Can't Choose Love Quotes & Sayings

You're not asking me to choose you. There's no choice about it. It's always been you. Your father once told me that we always have a choice, but I think he was wrong. I think sometimes things choose us. It's like with breathing. It's natural. It's a part of us. It just happens. We can hold our breath and try not to breathe anymore, and it'll work for a few minutes, but we'll eventually pass out and nature takes over. We can't just not breathe, just like I can't just not love you. — J.M. Darhower

You can't help who you fall in love with. — E.L. Montes

Shit, I'd heard all the songs about love but never really got them before. Didn't understand that it can come out of nowhere, grab you in a chokehold, then bodyslam you into the road until you give in to it, accept it for what it is: an unpredictable, uncontrollable force of nature that tames you. You don't choose it, you can't rationalize it, and you sure as shit don't know when it's going to hit. — Nikki Pink

I love you," he repeated, shaking her again. "I have for years. But if I asked you to pick, you'd choose Arobynn, and I. Can't. Take. It."
"You're a damned idiot," she breathed grabbing the front of his tunic. "You're a moron and an ass and a damned idiot." He looked like she had hit him. But she went on, and grasped both sides of his face. "Because I'd pick you. — Sarah J. Maas

There's a funny thing about light and darkness
like hope, you can never blot out either one completely. They always exist, side by side, bright light making shadows darker, darkness making the light more beautiful, a tempting siren call. I can't hate the dark parts of myself. They are the things that showed me how special and rare the bright flames of trust, loyalty, friendship, and love were. My darkness showed me how to love Rob. But now I choose light and fire and love. No I choose freedom. — A.C. Gaughen

I think that everyone's life is controlled by a series of events. They choose what they want and if it is in their control they can reach it. Sometimes luck shines on them and sometimes it doesn't. I also think accidents happen and we are placed in situations where we have to do things for those we love that we don't want to do. — Abbi Glines

Sure, you can choose the safety and predictability of the cage, forfeiting the adventure God has destined for you. But you won't be the only one missing out or losing out. When you lack the courage to chase the Wild Goose, the opportunity costs are staggering. Who might not hear about the love of God if you don't seize the opportunity to tell them? Who might be stuck in poverty, stuck in ignorance, stuck in pain if you're not there to help free them? Where might the advance of God's kingdom in the world stall out because you weren't there on the front lines? — Mark Batterson

Be a good person, do good things, learn, and love other people, but do these things because you love yourself, God, life and people, not because you fear going to hell if you don't. Keep the commandments (or whatever tenets you believe) because you want to be happy. Do it for you. God and the universe will unconditionally love you no matter which path you choose. You can learn whatever lessons you choose for yourself. If you want to learn things the hard way and experience fear, guilt and shame that is okay. But nothing you do (or don't do) can separate you from love. — Kimberly Giles

It doesn't matter who you marry, as long as he thinks like you and is a gentleman and a Southerner and prideful. For a woman, love comes after marriage."
"Oh, Pa, that's such an Old Country notion!"
"And a good notion it is! All this American business of running around marrying for love, like servants, like Yankees! The best marriages are when the parents choose for the girl. For how can a silly piece like yourself tell a good man from a scoundrel? — Margaret Mitchell

First, it's okay to be sad. It's okay to feel things. Remember that. Second, be a kid for as long as you can. Play games, Travis. Be silly" - her eyes glossed over - "and you and your brothers take care of each other, and your father. Even when you grow up and move away, it's important to come home. Okay?"
My head bobbed up and down, desperate to please her.
"One of these days you're going to fall in love, son. Don't settle for just anyone. Choose the girl that doesn't come easy, the one you have to fight for, and then never stop fighting. Never" - she took a deep breath - "stop fighting for what you want. And never" - her eyebrows pulled in - "forget that Mommy loves you. Even if you can't see me." A tear fell down her cheek. "I will always, always love you. — Jamie McGuire

Love is ignorant of time. You can't choose when it hits, or how long it will last. You just enjoy it while it's there. — Lisa S. Lewis

Katie says, "You can't choose the time and place the when and where with whom you fall in love."
She says, "It just happens like that weird feeling you get right before you fall asleep when you gasp in surprise because your muscles just relaxed and you feel like you are falling."
She says, "Marcie, you shouldn't worry about it
give it time to actually happen."
I guess
I worry that I won't do it right.
That it'll be the wrong time, the wrong place, the wrong person. — Sarah Tregay

