Quotes, Poems, & Sayings...

[JakeTulane]

"We never know how high we are
Till we are called to rise;
And then, if we are true to plan,
Our statures touch the skies." - Emily Dickinson

[jenny]

‎"This time, like all times, is a very good one if we but know what to do with it." ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

[Spirit Dancer]

Whosoever finds peace at home is the happiest of all persons.
Goethe

[The_Lady_Snow]

" If we accept and acquiesce in the face of discrimination, we accept the responsibility ourselves. We should, therefore, protest openly everything ... that smacks of discrimination or slander. "

[torchiegirl]

"What would Jesus do and what would your momma say?"
~Shully

[BestButchBoy]

“I'm not one of those complicated, mixed-up cats. I'm not looking for the secret to life.... I just go on from day to day, taking what comes.

~FRANK SINATRA

[Diva]

Manners are a sensitive awareness of the feelings of others. If you have that awareness, you have good manners, no matter which fork you use.

~Emily Post

[Tucker]

"Dum Sipro Spero"
While I breathe I hope

[Diva]

The hardest job kids face today is learning good manners without seeing any.

~Fred Astaire

[Fancy]

Sure, I'll carry your meat!

-my HR director
:sunglass:

[turasultana]

Life begins at the end of your comfort zone

[BullRider_Dillon]

Real Men Don´t Make War On Women

[BestButchBoy]

“But that’s life. One minute you’re on top of the world, the next minute some secretary’s running you over with a lawn mower.

JOAN HARRIS

[JakeTulane]

"There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle." - Albert Einstein

[JakeTulane]

"The longer I live the more I see that I am never wrong about anything, and that all the pains that I have so humbly taken to verify my notions have only wasted my time." - George Bernard Shaw

[JakeTulane]

"When I am working on a problem I never think about beauty. I only think about how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong."- Buckminster Fuller

[Spirit Dancer]

Vision is the art of seeing things invisible.
Jonathan Swift

[Spirit Dancer]

Forgiveness is the perfume the trampled flower
casts back on the foot that crushed it.

Author Unknown

[Spirit Dancer]

Forgiveness is the answer to the child's dream of a miracle
by which what is broken is made whole again,
what is soiled is again made clean.

Dag Hammarskjold

[Spirit Dancer]

Forgiveness enables you to bury your grudge in the icy earth and
put the past behind you. You flush resentment away by being
the first to forgive. Forgiveness fashions your future. It is a brave
and brash thing to do. The gutsiest decision you can make. As you
forgive others, winter will soon make way for springtime as fresh joy
pushes up through the soil of your heart.
Forgiveness is a stunning principal, your ticket out of hate and fear
and chaos. I know what regret feels like; I’ve earned my credentials.
But I also know what forgiveness feels like, because God has
so graciously forgiven me. Forgiveness frees you of the past so
you can make good choices today.

Barbara Johnson

[JakeTulane]

"The clearest way into the universe is through a forest wilderness." -John Muir

[JakeTulane]

"It is a wholesome and necessary thing for us to turn again to the earth and in the contemplation of her beauties to know of wonder and humility." -Rachel Carson

[JakeTulane]

"What befalls the earth befalls all the sons of the earth. This we know: the earth does not belong to man, man belongs to the earth. All things are connected like the blood that unites us all. Man does not weave this web of life. He is merely a strand of it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself." -Chief Seattle

[Leader]

And then a scholar said, "Speak of Talking."

And he answered, saying:

You talk when you cease to be at peace with your thoughts;

And when you can no longer dwell in the solitude of your heart you live in your lips, and sound is a diversion and a pastime.

And in much of your talking, thinking is half murdered.

For thought is a bird of space, that in a cage of words many indeed unfold its wings but cannot fly.

There are those among you who seek the talkative through fear of being alone.

The silence of aloneness reveals to their eyes their naked selves and they would escape.

And there are those who talk, and without knowledge or forethought reveal a truth which they themselves do not understand.

And there are those who have the truth within them, but they tell it not in words.

In the bosom of such as these the spirit dwells in rhythmic silence.

When you meet your friend on the roadside or in the market place, let the spirit in you move your lips and direct your tongue.

Let the voice within your voice speak to the ear of his ear;

For his soul will keep the truth of your heart as the taste of the wine is remembered

When the color is forgotten and the vessel is no more.

[BullRider_Dillon]

If you get thrown from a horse, you have to get up and get back on, unless you landed on a cactus; then you have to roll around and scream in pain.

[Fancy]

"The slower we move the faster we die. Make no mistake, moving is living. Some animals were meant to carry each other to live symbiotically over a lifetime. Star crossed lovers, monogamous swans. We are not swans. We are sharks."

-Ryan Bingham (Up In The Air)

[Janstevie]

I hate two faced people, it's so hard to decide which face to slap first.

[JakeTulane]

"Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense." -Buddha

[JakeTulane]

"The soul should always stand ajar. Ready to welcome the ecstatic experience."
-Emily Dickinson

[JakeTulane]

"I could not, at any age, be content to take my place by the fireside and simply look on. Life was meant to be lived Curiosity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life." -Eleanor Roosevelt

[jenny]

"Sex is a body-contact sport. It is safe to watch but more fun to play." ~Thomas Szasz, M.D.

[Arwen]

"Self-trust is the first secret of success." -Ralph Waldo Emerson

[Fancy]

...that's like pulling chicken teeth...

[jenny]

"Expect nothing. Live frugally on surprise." ~ Alice Walker

[turasultana]

"There's a hell of a distance between wise-cracking and wit. Wit has truth in it; wise-cracking is simply calisthenics with words."

— Dorothy Parker

[ravfem]

Please knock hard, the bell is broken.

[ravfem]

“The only gracious way to accept an insult is to ignore it. If you can’t ignore it, top it. If you can’t top it, laugh at it. If you can’t laugh at it, it’s probably deserved.” – Joseph Russell Lynes
:chocolate:

[nowandthen]

To love and to serve is to persevere and endure.:glasses:

[BestButchBoy]

"Lovely ... Never, ever change. Keep that breathless charm.

~FRANK SINATRA

[jenny]

"You can't cross the sea merely by standing and staring at the water." ~ Rabindranath Tagore

[JustLovelyJenn]

Growing old is mandatory; growing up is optional. ~Chili Davis

[JustLovelyJenn]

A diplomat is a man who always remembers a woman's birthday but never remembers her age. ~Robert Frost

[JustLovelyJenn]

If there were no schools to take the children away from home part of the time, the insane asylums would be filled with mothers. ~Edgar W. Howe

[JustLovelyJenn]

Holidays are enticing only for the first week or so. After that, it is no longer such a novelty to rise late and have little to do. ~Margaret Laurence

[nowandthen]

‎"Don't spend your life with someone you can live with. Spend it with someone you can't live without - AND that can't live without you!"

