Act Of Remembering Involves Chosing Words, Actions And Images. In Other Words, Any Witness Who Was Supposed To Be Giving A Court Facts Is Really Just Giving Them A Version Of Fiction.
People
Giving
Fiction
I Think That When You Live In A World With Limits... When You've Met Everyone And Seem Everything You're Going To See - You Lose The Hope That Something Extraordinary Will Happen In Your Life
Thinking
World
Limits
The Truth Was, History Repeated Itself On A Daily Basis; Mistakes Were Made Over And Over. People Were Haunted By What They Had Done, And By What They Hadn't Had Time To Do.
Mistake
People
Done
Sometimes Words Are Not Big Enough To Contain All The Feelings You Are Trying To Pour Into Them.
Feelings
Trying
Sometimes
Everyone Has A Story; Everyone Hides His Past As A Means Of Self-preservation. Some Just Do It Better, And More Thoroughly, Than Others.
Mean
Past
Self
The Problem With You Is That You Always See A Glass Of Milk Half Empty Instead Of Half Filled.
Glasses
Half
Milk
Sometimes Chris Wished He Could Sneak A Peek At The Back Of The Book, So To Speak, And See How It Was All Going To Turn Out, So That He Wouldn't Have To Bother Going Through The Motions.
Book
Sometimes
Speak
When It's All Over, You're Remembered For What You Did, Not What You Said You Were Going To Do.
Over You
Said
Remembered
Music Therapy, To Me, Is Music Performance Without The Ego. It's Not About Entertainment As Much As Its About Empathizing. If You Can Use Music To Slip Past The Pain And Gather Insight Into The Workings Of Someone Else's Mind, You Can Begin To Fix A Problem.
Pain
Past
Ego
There Was A Difference Between People Looking At You Because They Wanted To Be Like You, And People Looking At You Because Your Misfortune Brought Them One Rung Higher.
Differences
People
Like You
Even The Most Beautiful Things Can Be Toxic.
Beautiful
Toxic
Beautiful Things
Logical Thinking Keeps You From Wasting Time Worrying, Or Hoping. It Prevents Disappointment. Imagination, On The Other Hand, Only Gets You Hyped Up Over Things That Will Never Realistically Happen.
Disappointment
Thinking
Hands
If You Live In Each Other's Pockets Long Enough, You're Related.
Long
Pockets
Enough
I Drew It Over My Skin Like A Violins Bow, No One Would Ever Hear The Song Of My Shame.
Song
Skins
Violin
It's Because Of Libraries That Books Like Mine Get Recommended To Book Clubs And Avid Readers, Who In Turn Pass Them Onto Others Looking To Be Whisked Away From The World For A Little While...and Perhaps To Learn A Bit About Themselves In The Process.
Book
Avid
Library
Infatuation's Just Another Word For Not Seeing Clearly. When You Start To Love A Person- That's When They Become Real
Real
Infatuation
Persons
You Know What The Difference Is Between A Dream And A Goal?... A Plan.
Motivational
Dream
Differences
A Public Persona That Might Be Different From What We Truly Feel Inside... Everyone Wonders If They Are Good Enough, Smart Enough, Pretty Enough, No Matter How Old They Are. It Is An Archetypical Moral Dilemma - Do You Act Like Yourself And Risk Becoming An Outcast?
Smart
Risk
Different
When You Love Someone More Than He Loves You, You'll Do Anything To Switch The Scales. You Dress The Way You Think He'd Like You To Dress. You Pick Up His Favorite Figures Of Expression. You Tell Yourself That If You Re-create Yourself In His Image, Then He'll Crave You In The Same Way You Crave Him.
Love You
Thinking
Expression
I Think Once You Sign On To Be A Mother, That's The Only Shift They Offer.
Mother
Parenting
Funny Parent
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