Your security and love of life don't depend on the presence of another, but only on yourself, your chosen work, and your developing identity. Then you can safely choose to enrich your life by marrying another person, and not, as e e cummings says, until. — Sylvia Plath

If someone is not treating you with love and respect, it is a gift if they walk away from you. If that person doesn't walk away, you will surely endure many years of suffering with him or her. Walking away may hurt for a while, but your heart will eventually heal. Then you can choose what you really want. You will find that you don't need to trust others as much as you need to trust yourself to make the right choices. — Miguel Ruiz

That word can be very extreme ... But I guess I am a modern-day feminist. I do believe in equality. Why do you have to choose what type of woman you are? Why do you have to label yourself anything? I'm just a woman and I love being a woman. If you're attractive then you can't be sexy, and you can't be intelligent? What is all of that?
-from Vogue — Beyonce Knowles

I'm in love with her and I'm in love with Maxwell. I don't know if it's equal. How do you measure how much you love someone? If they were both hanging off a cliff and I could only choose one, I'd join them on the cliff and hope we could go together. I can't divide myself from them. — Amelia LeFay

Life is presenting every person and circumstance to you so you can choose what you love and what you don't love. When you react to anything, you are reacting with your feelings, and as you do so, you are choosing it. — Rhonda Byrne

Liberty is a harsh mistress. You cannot pick and choose what you like and dislike about her. Liberty will not change her principles for you, no matter how much you claim to love her. She will stand fast in her demands for total acceptance. If you can't receive her, she will recognize you as a false lover and leave you. And when you hear that door slam, it will take every tear in your eye, every ounce of blood in your veins, and all the nerve in your heart to win her back. — William H. Masters

Dear Jack,
I love you, too.
And I think I know the secret to a long and happy marriage - just choose someone you can't live without.
For me, that would be you.
So if you insist on being traditional ...
Yes.
- Ella — Lisa Kleypas

It hurts, doesn't it? Giving someone everything you can think of. The wings to fly and roots to stay and yet watch them choose none of those, leaving you hanging in the middle of void and nothingness. — Akshay Vasu

I don't eat Puerto Rican food in L.A. because it's just too much, too addicting, but I know how to cook, so I can easily make it. I just choose not to because you never stop! I think my favorite would be pollo guisado con arroz blanco y habichuelas. I love tostones, I love maduros! I can eat rice and beans all day long! — Justina Machado

We women, me and you. Tell me something real. Don't just say I'm grown and ought to know. I don't. I'm fifty and I don't know nothing. What about it? Do I stay with him? I want to, I think. I want ... well, I didn't always ... now I want. I want some fat in this life."
"Wake up. Fat or lean, you got just one. This is it."
"You don't know either, do you?"
"I know enough to know how to behave."
"Is that it? Is that all it is?"
"Is that all what is?"
"Oh shoot! Where the grown people? Is it us?"
"Oh, Mama." Alice Manfred blurted it out and then covered her mouth.
Violet had the same thought: Mama. Mama? Is this where you got to and couldn't do it no more? The place of shade without trees where you know you are not and never again will be loved by anybody who can choose to do it? Where everything is over but the talking?
- Violet Trace and Alice Manfred — Toni Morrison

I told Victria that love is a choice, and I told myself that I didn't have to choose Elder, but I can't forget the way my heart stopped when his did. — Beth Revis

Before I moved here, I never got the whole love-triangle thing. You know, in movies or romance novels or whatnot, where there's one chick that all the guys are drooling over, even though you can't see anything particularly special about her. But oh, no, they both must have her. And she's like, oh dear, however will I choose? William is so sensitive, he understands me, he swept me off my feet, oh misery, blubber, blubber, but how can I go on living without Rafe and his devil-may-care ways and his dark and only-a-little-abusive love? Upchuck. — Cynthia Hand

You can't choose the time and place, the when and where, and with whom you fall in love. — Sarah Tregay

You don't have to choose, Hannah. It's not success or fun. It's not life or love. You don't have to just pick one door to walk through. You can have both. It's okay. You just have to go out and do something about it. Don't sit back and let life happen to you. Go grab what you want, whatever it is. — Jessica Love

Some people say they will not believe in anything they can't see. What a catastrophe to not have any faith at all! You live only less than a half of life, if you will only believe in the things that you can see. Life is lived by those who have much faith and believe in many unseen things. If you believe in nothing that you cannot see, think about how much there is that you choose to turn your face away from! You can't see your soul and you cannot prove that it exists, therefore if you call yourself one who believes in nothing unseen, then you will forever deny your soul its existence, for the existence of the soul dwells in love, trust, anger, passion, faith, belief, strength; the soul is forever nourished by things that are unseen! And so we have too many empty bodies walking around! Bodies with souls inside that are half-dead and dying. — C. JoyBell C.