[Duchess]

If you want to reach a state of bliss, then go beyond your ego and the internal dialogue. Make a decision to relinquish the need to control, the need to be approved, and the need to judge. Those are the three things the ego is doing all the time. It's very important to be aware of them every time they come up.(f)

Deepak Chopra (http://www.great-quotes.com/cgi-bin/viewquotes.cgi?action=search&Author_First_Name=Deepak&Author_Last_Name=Chopra&Movie=)
East-Indian- American M.D., New Age Author, Lecturer

[Jesse]

As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/j/johannwolf133870.html)

Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life. Make the most of yourself by fanning the tiny, inner sparks of possibility into flames of achievement.
Golda Meir (http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/g/goldameir162893.html)

Each of us has an inner dream that we can unfold if we will just have the courage to admit what it is. And the faith to trust our own admission. The admitting is often very difficult.
Julia Cameron (http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/j/juliacamer134740.html)

[pajama]

When, in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries
And look upon myself and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featur'd like him, like him with friends possess'd,
Desiring this man's art and that man's scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts myself almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remember'd such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

~Shakespeare

[ravfem]

Confidence is the sexiest thing a person can have. It’s much sexier than any body part.

:hippie:

[jenny]

"It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power." ~ Alan Cohen

[Massive]

You come to love not by finding the perfect person, but by seeing an imperfect person perfectly.
~ Sam Keen

What the heart has once owned and had, it shall never lose.
~ Henry Ward Beecher

There is more hunger for love and appreciation in this world than for bread.
~ Mother Teresa

We can only learn to love by loving.
~Iris Murdoch

Don't hold to anger, hurt or pain. They steal your energy and keep you from love.
~Anonymous

To fear love is to fear life,
and those who fear life are already three parts dead.
~Bertrand Russell, Earl Russell

I hold it true, what e'er befall;
I feel it , when I sorrow most;
'Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all.
~Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Lie still, lie still, my breaking heart
My silent heart, lie still and break.
~Christina Rossetti

Knowledge talks, wisdom listens.
~ Unknown

The mind is like a parachute. It doesn’t work unless it’s open.
~ Unknown

Life isn’t worth living for, unless you have something
worth dying for.
- Unknown

Love is, above all, the gift of oneself.
~Jean Anouilh (1910-1987)

Love never claims, it ever gives.
~Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869-1948)

Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things.
~Paul (A.D. First Century) 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

"Love doesn't make the world go round, love is what makes the ride worthwhile."
~Elizabeth Browning

[The_Lady_Snow]

"Tolerance is not peace,
But from tolerance,
In the near or distant future,
Peace may blossom."

[Janstevie]

If only closed minds came with closed mouths.

[Kätzchen]

When love beckons to you, follow him,
Though his ways are hard and steep.
And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Though the sword hidden among his pinions may wound you.
And when he speaks to you believe in him,
Though his voice may shatter your dreams
as the north wind lays waste the garden.

For even as love crowns you so shall he crucify you.
Even as he is for your growth so is he for your pruning.
Even as he ascends to your height and caresses your
tenderest branches that quiver in the sun,
So shall he descend to your roots and shake them
in their clinging to the earth.

Like sheaves of corn he gathers you unto himself.
He threshes you to make you naked.
He sifts you to free you from your husks.
He grinds you to whiteness.
He kneads you until you are pliant;
And then he assigns you to his sacred fire, that you may become sacred bread for God's sacred feast.

All these things shall love do unto you that you may know the secrets of your heart, and in that knowledge become a fragment of Life's heart.

But if in your fear you would seek only love's peace and love's pleasure,
Then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness and pass out of love's threshing-floor,
Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, but not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of your tears.
Love gives naught but itself and takes naught but from itself.
Love possesses not nor would it be possessed;
For love is sufficient unto love.

When you love you should not say, "God is in my heart," but rather, "I am in the heart of God."
And think not you can direct the course of love, for love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.

Love has no other desire but to fulfill itself.
But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:
To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night.
To know the pain of too much tenderness.
To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.
To wake at dawn with a winged heart
and give thanks for another day of loving;
To rest at the noon hour and meditate love's ecstasy;
To return home at eventide with gratitude;
And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart
and a song of praise upon your lips.

~ Kahlil Gibran
The Prophet
"Love"

[jenny]

"If someone is too tired to give you a smile, leave one of your own, because no one needs a smile as much as those who have none to give." ~ Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch

[Spirit Dancer]

To set us on a clear path, it is important to communicate well, at least
with ourselves. To know what we want, to know what we mean, and
to learn to express ourselves clearly, with as little confusion as possible.
If you are confused about yourself, you can expect to be misunderstood
by those around you. You have to set your mind straight, and that is
a task that no one else can undertake for you.

Rosemary Altea

[Spirit Dancer]

The balance and peace we seek for ourselves and our society
won’t be achieved through mental effort alone. Mind and spirit are
meant to travel together, with spirit leading the way. Until we make a conscious commitment to understand and embrace our spiritual nature,
we will endure the ache of living without the awareness and guidance
of the most essential part of ourselves.

Susan L. Taylor

[Kätzchen]

(8) "Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves,
for the rights of all who are destitute.
(9) Speak up and judge fairly;
defend the poor and the needy."

~ Proverbs 31: 8-9 (NIV)

[Duchess]

The quality of your life is the quality of your relationships.
(f)(f)(f)
Anthony Robbins (http://www.great-quotes.com/cgi-bin/viewquotes.cgi?action=search&Author_First_Name=Anthony&Author_Last_Name=Robbins&Movie=)
1960-, American Author, Speaker, Peak Performance Expert / Consultant

[nowandthen]

To the extent that our experience of suffering reminds us of what everyone else also endures, it serves as a powerful inspiration to practice compassion and avoid causing others pain. And to the extent that suffering awakens our empathy and causes us to connect with others, it serves as the basis of compassion and love.

[JakeTulane]

"If we all worked on the assumption that what is accepted as true is really true, there would be little hope of advance." - Orville Wright

[JakeTulane]

"Discoveries are often made by not following instructions; by going off the main road; by trying the untried." - Frank Tyger

[JakeTulane]

"How little do they see what really is, who frame their hasty judgment upon that which seems." - Robert Southey

[jenny]

‎"Life is a classroom if you let it be." ~Ky-Mani Marley

[Janstevie]

If you want to forget your troubles wear tight shoe's.

[Jesse]

To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly
Henri L. Bergson


You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you.
James Allen


We are what we repeatedly do.
Aristotle

[princessbelle]

What we see in others depends mainly on what we look for.
We need to enlighten our own spirit before we assign conviction to anyone.

