I’ve always been a fan of the quote “We are all made of stardust.” I don’t know who coined it, if it was an astronomer or a poet. I find myself wanting to attribute it to Carl Sagan or Neil Gaiman. Regardless of its author, the phrase has always had a lovely and calming effect for me. It’s a phrase that’s danced images of peaceful skies and twinkling stars across my closed eyelids. It’s always seemed like a lullaby, laced with an undercurrent of romance and elegance.
But I’m wrong.
I’m 100% wrong.
If we came from the cosmos and we came from stardust … then we are really made up of this:
We aren’t pretty twinkling lullabies. We’re color and vibrancy and violent, churning, burning, birthing, starbursts of luminescence. I mean holy shit! We are bloody unfathomable and complex and gorgeous!
I made a Pinterest board of these images. It’s here. I’m humbled and empowered and in awe right now.
You are made of stardust my friends! Don’t ever believe you are anything less!
Those images are indeed stunning. And people are equally if not more so.
You were right – Carl Sagan! And these images are beautiful!
“The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos
Oh fantastic! Thanks for letting me know where the quote came from!
Just adding a bit. 🙂
One of the most poetic and perspective-giving phrases belongs to Carl Sagan: “The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of star stuff.”
I want to add a bit more as I thought astronomer Anna Frebel’s words are equally moving:
“Not only are we made of star dust; we’re made of elements so fundamental to the universe they were created in the first moments of the Big Bang. The history inside of us stretches back further than we knew and our future remains inescapably among the stars.”
Hi Ingrid ~ and nice, thoughtful, informative blog.
To my knowledge, the ofirts pop culture reference to this truth, which predates Sagan by a full decade, is Joni Mitchell’s original of the song, “Woodstock”. From the refrain:
We are stardust, we are golden,
We are billion-year-old carbon
Best,
Dario