What can I say to you that I haven't already said? What can I give you that I haven't already given? Is there anything of me that isn't yours already? My body, my mind, my heart, even my soul. Everything that is me belonged to you long before this, and it shall be yours long after this. I will follow you anywhere and everywhere you lead. I will keep you and anyone created with our love safe from all harm. From this day on, I choose you, my beloved, to be my wife. To live with you and laugh with you; to stand by your side, and sleep in your arms; to bring out the best in you always, and, for you, to be the most that I can. I promise to laugh with you in good times, to struggle with you in bad; to wipe your tears with my hands; to comfort you with my words; to mirror you with my soul; and savor every moment, happy or sad, until the end of our lives and beyond. — Jamie McGuire

Who wants that? I'd rather choose to fall in love and be hurt. Sometimes I can't even sleep because I love someone too much. And there's always sadness in our lives. It's that sad feeling that keeps us going. - Usagi/Sailor Moon — Naoko Takeuchi

Loving someone is kind of like offering forgiveness. There's no guarantee that they're not going to hurt you again. You can't promise perfection. But you choose to love and you choose to forgive, because living in fear of being hurt again is just a facsimile of life. — Liz Johnson

I like women who haven't lived with too many men.
I don't expect virginity but I simply prefer women
who haven't been rubbed raw by experience.
There is a quality about women who choose
men sparingly;
it appears in their walk
in their eyes
in their laughter and in their
gentle hearts.
Women who have had too many men
seem to choose the next one
out of revenge rather than with
feeling.
When you play the field selfishly everything
works against you:
one can't insist on love or
demand affection.
You're finally left with whatever
you have been willing to give
which often is:
nothing. — Charles Bukowski

You're become a good friend, Arthur. I appreciate all you've done to help me since Warren's death. If we were to put the deeds of giving on a scale, your side would plunge downward compared to the paltry things I've done for you in return.'
She had no idea what she'd done for him, awakening him to love again, inspiring him to look beyond his own needs to someone else's. He started to tell her so, but she went on.
'But I can't look at years and weeks. I have to look at souls and sales. What would God have me view as the most valued?' She imitated the gesture he'd made earlier, raising one hand as high as her chin and lowering the other to midthigh. 'Souls, Arthur.' She balled the hand beside her leg into a tight fist, lifted it, and pressed it to her heart. 'Souls matter most. Even if it means I lose my mercantile - my home - I choose to love those children. — Kim Vogel Sawyer

Some say we can't choose who we fall in love with; love chooses us. Sometimes people fall for the complete antithesis of everything they believe they're looking for. — Alexandra Adornetto

Kitten,
Letting go of someone who owns your heart is hard.
Sometimes holding on to that person is even harder. I
know I'm not the easiest person to love, but you are.
I'ts not that I can't live without you; it's that I don't want to. There's a difference. We all make choices in life and I choose you.
My heart belongs to you. And I'm not asking for it back, even if you don't want it anymore. I'm just asking for the chance to have yours again. I promise I'll be more careful with it this time.
Love Always,
Jack — J. Sterling

You will have to pass through the Announcer first. Don't get hung up there. Move through until you find him in the Fall."
"I have to go alone, don't I?"
"I would follow you to the ends of the Earth and beyond. But you're the only one who can do this," Daniel said. He took her hand and kissed her fingers, her palm. He was shaking. "I'll be here."
Their lips met one last time.
"I love you, Luce," Daniel said. "I will love you always, whether or not Lucifer succeeds-"
"No, don't say that," Luce said. "He won't-"
"But if he does," Daniel continued, "I want you to know that I would do it all again. I will choose you every time."
A calmness came over Luce. She would not fail him. She would not fail herself.
"I won't be long."
She squeezed his hand and turned away and plunged through darkness, into Lucifer's Announcer. — Lauren Kate

Don't let your problems push you. Let your dreams lead you! The lens you choose to view the world determines how you feel about yourself and everything around you. Optimism attracts goodness into our lives and gives us strength to overcome obstacles. You can't live a positive life with a negative attitude. Heaven on earth is not a place we must find, it is a choice we must make. Let every day be a love you can feel. Let every day be a dream you can touch. Let every day be a reason to live. Life is too short to be anything but positive! — Anonymous