John Lubbock

[BestButchBoy]

"Time to make the donuts!"

~Fred the Baker [as portrayed by actor Michael Vale]

[FeminineAllure]

"There is a fine line between loosing it and getting it."

From a character on LMN

[JakeTulane]

"Only intuition can save you from the most dangerous individual of all, the articulate incompetent." - Robert Bernstein

[JakeTulane]

"We can cure physical diseases with medicine, but the only cure for loneliness, despair, and hopelessness is love. There are many in the world who are dying for a piece of bread, but there are many more dying for a little love" - Mother Teresa

[JakeTulane]

"Treat the earth well: it was not given to you by your parents, it was loaned to you by your children. We do not inherit the Earth from our Ancestors, we borrow it from our Children." - Ancient Indian Proverb

[Toofrufru]

“In seed time learn, in harvest teach, in winter enjoy.” William Blake

[Duchess]

Our friends should be companions who inspire us, who help us rise to our best.:)

Joseph B. Wirthlin (http://www.great-quotes.com/cgi-bin/viewquotes.cgi?action=search&Author_First_Name=Joseph+B.&Author_Last_Name=Wirthlin&Movie=)

[BullRider_Dillon]

Nature gave us all something to fall back on, and sooner or later we all land flat on it.

[Spirit Dancer]

Turn around, and you will see that happiness is the shadow right behind you.
Felipe Villaespesa

[Spirit Dancer]

This is not an ordinary day; discover the excitement of your day.

[Tommi]

Moving fast is not the same as going somewhere.


Robert Anthony

[Fancy]

I can see it all now, this is gonna be just like last summer. You fell in love with that girl at the Fotomat, you bought forty dollars worth of fuckin' film, and you never even talked to her. You don't even own a camera.

-mike damone
Fast times at ridgemont high

[Tucker]

" I am an excitable woman who only understands life lyrically, musically, in whom feelings are much stronger than reason. I am so thirsty for the marvelous that only the marvelous has power over me. Anything I cannot transform into something marvelous, I let go. Reality doesn't impress me. I only believe in intoxication, in ecstasy, and when ordinary life shackles me, I escape, one way or another." Anais Nin

[Hack]

Cure for an obsession: get another one. -- Mason Cooley

[Spirit Dancer]

To love women and never enjoy them, is as much to love wine and never taste it. -- John Lyly

[Spirit Dancer]

I, with a deeper instinct, choose a man who compels my strength, who makes enormous demands on me, who does not doubt my courage or my toughness, who does not believe me naive or innocent, who has the courage to treat me like a woman. -- Anais Nin

[Jesse]

Cultural pollution is just as bad as chemical pollution...maybe worse. - Me

[weatherboi]

Who, What am i?

Do I try to explain
Or do I deny
Who I am what I am

Do I try to hide
Not let them see
Who I am what I am

Do I try to run
and so run from
Who I am what I am

[dixie]

Cowboy's Dream

Every cowboy has one,
Just like his hat, boots and jeans.
It's a part of his genetic make-up,
This thing called a Cowboy's Dream.

Now this dream has many sections,
And each section has just as many parts.
But the end result leads to a cowboy's toughest feature,
Located smack dab in the middle of his heart.

Now give the cowboy credit,
Cause he'll try his damnedest not to show it.
But most of us have been through it enough,
To speak in detail about how we know it.

His vision of perfect beauty,
One that could steal his breath at any moment.
A life put on hold and a mind on edge,
By the reoccurring dream of that special woman.

Within his life of solitude,
A cowboy's mind is plagued with lots of time.
Time spent on opinions he'll never use,
And the girl he might never find.

Most any cowboy has had his share,
Of women along the way.
And people will argue that he's just a player,
Using those women in his sinister game.

But that isn't true for the better of 'em,
And if you could get him to speak he'd probably say.
That his cowboy dream would be his perfect match,
One from which he'll never stray.

Her heart would be as big as his,
Her soul at least twice or more.
So sweet and rare, a desert jewel,
Like a rose without the thorns.

She'd smell like the mountain flowers,
And her lips would hold the perfect taste.
The desire she brings him makes the time without her,
Time he's made to waste.

Her eyes would dance with a million emotions,
Changing no matter brown, green or blue.
Her flowing hair straight from angels spindles,
Taylor made to run hands through.

And the curves of her luscious body.
The one's at home in Wrangler's or a Sunday dress.
Have a way to make the cleanest cowboy,
Turn completely to a big old' mess.

Of course, she'd possess a streak of toughness,
Cause the hay needs bucking and those calves need a brand.
And when it came to moments of passion,
He would feel the tenderness in her hand.

The cowboy dreams of rescuing his woman,
From the hustle of today's stressful mix.
This quiet knight could slay her dragon,
And win her heart, which he would fix.

In return she'd mend his wounds,
Accustomed to all those rodeo falls.
And as long as he was willing, her guarantee to him,
Would be her by his side through it all.

They'd spend their nights on an old porch swing,
Embraced, as they gaze at the stars.
Knowing their love is forever safe,
Within each others arms.

For years and years their fire would burn,
Through all the nasty, stormy weather.
And when it came time to end it all,
The cowboy and her would take one last ride up to heaven together.

Well sure as the cowboy was born to ride,
He was also born to dream.
All the women left in his wake,
Will now know what he means.

The cowboy has a way of hiding,
Things he never wants to show.
The most important being his broken heart,
Which that special women could make whole.

For years, it seems, he'll make the wait,
Till he's able to slip out of 'dem jeans.
When he'll crawl into bed, and rest his head,
In the arms of his Cowboy Dream.

[femmedyke]

"Do not let your fire go out...spark by irreplaceable spark...in the hopeless swamps of the not-quite, the not-yet, and the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish...in lonely frustration for the life you deserved...but never been able to reach. The world you desire can be won. It exists, it is real. It is possible, it is yours."
-Ayn Rand

[JakeTulane]

"It is my conviction that it is the intuitive, spiritual aspects of us humans-the inner voice-that gives us the 'knowing,' the peace, and the direction to go through the windstorms of life, not shattered but whole, joining in love and understanding." -Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

[JakeTulane]

"Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting;
The soul that rises with us, our life's star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar;
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But railing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home."
-William Wordsworth

[JakeTulane]

"I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish small tasks as if they were great and noble." -Helen Keller

[jenny]

"It's never too late - in fiction or in life - to revise." ~Nancy Thayer

[Rook]

When concern for others' feelings and welfare is missing, our activities tend to become spoiled. Through lack of basic human feeling, religion, politics, economics, and so on can be rendered dirty. Instead of serving humanity, they become agents of its destruction. Therefore, in addition to developing a sense of universal responsibility, we need actually to be responsible people.
- Dalai Lama -
:glasses:

[Kätzchen]

In 4,000 to 5,000 languages are rhythms:

A wave's pummel,
stirred ocean,
cloud bursts on islands over mountains,
burst of plant greens in loam,
it is spoken in sleep of Earth's name,
all life.

http://users.sa.chariot.net.au/~dna/images/2borolga.jpg

[jenny]

‎"If you're not making mistakes, you're not taking risks, and that means you're not going anywhere.” ~ John W Holt Jr.

