Quotes and Other Thoughts...

To preface these quotes and observations, I should say that words are very precious to me. They are more important and valuable than we often realize. Even when taken out of context, words have power. While there are words from many sources, none of them represented here indicates my attachment to the source, but rather that what I see or feel when I read the words, put together this way, is touching or valuable to me.

"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." - Nin

"I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride; so I love you because I know no other way." - Neruda

"Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it's cracked up to be. That's why people are so cynical about it. It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more." - Jong

"Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage." - Tsu

"Love is passion, obsession, someone you can't live without. If you don't start with that, what are you going to end up with? Fall head over heels. I say find someone you can love like crazy and who'll love you the same way back. And how do you find him? Forget your head and listen to your heart. I'm not hearing any heart. Run the risk, if you get hurt, you'll come back. Because, the truth is there is no sense living your life without this. To make the journey and not fall deeply in love - well, you haven't lived a life at all. You have to try. Because if you haven't tried, you haven't lived." - William Parrish (Anthony Hopkins) in Meet Joe Black

"The big question is whether you are going to be able to say a hearty yes to your adventure." - Campbell

"When we quit thinking primarily about ourselves and our own self-preservation, we undergo a truly heroic transformation of consciousness." - Campbell

"I know why families were created with all their imperfections. They humanize you. They are made to make you forget yourself occasionally, so that the beautiful balance of life is not destroyed." - Nin

"I beg you...to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without ever noticing it, live your way into the answer..." - Rilke

"The woman who loves always transcends the man she loves, because life is greater than fate. Her devotion wants to be immeasurable; that is her happiness." - Rilke

"Is devotion to others a cover for the hungers and the needs of the self, of which one is ashamed? I was always ashamed to take. So I gave. It was not a virtue. It was a disguise." Nin

"There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are messengers of overwhelming grief...and unspeakable love." - Irving

"I have a prejudice against people with money. I have known so many, and none have escaped the corruption of power. In this I am a purist. I love people motivated by love and not by power. If you have money and power, and are motivated by love, you give it all away." - Nin

"I have spent my days stringing and unstringing my instrument, while the song I came to sing remains unsung." - Tagore

"Our desires presage the capacities within us; they are harbingers of what we shall be able to accomplish. What we can do and want to do is projected in our imagination, quite outside ourselves, and into the future. We are attracted to what is already ours in secret. Thus passionate anticipation transforms what is indeed possible into dreamt-for reality." - Goethe

"I held a moment in my hand, brilliant as a star, fragile as a flower, a tiny sliver of one hour. I dripped it carelessly, Ah! I didn't know, I held opportunity." - Lee

"Each of us has the right and the responsibility to asses the road which lie ahead and those over which we have traveled, and if the future road looms ominous or unpromising, and the road back uninviting, then we need to gather our resolve and carrying only the necessary baggage, step off that road into another direction. If the new choice is also unpalatable, without embarrassment, we must be ready to change that one as well." Angelou

"We are at times too ready to believe that the present is the only possible state of things." - Proust

"Spend the afternoon. You can't take it with you." - Dillard

"Obstacles cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed to a star does not change his mind."da Vinci

"Fine friendships, like fine wine develop slowly, with deliberate care and attention. The best unfold slowly into a true reflection that combines the unique character of the individual elements." ~ Me

"Tell me who admires and loves you, and I will tell you who you are." - Sainte-Beuve

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

"Always, Sir, set a high value on spontaneous kindness. He whose inclination prompts him to cultivate your friendship of his own accord, will love you more than one whom you have been at pains to attach to you." - Johnston

"True friendship is a plant of slow growth, and must undergo and withstand the shocks of adversity before it is entitled to the appellation." - Washington

"I can never think of promoting my convenience at the expense of a friend's interest and inclination." - Washington

"Never shall I forget the days I spent with you. Continue to be my friend, as you will always find me yours." - Beethoven

"A friend should be a master at guessing and keeping still." - Nietzsche

"A friend to all is a friend to none." - Aristotle

"We shall need compromises in the days ahead, to be sure. But these will be, or should be, compromises of issues, not principles. We can compromise our political positions, but not ourselves. We can resolve the clash of interests without conceding our ideals. And even the necessity for the right kind of compromise does not eliminate the need for those idealists and reformers who keep our compromises moving ahead, who prevent all political situations from meeting the description supplied by Shaw: 'smirched with compromise, rotted with opportunism, mildewed by expedience, stretched out of shape with wirepulling and putrefied with permeation.' Compromise need not mean cowardice." - Kennedy

"I've learned that no matter what happens, or how bad it seems today, life does go on, and it will be better tomorrow. I've learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way he/she handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights. I've learned that regardless of your relationship with your parents, you'll miss them when they're gone from your life. I've learned that making a 'living' is not the same thing as 'making a life'. I've learned that life sometimes gives you a second chance. I've learned that you shouldn't go through life with a catcher's mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw some things back. I've learned that whenever I decide something with an open heart, I usually make the right decision. I've learned that even when I have pains, I don't have to be one. I've learned that every day you should reach out and touch someone. People love a warm hug or just a friendly pat on the back ... I've learned that I still have a lot to learn. I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel." - Angelou

"Destiny is no matter of chance. It is a matter of choice. It is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved." - Bryan

"Every time our hope for a better world is based on a system, this system collapses, due to the corruptibility and imperfections of human beings. I believe we have to go back and work at the growth of human beings, so they will not need systems, but will know how to rule themselves." - Nin

"Once you don't vote your ideals ... that has serious undermining affects. It erodes the moral basis of our democracy." -Ralph Nader

"Nothing endures but change." - Heraclitus

"You can have a lot more leverage in this country in another way, and that is by determining the margin of victory between Democrats and Republicans. It's not a spoiler role, it's a leverage role." - Nader

Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option.

"Life is too short for drama & petty things, so kiss slowly, laugh insanely, love truly and forgive quickly."

"You will never find time for anything. If you want time you must make it." - Buxton

"For a long time it had seemed to me that life was about to begin - real life. But there was always some obstacle in the way. Something to be got through first, some unfinished business, time still to be served, a debt to be paid. Then life would begin. At last it dawned on me that these obstacles were my life." - D'Souza

"Anticipation - It's a ticklish thing really, Quivering, exciting, waiting, Until it dies - Killed by it's own self Lost through virtue of being there." - Dal Perry

Past the beggar and the suffering walked he who asks, "Why, oh god, do you not do something for these people?" To which god replied, "I did do something, I made you."

"The difference between 'involvement' and 'commitment' is like an eggs-and-ham breakfast: the chicken was 'involved' - the pig was 'committed'."

"A monoculture is not only Hollywood, but Americans trying to export democracy. I don't think you can in any way export culture with guns or tanks. " - Bertolucci

"The subprime problem has been contained. It's been contained on planet earth." - Grant

"Men are like wine. Some turn to vinegar, but the best improve with age." - Joad

"They say that age is all in your mind. The trick is keeping it from creeping down into your body."

"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened." - Churchill

A man and his wife, now in their 60's, were celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary. On their special day a good fairy came to them and said that because they had been so good that each one of them could have one wish. The wife wished for a trip around the world with her husband. Whoosh! Immediately she had airline/cruise tickets in her hands. The man wished for a female companion 30 years younger... Whoosh...immediately he turned ninety!!! Gotta love that fairy!

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