You can't choose between Love and Friendship. They're like a package: You either get both or you lose both — Jaejoong

When I was young, I lacked certainty, too," he says. "I have the certainty, now, of not needing certainty. I have the certainty, of uncertainty. The peace, with being uncertain. All is good. All is holy. Whatever you choose, it can be fine. Hatred never ceases with hatred, but with love alone is healed. Rejection never ceases with rejection, but with acceptance alone is healed. — T. Scott McLeod

War's lips quivered as tears welled in his eyes. He fisted his hands in Fain's braids for comfort. 'It's Vega ... she done threw me out and locked the door. She said she don't want no man around her ever again and that so long as I have a penis, I can't come in anymore. I like my penis, Paka, but I love my sister. Do I really have to choose between them? I mean, I guess I'll choose my sister, but I'd really like to keep them both if I could. — Sherrilyn Kenyon

This is who I am, Rachel . Accept it or not. The tattoos won't wash off. The earrings will never change. I am who I am and nothing more. I'm loyal to a chosen few, I always keep my word and I'll protect you with my life.
"I scare the hell out of most people, but you will never have anything to fear from me. Choose. Love me or don't. But tell me now." Because I can't leave my heart open for her to rip out later. If I belong to her, then I do, and nothing will stand in our way. — Katie McGarry

You can't make yourself fall in love, just as you can't choose who you fall in love with. — Alexandra Potter

Zita shrugged. "I wouldn't hold it against ya, kid. You're asking if you should choose war or love. Hate is easy, everybody does it. But most people go their entire lives without really loving. Miora's gonna tell you that you can't love her because she's zonbiri, but if it's really love . . . you won't be able to help yourself." Zita smiled and went out. — Ash Gray

I shan't mind if you don't," he agreed. "But I'll not let you go, Prudence. Til not pester you, but know this: I will wait until you choose to listen to your heart."
"Pshaw." It was a feeble effort. She took a deep breath and tried again. "Humbug! How can you presume to know my heart?"
He smiled a slow, devastating smile. "You are my heart." He lifted her hand and kissed it. "And our hearts beat in tune. I know it - I, who used not to believe in such things. And you know it. — Anne Gracie

We can't choose who we love. I wish, more than anything, that we could. — Victoria Aveyard

So don't fall in love, there's just too much to lose; if you're given the chance then I'm begging you choose to walk away, walk away, don't let it get you. I can't bear to see the same thing happen to you. — Mayday Parade

I often feel the pressure, from my peers and others, to come out and "take a stand" on a moral or social issue. Typically, I refuse to do so, or at least I refuse to do so in a way that will please my critics. On so many of the hard and divisive issues of our times, I don't close my eyes. I do stand for something: I stand for love. For if Jesus came, not to condemn the world, but to redeem it, how can we who bear the Name respond any differently? Yes, what I believe about all these moral and social issues matters, without a doubt. But these beliefs mean nothing, if my first and consuming conviction is not love for those who are different and believe differently than me. We have a choice: We can choose to show how "right" we are, or we can choose to love. Sometimes, it is impossible to do both at the same time. — Ronnie McBrayer

Choice: that was the thing. Other people claimed that you can't choose who you love
it just happens!
but Grace and Roman knew that was a bunch of happy horseshit. Of course you chose who you loved. If you didn't choose, you ended up with what was left
the drunks and abusers, the debtors and vacuums, the ones who ate their food too fast or had never read a novel. Damn, marriage was hard work, was manual labor, and unpaid manual labor at that. Yet, year after year, Grace and Roman had pressed their shoulders against the stone and rolled it up the hill together. — Sherman Alexie

Remember that you don't choose love; love chooses you. All you really can do is accept it for all its mystery when it comes into your life. Feel the way it fills you to overflowing then reach out and give it away. — Kent Nerburn

After all, the Beatitudes don't tend to look a lot like modern Christianity. We choose a political team. We select a denominational preference. We hitch our cart to a branch of philosophy. Anyone that disagrees is quickly and succinctly judged, and simultaneously disregarded as worthless. Big problem with that approach. We are supposed to be loving those who don't agree with us to Jesus - and you can't love those whom you deem worthless. — Mark Steele

We can help pave the roads of those around us, but we can't choose their direction. — Michelle Moran

I can't pick a favorite animal; I love so many! But I guess if I have to choose, I pick bees! There's this brilliant documentary called 'Queen of the Sun: What Are the Bees Telling Us?' I think it's important for people to be educated about bees - they pollinate almost all the food we eat. They are amazing! — Isabel Lucas