[nowandthen]

When concern for others' feelings and welfare is missing, our activities tend to become spoiled. Through lack of basic human feeling, religion, politics, economics, and so on can be rendered dirty. Instead of serving humanity, they become agents of its destruction. Therefore, in addition to developing a sense of universal responsibility, we need actually to be responsible people.

[Tucker]

Sex must be mixed with tears, laughter, words, scenes, foreign travel, new faces, stories, dreams, music, dancing, opium, wine.

[Jesse]

When you engage in a work that taps your talent and fuels your passion--that rises out of a great need in the world that you feel drawn by conscience to meet--therein lies your voice, your calling, your soul's code.



Stephen Covey

[Arwen]

“What happens if a big asteroid hits Earth? Judging from realistic simulations involving a sledge hammer and a common laboratory frog, we can assume it will be pretty bad.” Dave Barry

[BestButchBoy]

The finest eloquence is that which gets things done.
~last night's fortune cookie

[Spirit Dancer]

The cure for all the illness of life is stored in the inner depth of life itself, the access to which becomes possible when we are alone. This solitude is a world in itself, full of wonders and resources unthought of. It is absurdly near; yet so unapproachably distant.

Rabindranath Tagore

[Spirit Dancer]

There is in this world no such force as the force
of a person determined to rise.
The human soul cannot be permanently chained.
W.E.B. Du Bois

[Spirit Dancer]

A handful of pine-seed will cover mountains
with the green majesty of a forest.
I too will set my face to the wind
and throw my handful of seed on high.

Fiona MacLeod

[Spirit Dancer]

We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark;
the real tragedy is when adults are afraid of the light.
Plato

[Duchess]

When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace.
(f)(f)(f)
Jimi Hendrix (http://www.great-quotes.com/cgi-bin/viewquotes.cgi?action=search&Author_First_Name=Jimi&Author_Last_Name=Hendrix&Movie=)
American, Musician Quotes

[JakeTulane]

"Love is the only thing that we can carry with us when we go, and it makes the end so easy." -Louisa May Alcott

[JakeTulane]

"Just as there is no loss of basic energy in the universe, so no thought or action is without its effects, present or ultimate, seen or unseen, felt or unfelt." -Norman Cousins

[JakeTulane]

"God is the friend of silence.See how nature-trees, flowers, grass-grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence...We need silence to be able to touch souls." -Mother Teresa

[BestButchBoy]

“Create your own visual style…let it be unique for yourself and yet identifiable for others.”
~Winston Churchill

[BullRider_Dillon]

As soon as you put that hat on, you better be ready for a fist fight.

[Chaoticsoul]

Each morning when I open my eyes I say to myself: I, not events, have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be. Yesterday is dead, tomorrow hasn't arrived yet. I have just one day, today, and I'm going to be happy in it.

- Groucho Marx

[Hack]

I've reached the age where competence is a turn-on. -- Billy Joel

[BestButchBoy]

"Style is knowing who you are, what you want to say, and not giving a damn."
~Gore Vidal

[JakeTulane]

“I sometimes think we expect too much of Christmas Day. We try to crowd into it the long arrears of kindliness and humanity of the whole year. As for me, I like to take my Christmas a little at a time, all through the year. And thus I drift along into the holidays--let them overtake me unexpectedly--waking up some fine morning and suddenly saying to myself: Why this is Christmas Day!” David Grayson

[JakeTulane]

“All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.” - T.E. Lawrence

[JakeTulane]

“Every morning in Africa, a Gazelle wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning a Lion wakes up. It knows it must outrun the slowest Gazelle or it will starve to death. It doesn't matter whether you are a Lion or a Gazelle... when the sun comes up, you'd better be running.” - Author Unknown

[Hack]

The secret of charm is bullshit. -- Tyrone Power

[Spirit Dancer]

Use your consciousness as an adventure.
Anonymous

[Spirit Dancer]

Love is a force. . . . It is not a result;
it is a cause. It is not a product.
It is a power, like money, or steam
or electricity. It is valueless unless you
can give something else by means of it.

Anne Morrow Lindbergh

[Spirit Dancer]

One of the paradoxes of our time is that
we have more power at our disposal than
ever before, and yet we seem more powerless than ever.

Ralph W. Sockman (1953)

[Spirit Dancer]

If we do not rise to the challenge of our unique capacity to shape our lives, to seek the kind of growth that we find individually fulfilling, then we can have no security; we will live in a world of sham, in which our selves are determined by the will of others, in which we will be constantly buffeted and increasingly isolated by the changes round us.

Nena O’Neil

[weatherboi]

Social order at the expense of liberty is hardly a bargain.
Marquis de Sade

[Kätzchen]

Chapter 1 - "Fighting for Our Lives"

"the argument culture urges us to approach the world - and the people in it- in an adversarial from of mind. It rests on the assumption that opposition is the best way to get anything done..." (p. 3)


"we hoped to do our part to ameliorate the conflict by focusing on commonalities (in response to a flawed PR campaign) [...] The promise of controversy seems an easy and natural way to rouse interest. But serious consequences are often intended: Stirring up animosities to get a rise out of people, though easy and "provocative," can open old wounds or create new ones that are hard to heal. This is one of many dangers inherent in the argument culture..." (p. 7)

"our determination to pursue truth by setting up a fight between two sides leads us to believe that every issues has two sides - no more, no less: If both sides are given a forum to confront each other, all the relevant information will emerge, and the best case will be made for each side. BUT, opposition does not lead to truth when an issue is not composed of two opposing sides but is a crystal of many sides. Often the truth is in the complex middle, not the over-simplified extremes..." (p. 10)

"What does it matter that our public discourse is filled with military metaphors? Aren't they just words? Why not talk about something that matters - like actions? Because words matter. When we think we are using language, language is using us. As linguist Dwight Bolinger put it (employing a military metaphor), language is like a loaded gun: It can be fired intentionally, but it can wound or kill just as surely when fired accidentally. The terms in which we talk about something shape the way we think about it - and even what we see..." (p. 14)