I can't choose one favorite place because all destinations have something different to offer. My favorite city to explore is Paris; I love the culture of Morocco and the waterfalls in St. Lucia. I just can't choose one. I would like to go back to New Zealand to see more of what it has to offer. — Martha Hunt

Every character is a baby. You can't choose between them. If you can, you didn't do your job. You have to fall in love with every character. — Jim Carrey

In my own opinion (key word), the foundation of feminism is this: being able to choose. The core of anti-feminism is, conversely, telling a woman she can't do something solely because she's a woman - taking any choice away from her specifically because of her gender ... One of the weird things about modern feminism is that some feminists seem to be putting their own limits on women's choices. That feels backward to me. It's as if you can't choose a family on your own terms and still be considered a strong woman. How is that empowering? Are there rules about if, when, and how we love or marry and if, when, and how we have kids? Are there jobs we can and can't have in order to be a "real" feminist? To me, those limitations seem anti-feminist in basic principle. — Stephenie Meyer

You don't choose who you fall in love with, do you? And once you do fall in love - that obsessive sort of love, that all-consuming love, where two people can't stand to be apart from each other for even a moment - how are you supposed to let a love like that pass you by? — Jordan Belfort

A good story, you'd have said, is like our river Drina: never calm, it doesn't trickle along, it is rough and broad, tributaries flow in to enrich it, it rises above its banks, it bubbles and roars, here and there it flows into shallows but then it comes to rapids again, preludes to the depths where there's no splashing. But one thing neither the Drina nor the stories can do: there's no going back for any of them. The water can't turn back and choose another bed, just as promises now can't be kept. No drowned man comes up again asking for a towel, no love is found again, no tobacconist fails to be born in the first place, no bullet shoots out of a neck and back into the gun, the dam will hold or will not hold. The Drina has no delta. — Sasa Stanisic

My skin burns under Maven's gaze, with the memory of one stolen kiss. It was him who saved me from Evangeline. Cal who saved me from escaping and bringing more pain upon myself. Cal who saved me from conscription. I've been too busy trying to save others to notice how much Cal saves me. How much he loves me.
Suddenly it's very hard to breathe.
Maven shakes his head. "He will always choose you."
Farley scoffs. "You want me to pin my entire operation, the entire revolution, on some teenaged love story? I can't believe this."
Across the table, a strange look crosses Kilorn's face. When Farley turns to him, looking for some kind of support, she fines none.
"I can," he whispers, his eyes never leaving my face. — Victoria Aveyard

I am a plant, she said, I need fire, earth, water. Otherwise I will be stunted. And: Is marriage not such a stunting? The fire goes out. The wind grows weak. The earth dries out. The water dwindles. I would die. You too. She tossed her hair over her shoulders. Purple lavender. And what if it wasn't like that, I argued. What if the daily routine, our daily routine, is my promise to you? Your toothbrush next to mine. You get annoyed because I've forgotten to turn the light off in the bathroom. We choose wallpaper we think is horrible a year later. You tell me I'm getting a belly. Your forgetfulness. You've left your umbrella somewhere again. I snore, you can't sleep. In my dream I whisper your name...You tie my tie. Wave goodbye to me as I go to work. I think: you are like a fluttering flag. I think it with a stabbing pain in my heart. For Heaven's sake, is that not enough? Is that not enough to be happy? She turned away: Give me time. I'll think about it. — Milena Michiko Flasar

And in that moment, you realize how little control you have over your own destiny. From the time you're born, you have no control; you can't choose your parents, and, unless you're suicidal, you can't choose your death. The only thing you can do is choose the person you love, be kind to others, and make your brutally short stint on earth as pleasant as possible. — Renee Carlino

The thing about love is, you don't get to choose," Suze said.

"You just wake up one day and there it is, sitting at the foot of the bed, going 'nyah, nyah, gotcha,' and there's not a damn thing you can do about it. — Jennifer Crusie

He calls me his Queen of the Night. He shows me the wonders in this incredible city. He encourages me to find my own way, and to choose what I think is right or wrong.
And the sex, God, the sex! I never knew what sex was until him! It's not soft music and candlelight, a choice, a deliberate action.
It's as involuntary as breathing, and as impossible not to do. It's slammed up against a wall in a dark alley, or flat on my back on cold concrete because I can't stand one more second without him. It's on my hands and knees, dry-mouthed, heart-in-my-throat, waiting for the moment he touches me, and I'm alive again. It's punishing and purifying, velvet and violent, and it makes everything else melt away, until nothing matters but getting him inside me and I wouldn't just die for him - I'd kill for him, too.
Like I did tonight. — Karen Marie Moning

The way you remember or dream about your loved ones - the ones who are gone - you can't stop their endings from jumping ahead of the rest of their stories. You don't get to choose the chronology of what you dream, or the order of events in which you remember someone. In your mind - in your dreams, in your memories - sometimes the story begins with the epilogue. — John Irving

Life is to be lived. It doesn't really matter the how and why of things. It matters how you choose to live. I taught you to live life large. Tha's all, Wyatt. Love when you can. Laugh. Sing. And take care of your family and friends and then your community. It's not always easy, but it's good and at the end of it all, you'll be satisfied. — Christine Feehan

You can't care what other people think of whom you choose to love, or not to love. When it comes to your love life, it's NOT the time to be satisfying other people's opinions. The difference between what's good for you and what's good for everyone else is happiness. — Chrissy Anderson

I would like to disagree. I would like to argue. But that's the problem with the dead. You can't fight with them, you can't reason with them, you can't prove them wrong or yourself right, beg them to choose you, to stay with you, to love you more than death. They are gone. They have left only a big black ugly gash where their beautiful vibrant selves used to be. They no longer give a shit. — K.S.R. Burns

Maybe part of the reason that love becomes such a volatile force in our lives when it's supposed to be so still and beautiful is that we keep reaching for that forever love. We can't just let it be what it is. We try to make feelings and interest sustain themselves for years and years when they just don't have that kind of staying power. But how much of it is a result of our own changing and how much is the fact that forever love comes with so many expectations and too much pressure? What if it's really that nobody is to blame, other than whoever instilled in us the idea that "forever" was the ultimate kind of love? Because what if we stopped expecting and started just being. I think that's what scares people. I think they choose to not love someone because of what it means for the long-term instead of having any interspersed bits of love. But those bits might be all we ever have. It's out of them that the rest grows. — Brianna Wiest

But I have seen the best of you and the worst of you, and I choose both. I want to share every single one of your sunshines and save them for later. I will tuck them into my pockets so I can give them back to you when the rain falls hard. Friend, I want to be the mirror that reminds you to love yourself. I want to be the air in your lungs that reminds you to breath. When the walls come down, when the thunder rumbles, when nobody else is home, hold my hand, and I promise I won't let go. — Sarah Kay

She knew they were all afraid. But love and disease are both like electricity, Weetzie thought. They are always there
you can't see or smell or hear, touch or taste them, but you know they are there like a current in the air. We can choose, Weetzie thought, we can choose to plug into the love current instead. — Francesca Lia Block

Writing is one of the best therapies that exist. Either on paper, computer, phone or tablet, in any form it is helpful. Whenever you feel like writing, just do it. Let the words flow out of your mind and heart. It doesn't have to make sense to anyone but you. Some people may find easier to express themselves in writing than verbally. While you will have time to choose the best words, you will also escape the fear of immediate reaction. Take your time and play with the words until you feel you got them right. One can write about anything. About a dream, a fantasy, a love story, happenings during the day, an apology or a greeting, everything is permitted in the world of writing. There it is no good or bad. — Nico J. Genes

So I told him that I don't look for boyfriends; I look for a person, then if the person happens to be the one then he's the one. And if not, then not! And I was also thinking to myself, about how I will not commit myself to a man more than he is willing to commit himself to me. I refuse to be braver. I choose to be secure. I am brave in so many areas of life and when it comes to a man I would rather he be braver than I. I would rather he commit himself to me in ways that will make my heart know him so well that I can say he swims in my blood and he walks inside my bones. But for me to throw my commitment in front of him, on the ground, to see if it's good enough? Hell will freeze over before that happens. I compromise myself in many ways, because compromise is selfless and compromise is giving. But one thing I will not compromise is my commitment. I have to feel safe to do that. I have to know that I am reciprocating; not initiating. — C. JoyBell C.