"it's as if we value a fight for its own sake, not for its effectiveness in resolving disputes. This ethic shows up in many contexts. In a review of a contentious book, for example, a reviewer wrote, "Always provocative, sometimes infuriating, this collection reminds us that the purpose of art s not to confirm and coddle but to provoke and confront." This false dichotomy encapsulates the belief that if you are not provoking and confronting, then you are confirming and coddling - as if there weren't a myriad of other ways to question and learn. What about exploring, exposing, delving, analyzing, understanding, moving, connecting, integrating, illuminating... or any of innumerable verbs that capture other aspects of what art can do?" (p. 23-24)

and finally:

"Philospher JOhn Dewey said, on his ninetieth birthday, "Democracy begins in conversation." In conversation we form the interpersonal ties that bind individuals into a community. In conversation we exchange the many types of information that citizens in a democracy need in order to decide how to vote [...] Of course, it is the responsibility of intellectuals to explore potential weaknesses in others' arguments, and of journalists to represent serious opposition when it exists. BUT, when opposition becomes the overwhelming avenue of inquiry - a formula that requires another side to be found or a criticism to be voiced; when the lust for opposition privileges extreme views and obscures complexity; when our eagerness to find weaknesses blinds us to strengths; when the atmosphere of animosity precludes respect and poisons our relations with one another; then the argument culture is doing more damage than good" (p. 25)


Reference:

Tannen, Deborah. (1998).Fighting for Our Lives. In, The Argument Culture (pp. 3-26). New York, NY: Ballantine Books Publishers.

[Hack]

I am a camera with its shutter open, quite passive, recording, not thinking. Recording the man shaving at the window opposite and the woman in the kimono washing her hair. Some day, all this will have to be developed, carefully printed, fixed. — Christopher Isherwood

[Diva]

Sometimes, not often enough,
We reflect upon the good things;
And those thoughs always center around those we love.
And I think about those people who mean so much to me;
And for so many years have made me so very happy.
And I count the times I have forgotten to say 'thank you',
And just how much I love them.

~The Carpenters, "Sometimes"

[Diva]

Courage is fire, and bullying is smoke.

~Benjamin Disraeli

[Maria]

She's a diamond that wants to stay coal. Tom Waits

[Hack]

Nora Charles: Take care of yourself
Nick Charles: Why, sure I will.
Nora Charles: Don't say it like that! Say it as if you meant it!
Nick Charles: Well, I do believe the little woman cares.
Nora Charles: I don't care! It's just that I'm used to you, that's all.

[MrSunshine]

Hogs get slaughtered~ my brother

[Kätzchen]

I love that you get cold when it is 71 degrees out. I love that it takes you an hour and a half to order a sandwich. I love that you get a little crinkle in your nose when you're looking at me like I'm nuts. I love that after I spend day with you, I can still smell your perfume on my clothes. And I love that you are the last person I want to talk to before I go to sleep at night. And it's not because I'm lonely, and it's not because it's New Year's Eve. I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.

[Chaoticsoul]

I couldn't sleep last night because I know that it's over between us. I'm not bitter any more, because I know that what we had was real. And if in some distant place in the future we see each other in our new lives, I'll smile at you with joy and remember how we spent the summer beneath the trees, learning from each other and growing in love. The best love is the kind that awakens the soul and makes us reach for more, that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds, and that's what you've given me

[Janstevie]

A rumour without a leg to stand on will get around some other way.

[Tcountry]

"She walks a different path than most of us...yet those on her wavelength enjoy the journey with her."

[JakeTulane]

"Without accepting the fact that everything changes, we cannot find perfect composure. But unfortunately, although it is true, it is difficult for us to accept it. Because we cannot accept the truth of transience, we suffer." ~Shunryu Suzuki

[JakeTulane]

"There is a certain relief in change, even though it be from bad to worse! As I have often found in travelling in a stagecoach, that it is often a comfort to shift one's position, and be bruised in a new place." ~Washington Irving

[JakeTulane]

"We would rather be ruined than changed;
We would rather die in our dread
Than climb the cross of the moment
And let our illusions die."
~W.H. Auden

[Spirit Dancer]

Contentment. . . comes as the infallible result
of great acceptances, great humilities—of
not trying to make ourselves this or that
(to conform to some dramatized version
of ourselves), but of surrendering ourselves
to the fullness of life—of letting life flow
through us.

David Grayson

[Toofrufru]

I don't care if you are a F***ing _____,
your still not smarter than a 5th grader
My 93 year old grandmother to anyone who watches tv with her
and disagrees LOL

[Arwen]

"There is no reality except the one contained within us. That is why so many people live such an unreal life. They take the images outside them for reality and never allow the world within to assert itself."

-Hermann Hesse

[Toofrufru]

Oh, the comfort - the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person - having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but pouring them all right out, just as they are, chaff and grain together; certain that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping, and then with the breath of kindness blow the rest away. ~Dinah Craik, A Life for a Life, 1859

[Hack]

I am intrigued by glamorous women....A vain woman is continually taking out a compact to repair her makeup. A glamorous woman knows she doesn`t need to. -- Clark Gable

[Diva]

Language... has created the word "loneliness" to express the pain of being alone. And it has created the word "solitude" to express the glory of being alone.

~Paul Johannes Tillich, The Eternal Now

[Mister Bent]

Weaponry
Kim Addonizio

I used an arrow to kill the spider.
I used a steamroller to flatten the worm.

For the ants I called in an air strike.
Bee that found its way in through the screen:

blowtorch.
The mammals were easier—

a bucket of water for submerging the cat,
a poisoned word thrown to the dog.

For love, only a kitchen match. That
and a stove leaking gas

and waiting until the dinner
was good and burned.

[femmedyke]

"There are a hundred things she has tried to chase away, the things she won't remember and that she can't even let herself think about, because that's when the birds scream and the worms crawl and somewhere in her mind it's always raining a slow and endless drizzle.


You will hear that she has left the country, that there was a gift she wanted you to have, but it is lost before it reaches you. Late one night the telephone will ring, and a voice that might be hers will say something that you cannot interpret before the connection crackles and is broken.

Several years later, from a taxi, you will see someone in a doorway who looks like her, but she will be gone by the time you persuade the driver to stop. You will never see her again.

Whenever it rains you will think of her. "

~ Neil Gaiman

[femmedyke]

"I fell for her in summer, my lovely summer girl,
From summer she is made, my lovely summer girl,
I’d love to spend a winter with my lovely summer girl,
But I’m never warm enough for my lovely summer girl,
It’s summer when she smiles, I’m laughing like a child,
It’s the summer of our lives; we’ll contain it for a while
She holds the heat, the breeze of summer in the circle of her hand
I’d be happy with this summer if it’s all we ever had. "
~ M. Stiefvater

[Tucker]

I, with a deeper instinct, choose a man who compels my strength,
who makes enormous demands on me, who does not doubt my courage or my toughness, who does not believe me naive or innocent, who has the courage to treat me like a woman.