You can choose how things affect you, and you can choose how you affect the world. The happiness that surrounds you is greatly affected by the choices you make every day. So be the change you want to see in the world. Don't tell others how to live their lives. Lead by example and let them follow you. Don't let your problems push you. Let your dreams lead you! — Anonymous

I don't have time is the worst possible excuse for I'd rather be doing something else. You MAKE time! Whether it be family, friends or an activity, like reading it's all in what you WANT to do. The heartbreaking moment is when you have extended time & devotion sometimes years with someone you knew to be worthy who can return it & they CHOOSE not to. — Gypsie M. Holley

Remember every mistreatment experience shows up to give you the opportunity to learn love at a deeper level. You don't need to defend yourself because you cannot be diminished. You must understand that defensiveness doesn't protect you. It actually makes you feel more vulnerable and unsafe. In protecting yourself you are embracing the idea that you can be hurt and this will only create more fear in your life. If you embrace fear and judgment you are choosing to live in fear and judgment.
If you choose to let go of the need to protect and defend yourself and put down your defenses because you understand you cannot be hurt - you will actually feel safer. When you choose to feel bulletproof, infinite and absolute all the time, no defense is ever necessary. — Kimberly Giles

He knows me better than anyone ever has. Than anyone ever will again. I would have stopped it if I could have. But I've learned the hard way, we can't choose who we love. Love chooses us. Love doesn't care about what's convenient or easy or planned. Love has its own agenda and all we can do is get out of its way. — Amy Engel

What does a woman do as she waits for her man? She may wash her hair, put on makeup, choose the kind of outfit any woman would be eager to try on, spray on perfume, and look at herself one last time in the mirror. If she does these things, it's when she and the man she's waiting for are in love. It's different when a woman waits for a man she still loves but who has broken up with her, because the pure joy of it is missing. Loving someone is like carving words into the back of your hand. Even if the others can't see the words, they, like glowing letters, stand out in the eyes of the person who's left you. Right now, that's enough for me. — Kyung-ran Jo

Hate can be a deeply stimulating emotion. The world becomes easier to understand and much less terrifying if you divide everything and everyone into friends and enemies, we and they, good and evil. The easiest way to unite a group isn't through love, because love is hard, It makes demands. Hate is simple. So the first thing that happens in a conflict is that we choose a side, because that's easier than trying to hold two thoughts in our heads at the same time. The second thing that happens is that we seek out facts that confirm what we want to believe - comforting facts, ones that permit life to go on as normal. The third is that we dehumanize our enemy. — Fredrik Backman

You simply can't make someone love you if they don't. You must choose someone who already loves you. If you choose someone who does not love you, this is the sort of love you must want. — Israel Horovitz

You can't make me be nice.
You can't make me be good.
You can't make me believe.
But your example, your kindness, your patience and love will affect me perhaps enough that eventually I may choose to do those things. — Richelle E. Goodrich

A formal period in life where there isn't the worry of another person's dramas and insecurities can be of great advantage, especially when used for growing into the full and wholesome beings we intended to be when choosing to come to this material manifestation.
"Even after ending a long relationship or a marriage, it seems normal to have some alone-time to reflect, meditate, explore areas of interest, find meaning in one's suffering and try to placate the void felt in the heart before attempting to enter into new relationships, otherwise the same old mistakes will surely re-emerge.
"Once we're at the stage of life where we can stand our own silence, where we've made peace with our past, where we've accepted and grown from its lessons, and we would like to share our independence without becoming dependent on someone else for love and affection, then we can choose to commit to a two bodied intimate relationship. — Nityananda Das

You do know baby. You're just scared and that's okay. But don't throw away your
chance for happiness because you're afraid to take the leap or because you know someone ends up hurt. No matter what you choose, someone
was always going to end up heartbroken. But if there's a chance two hearts can be blissfully happy together in love, then that's worth the broken heart of one. They will mend. They will find love again and be happy. But if you do this, let them both walk away, the only heart that will break and
stay broken is yours baby. — Marie Coulson

The water can't turn back and choose another bed, just as promises now cannot be kept. No drowned man comes up again asking for a towel, no love is found again, no tobacconist fails to be born in the first place, no bullet shoots out of a neck and back into the gun, the dam will hold or will not hold. — Sasa Stanisic

We can't choose who we fall in love with....but we can choose when to walk away.. — Unknown

You can love someone as many ways as water falls from the sky. Sometimes it falls with thunder and lightning; other times it falls silently. Sometimes it falls as cool snow, and other times hard balls of ice beat down. If you want the water, you don't get to choose how it falls. — Anonymous

I don't want people instructing me what to do with my body; I don't want the government to tell me what I can do in my bedroom, with my body, or with whoever I choose to love. — Tyne Daly