[JustLovelyJenn]

The aim of education should be to teach us rather how to think, than what to think - rather to improve our minds, so as to enable us to think for ourselves, than to load the memory with thoughts of other men. ~Bill Beattie

[JustLovelyJenn]

The school is the last expenditure upon which America should be willing to economize. ~Franklin D. Roosevelt

[miss entycing]

I used to be Snow White.... but I drifted.

~Mae West~

[JustLovelyJenn]

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. ~Aristotle

[FeminineAllure]

Each morning when I open my eyes I say to myself: I, not events, have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be. Yesterday is dead, tomorrow hasn't arrived yet. I have just one day, today, and I'm going to be happy in it.

- Groucho Marx

[jenny]

"People need to be made more aware of the need to work at learning how to live because life... sometimes goes away too quickly." ~ Andy Warhol

[Tucker]

Creation which cannot express itself becomes madness.

[jenny]

"Talking perceptions, people. Do we see each other for what we really are, or do we just see what we want to see, the image distorted by our own personal lenses?" ~ Chris, "Northern Exposure"

[turasultana]

''Ida was a hellcat. Bert lost his balls. Roger's writing a book!''

-from Mad Men

[Janstevie]

Dont tell me i'm burning the candle at both ends, tell me where i can get more wax.

[Janstevie]

Succeeding.

To laugh often and much,to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children,to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends, to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others, to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition, to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived.
If you have done any of these, you have succeeded.

[Spirit Dancer]

When nothing is sure, everything is possible.
Margaret Drabble

[Laerkin]

This is just a bit of Hump Day silliness, courtesy of a Facebook friend:

"Religion is like a penis. It's fine to have one. It's fine to be proud of it. But please don't whip it out in public and start waving it around. And please don't try to shove it down my throat (unless we have a pre-established arrangement)."

Hugs to everyone today!!!

[FeminineAllure]

"To know that every moment — regardless of how it comes wrapped — is a gift greater than you can give yourself, is to be well on your way to a life without fear."


–Guy Finley

[Spirit Dancer]

Love is never abstract. It does not adhere to the universe or the planet or the nation or the institution or the profession, but to the singular sparrows of the street, the lilies of the field, “to the least of these my brethren.” Love is not, by its own desire, heroic. It is heroic only when compelled to be. It exists by its willingness to be anonymous, humble, and unrewarded.

Wendell Barry

[Spirit Dancer]

The Amish love the Sunshine and Shadow quilt pattern. It shows
two sides--the dark and light, spirit and form--and the challenge of
bringing the two into a larger unity. It's not a choice between
extremes: conformity or freedom, discipline or imagination,
acceptance or doubt, humility or a raging ego. It's a
balancing act that includes opposites.

Sue Bender

[The_Lady_Snow]

"May you be inscribed and sealed for a good year"

[Janstevie]

Not a shred of evidence exists in favour of the idea that life is serious.

[ravfem]

Your opinion of me is none of my business.

:hippie:

[Arwen]

“The jealous are troublesome to others, but a torment to themselves” -William Penn

[turasultana]

“Time moves in one direction, memory in another.”

- William Gibson

[Hack]

Any man who can drive safely while kissing a pretty girl is simply not giving the kiss the attention it deserves. -- Albert Einstein

[JAGG]

" I don't want to spend my life with someone I can live with. I want to spend my life with someone I can't live without."

[nowandthen]

"Fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to truth"

"Only to the extent that we expose ourselves to annihilation can that which is indestructible be found in us...I knew that this was the spirit of true awakening. It was all about letting go of everything."

[robbrt]

"I need something else besides drugs and punching babies..."

heard in my house tonight :|

[Spirit Dancer]

Positive thinking is not the destination; it is the journey. An optimistic person will be constantly challenged-- by external circumstances as well as inner fears and doubts. Always remember that these tests are like a ladder you must climb. As you move past each rung, your optimism strengthens and your confidence begins to flex newly found muscle that you might never have developed otherwise.

Montague Ewards

[Spirit Dancer]

As to the kindness you mention, I wish I could have been of more service to you than I have been, but if I had, the only thanks that I should desire are that you would always be ready to serve any other person that may need your assistance, and so let good offices go around, for humankind are all of a family. As for my own part,
when I am employed in serving others I do not look upon myself as conferring favors but paying debts.

Benjamin Franklin

[Spirit Dancer]

-:Khalil Gibran:-
And he said, 'Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding. Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain.

[Janstevie]

Never spoil an apology with an excuse.

[turasultana]

In order to overcome fear, it is also necessary to overcome hope.
-- Chogyam Trungpa

[JakeTulane]

"Men always want to be a woman's first love. Women have a more subtle instinct: What they like is to be a man's last romance." - Oscar Wilde

[JakeTulane]

"Some of the biggest challenges in relationships come from the fact that most people enter a relationship in order to get something: they're trying to find someone who's going to make them feel good. In reality, the only way a relationship will last is if you see your relationship as a place that you go to give, and not a place that you go to take." - Anthony Robbinss

[JakeTulane]

"All things need watching, working at, caring for and a love is no exception. Love is not something to be treated indifferently, or abused or something that simply takes care of itself. Nothing neglected will remain as it was or is, or will fail to deteriorate. All things need attention care and concern and especially so in this most sensitive of all relationships of life." - Richard L. Evans

[jenny]

"Ordinary riches can be stolen. Real riches cannot." ~ Oscar Wilde

[turasultana]

There is no coming to consciousness without pain.
--Carl Jung

[Diva]

Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind.

~Dr. Seuss

[Chaoticsoul]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In life, many thoughts are born in the course of a moment, an hour, a day. Some are dreams, some visions. Often, we are unable to distinguish between them. To some, they are the same; however, not all dreams are visions. Much energy is lost in fanciful dreams that never bear fruit. But visions are messages from the Great Spirit, each for a different purpose in life. Consequently, one person's vision may not be that of another. To have a vision, one must be prepared to receive it, and when it comes, to accept it. Thus when these inner urges become reality, only then can visions be fulfilled. The spiritual side of life knows everyone's heart and who to trust. How could a vision ever be given to someone to harbor if that person could not be trusted to carry it out. The message is simple: commitment precedes vision.

- High Eagle

[BestButchBoy]

“The best revenge is massive success.”
~Frank Sinatra

[JakeTulane]

"The life which is unexamined is not worth living." - Socrates

[JakeTulane]

"Sometimes when I consider what tremendous consequences come from little things I am tempted to think there are no little things." - Bruce Barton

[JakeTulane]

"I believe every human has a finite number of heartbeats. I don't intend to waste any of mine." - Neil Armstrong

[always2late]

"Possession of material riches, without inner peace,is like dying of thirst while bathing in a lake." - Paramahansa Yogananda

[JakeTulane]

"Loyalty means nothing unless it has at its heart the absolute principle of self - sacrifice." - Woodrow T. Wilson

[Janstevie]

I would rather regret something i did, than regret something i did'nt do.

[nowandthen]

The kind of behavior that really is spiritual practice consists of refraining from falsehood and abiding by the truth, neither humiliating nor mocking others, being humble, and having a good heart and helping others.:glasses:

[Kätzchen]

Excerpts from the chapter, I found interesting
(the first sub-section titled, The Phenomenon of the Prodigy):

"The term prodigiousness connotes a gift that borders on the miraculous" (p. 138)


"Without addressing the gender differences of prodigousness, I believe that a significant genetic or neuro-biological component exists in the prodigy: something in the structure or functioning of the nervous system of Mozart, of the chess player Bobby Fischer, or of the mathematician Carl Gauss that made it preternaturally easy to gain initial mastery of patterns involved in musical tones, the configuration of chess pieces, or the possibilities of numerical combinations, respectively" (p. 138-139).


"In terms of multiple intelligences theory, Picasso's precocity was most striking in the visual-spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, and interpersonal areas. Such gifts are what one would expect in a visual artist, but artists differ from one another in whether their strengths are more pronounced motorically, visually, spatially, or with respect to the world of human beings. Part of Picasso's prodigiousness stems from the fact that he was gifted across the range of relevant skills and could draw on them synergystically" (p. 140).

"It has been said that Picasso never mastered certain scholastic skills and had trouble with abstract thinking (Picasso was terribly distressed with the disparity between his artistic skills and his scholastic acumen)" (p. 141).


Gardner, Howard. (1993). Creating Minds: An Anatomy of Creativity Seen Through the Lives of Freud, Einstein, Picasso, Stravinsky, Eliot, Graham, and Ghandi. New York, NY: Harper-Collins Publishers.

[purepisces]

“What the caterpillar calls the end, the rest of the world calls a butterfly.” ~ Lao-tzu quotes

[purepisces]

Nothing is as frustrating as arguing with someone who knows what he's talking about. ~Sam Ewing :seeingstars:

[purepisces]

I have noticed even people who claim everything is predestined, and that we can do nothing to change it, look before they cross the road. ~ Stephen Hawking

[purepisces]

What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from. ~ T.S. Eliot quotes

[Hack]

Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea. — Robert A. Heinlein

[JakeTulane]

"There are two types of people. Those we who come into a room and say, Well, here I am! and those who come in and say, Ah, there you are." - Frederick Collins

[JakeTulane]

"There are people who in spite of their merit disgust us, and others who please us in spite of their faults." - Francois De LaRochefoucauld

[JakeTulane]

"It is better to be a lion for a day than a sheep all your life." -"Sister" Elizabeth Kenny

[jenny]

"Change the fabric of your own soul
and your own visions, and you change all."
~Vachel Lindsay

[BestButchBoy]

“Don’t pay attention to the critics—don’t even ignore them.
~SAMUEL GOLDWYN

[Jet]

I don't fear the devil, I fear people who fear the devil. —St Theresa of Avila

Lord, give me chastity, but not yet. —St. Augustine

When divine intervention knocked St. Theresa of Avila off her cart and into the mud she replied, "Lord, with the way you treat people, it's no wonder you haven't any friends."

When St. Aloysius, who loved to play pool, was asked what he would do if he knew he were to die tomorrow, he replied, "I'd finish my game."

[jenny]

"One day he decided he was more dependent on the kindness of women than he liked so he went off to hunt wild beasts with his bare hands. But all he found was a stray dog & a couple of old pigeons & it was cold & he missed the sound of soft voices, so finally he came back & never worried about it again." ~ Brian Andreas, "Storypeople"

[jenny]

"If it is to be, it's up to me." ~ Don Maynard

[NJFemmie]

Stealing someone's thunder might leave you with a storm you can't handle. -- me

[jenny]

"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." ~ Plato

[Janstevie]

Some days your the dog, some days your the lamp post.

[JakeTulane]

"Not what you have, but what you see; Not what you see, but what you choose; Not what seems fair, but what is true; Not what you dream, but what you do; Not what you take, but what you give; Not as you pray, but as you live. These are the things that mar or bless The sum of human happiness." - Author Unknown

[JakeTulane]

"Many people think that if they were only in some other place, or had some other job, they would be happy. Well, that is doubtful. So get as much happiness out of what you are doing as you can and don't put off being happy until some future date." - Dale Carnegie

[JakeTulane]

"True happiness consists not in the multitude of friends, but in the worth and choice." - Ben Johnson

[jenny]

"If you wait for the perfect moment when all is safe and assured, it may never arrive. Mountains will not be climbed, races won, or lasting happiness achieved." Maurice Chevalier (born Sept 12, 1888)

[Jesse]

"Habit is a man's sole comfort. We dislike doing without even unpleasant things to which we have become accustomed."
Goethe

[Spirit Dancer]

In this world there is nothing softer or thinner than water. But to compel the hard and unyielding, it has no equal. That the weak overcomes the strong, that the hard gives way to the gentle--this everyone knows, yet no one acts accordingly.

Lao-Tzu

[nowandthen]

‎"May you live the life of your dreams with the energy of your inner courage... May you fulfill the purpose of your birth with the illumination of courage and become steeped in divine contentment."

[Mister Bent]

When a man walks into a room, he brings his whole life with him. He has a million reasons for being anywhere. Just ask him. If you listen, he’ll tell you how he got there. How he forgot where he was going and then he woke up.

If you listen, he’ll tell you about the time he thought he was an angel and dreamt of being perfect. And then he’ll smile with wisdom, content that he realized the world isn’t perfect.

We’re flawed because we want so much more. We’re ruined because we get these things and wish for what we had.

- Don Draper, Mad Men

[always2late]

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. - Unknown

[jenny]

"You can run with the big dogs or sit on the porch and bark." -Wallace Arnold

[JakeTulane]

“Just remember, the same as a spectacular Vogue magazine, remember that no matter how close you follow the jumps: Continued on page whatever. No matter how careful you are, there's going to be the sense you missed something, the collapsed feeling under your skin that you didn't experience it all. There's that fallen heart feeling that you rushed right through the moments where you should've been paying attention. Well, get used to that feeling. That's how your whole life will feel some day. This is all practice. None of this matters. We're just warming up.” - Chuck Palahniuk

[JakeTulane]

“To love is to risk not being loved in return. To hope is to risk pain. To try is to risk failure, but risk must be taken because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.” - Author Unknown

[JakeTulane]

“I don't want to live. I want to love first, and live incidentally.” - Zelda Fitzgerald

[jenny]

"Why isn't my life like a situation comedy? Why don't I have a bunch of friends with nothing better to do but drop by and instigate wacky adventures? Why aren't my conversations peppered with spontaneous witticisms? Why don't my friends demonstrate heartfelt concern for my well being when I have problems? ...I gotta get my life some writers." ~Calvin, "Calvin & Hobbes"

[Fancy]

“Love is a promise, love is a souvenir, once given never forgotten, never let it disappear.”

John Lennon

[jenny]

“The time to relax most is when you don’t have time for it.” -Sydney J. Harris

[Spirit Dancer]

Do we need to make a special effort to enjoy the beauty of the blue sky? Do we have to practice to be able to enjoy it? No, we just enjoy it. Each second, each minute of our lives can be like this. Wherever we are, any time, we have the capacity to enjoy the sunshine, the presence of each other, even the sensation of our breathing. We don’t need to go to China to enjoy the blue sky. We don’t have to travel into the future to enjoy our breathing. We can be in touch with those things right now.

Thich Nhat Hanh

[Spirit Dancer]

It is only the souls that do
not love that go empty
in this world.

Robert Hugh Benson

[Arwen]

"The task of leadership is not to put greatness into humanity, but to elicit it, for the greatness is already there." -John Buchan (1875-1940)

[Arwen]

Cultivating contentment is crucial to maintaining peaceful coexistence. Dalai Lama (on Twitter. Yes, it's the real Dalai Lama or one of his assistants)

[Spirit Dancer]

To gain happiness, you must learn to enjoy that which you have. It is not how much you have. It is what we think about that which we have that produces happiness. In building a happy, contented life, you must give happiness to others. No one living unto him or herself will ever be contented with his or her lot. Your happiness is reflected upon you through the service you give to others. And the thought you give to the creation of happiness will attract a happiness-service from others. Start creating the happiness-habit by producing happy, love-filled thoughts. Happiness is an attribute of love; therefore, you can never be happy until you give your love to others.

Forest C. Shaklee Sr.

[JakeTulane]

"It takes a real storm in the average person's life to make him realize how much worrying he has done over the squalls." - Bruce Barton

[JakeTulane]

"Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity" - George Patton

[JakeTulane]

"Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get - only with what you are expecting to give - which is everything." - Katharine Hepburn

[Spirit Dancer]

Love is something you and I must have. We must have it because our
spirit feeds upon it. We must have it because without it we become
weak and faint. Without love our self-esteem weakens. Without it
our courage fails. Without love we can no longer look confidently at the
world. We turn inward and begin to feed upon our own personalities,
and little by little we destroy ourselves. With it we are creative.
With it we march tirelessly. With it, and with it alone,
we are able to sacrifice for others.

Chief Dan George

[Spirit Dancer]

Do, each day, all that can be done that day. You don’t need to overwork – or to rush blindly into your work, trying to do the greatest possible number of things in the shortest possible amount of time. Don’t try to do tomorrow’s – or next week’s – work today. It’s not so much the number of the things you do but the quality, the efficiency of each separate action that counts. . . . you need only to succeed in the small tasks of each day. This makes a successful day. With enough of these, you have a successful week, month, year – and lifetime.

Earl Nightingale

[jenny]

"Be careful Anais, abnormal pleasures kill the taste for normal ones."
~ Eduardo, (Anais Nin's cousin in the movie "Henry & June")

[Kätzchen]

The opposite of love is not hate - it's indifference.
The opposite of art is not ugliness - it's indifference.
The opposite of faith is not heresy - it's indifference.
The opposite of life is not death - it's indifference.


There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice,
but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.


Friendship marks a life even more deeply than love.

[Arwen]

I asked God for a bike, but I know God doesn't work that way. So I stole a bike and asked for forgiveness.

[jenny]

"There is a way to look at the past. Don't hide from it. It will not catch you if you don't repeat it." ~ Pearl Bailey

[BestButchBoy]

"Boris, how are we going to steal car from moose and squirrel?"
~Natasha Fatale

[nowandthen]

It doesn't interest me what you do for a living. I want to know what you ache for and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart's longing.
It doesn't interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dream, for the adventure of being alive.
It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon. I want to know if you have touched the centre of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life's betrayals or have become shrivelled and closed from fear of further pain.
I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it, or fade it, or fix it.
I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own; if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, be realistic, remember the limitations of being human.
It doesn't interest me if the story you are telling me is true. I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself. If you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul. If you can be faithless and therefore trustworthy.
I want to know if you can see Beauty even when it is not pretty every day. And if you can source your own life from its presence.
I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand at the edge of the lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, 'Yes.'
It doesn't interest me to know where you live or how much money you have. I want to know if you can get up after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone and do what needs to be done to feed the children.
It doesn't interest me who you know or how you came to be here. I want to know if you will stand in the centre of the fire with me and not shrink back.
It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom you have studied. I want to know what sustains you from the inside when all else falls away.
I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.

Oriah Mountain Dreamer:glasses:

[JakeTulane]

"For beautiful eyes, look for the good in others; for beautiful lips, speak only words of kindness; and for poise, walk with the knowledge that you are never alone" - Audrey Hepburn

[JakeTulane]

"We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time."
- T.S. Eliot

[JakeTulane]

"Man often becomes what he believes himself to be. If I keep on saying to myself that I cannot do a certain thing, it is possible that I may end by really becoming incapable of doing it. On the contrary, if I have the belief that I can do it, I shall surely acquire the capacity to do it even if I may not have it at the beginning." - Mahatma Gandhi

[jenny]

"Get busy living, or get busy dying." ~ Andy Dufresne, "Shawshank Redemption

[Spirit Dancer]

The art of knowing is knowing what to ignore.
Rumi

[Spirit Dancer]

Almost any intense emotion may open our “inward eye” to the beauty of reality. Falling in love appears to do it for some people. The beauties of nature or the exhilaration of artistic creation does it for others. Probably any high experience may momentarily stretch our souls up on tiptoe, so that we catch a glimpse of that marvelous beauty which is always there, but which we are not often tall enough to perceive.

Margaret Prescott Montague

[Spirit Dancer]

Give yourself an even greater challenge than the one
you are trying to master and you will develop the
powers necessary to overcome the original difficulty.

William Bennett

[Spirit Dancer]

If we do not rise to the challenge of our unique capacity to
shape our lives, to seek the kinds of growth that we find
individually fulfilling, then we can have no security: we will
live in a world of sham, in which our selves are determined
by the will of others, in which we will be constantly
buffeted and increasingly isolated by the changes round us.

Nena O'Neil

[Janstevie]

There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth, we are all crew. ... yeah right.

[Fancy]

“Opportunity is a favorable occasion for grasping a disappointment.”
~Ambrose Bierce

[MysticOceansFL]

It's true that we don't know what we've got until we lose it, but it's also true that we don't know what we've been missing until it arrives.