When I had nothing more to lose, I was given everything. When I ceased to be who I am, I found myself. When I experienced humiliation and yet kept on walking, I understood that I was free to choose my destiny. Perhaps there's something wrong with me, I don't know, perhaps my marriage was a dream I couldn't understand while it lasted. All I know is that even though I can live without her, I would still like to see her again, to say what I never said when we were together: I love you more than I love myself. If I could say that, then I could go on living, at peace with myself, because that love has redeemed me. — Paulo Coelho

I knew this id who very bravely and bossily came out of the closet when she was only fourteen years old. She told me then that we can't choose who we love. We just love the people we love, no matter what anyone else might want for you. — Madeleine George

[I]t is the folly of a young man to believe that he can pick and choose between what Love and Power offer him, keeping only the Light and leaving behind the Shadows. — Peter Coyote

Love is like sunlight," she said when I didn't respond. "You can give all of yourself to someone and still have all of yourself left to give to others, and to yourself. To your work. To anything or anyone you choose. Love isn't like food; you won't starve anyone by giving It freely. It's not a finite resource. — Jacqueline Koyanagi

I love you because you're you. Neither of us are perfect, but if we put the tiny bit of perfection that we do have together and choose to learn from either others imperfections, that makes us as a whole, perfect. It's like putting together a broken heart. One half can't be a full heart without the other half. — Binta Userkaf

Here's the truth: It is not Grown to expect a relationship to provide what you are not committed to providing for yourself. The capacity for others to love you can never exceed the love you demonstrate for yourself. Furthermore, you don't attract what you want in relationships, but what you are. So if you want financial security in a relationship, you need to commit to providing that for yourself. If tender, loving treatment is what you desire, then you should be giving that to yourself as a single person. If you seek forgiveness, compassion and emotional safety in a relationship, you must be committed to requiring that of yourself in single life. If you want a relationship rich with fun, joy and adventure, then that is exactly the life you should be pursuing as a single person. On the other hand, if you are desperate and unhappy as a single person, you are neither qualified nor prepared for a healthy relationship and you will attract and choose anything but. — Zara D. Green

I believe we must choose the path to faith, freedom and individual liberty. It starts with us, here today, now, Working together, with God's favor, we can save the America that we love. — T.W. Shannon

Reincarnation isn't something in which I choose to believe but rather a truth I accept. Most people will never know the meaning of their friendships, passions, choices and even challenges. I embrace them, knowing that there's always a perfect correlation between everything, including between us and the ones that love us and betray us at the end. That's how I know I'm almost never traveling somewhere but returning, or not meeting someone but fixing the past, or facing a challenge but ending a karmic cycle. If I was a Buddhist Monk, a Scottish Doctor, a French Monarch, or a Spanish Templar, none of that really matters, not as much as what I experienced and believed during that time, not as much as what I did ten years ago or what I believed during my childhood, not as much as who I am now and what I can do with my life at present time. — Robin Sacredfire

Cal: "I'm not presuming. I know exactly what you think about me. You think I'm an anal-retentive Armrest Nazi ... an arrogant Modelizer. You can't stand the way I talk, any of the subjects I choose to talk about, the imperious manner I order food in restaurants or tell cab drivers how much we owe them. You find my taste in women odious, the fact that I don't own a television an unforgivable sin, and the fact that I would choose to write a book about Saudi Arabia completely unfathomable. And you're also totally in love with me. If you weren't you wouldn't have pushed me into the pool earlier today when you saw Grazi walk in."
Every Boy's Got One — Meg Cabot

It's not any easier. We can't choose who we fall in love with. Besides, there's nothing abnormal about two guys being together. Nature made you the way you are and me the way I am. We're already living normal lives. — Jay Bell

It was a story of people who don't choose life over death until it's too late to know the difference, people whose goodness is forgotten, left behind like a child's toy in a dusty playroom, people who see many things and remember only a handful of the them and learn from even fewer, people who hurt themselves, who wreck their own lives and then go on to wreck the lives of those around them, who cannot be helped or assuaged by love or kindness or luck or charm, who forget kindness, the feeling and practice of it, and how it can save even the worst, most misshapen life from despair. It was just a story about despair. — Robert Goolrick

Maybe we choose to stay in a constant state of ignorance as a protective instinct - maybe I was just in denial. I just don't get how you can be completely in love with someone one day, and then all of a sudden you just aren't. I will never forget that day ... the day where I became numb. — Piper Caleb

We can co-create this change. Spreading the word, learning to treat others with love, acceptance and forgiveness, and bravely stepping up to do our part ... it's all part of the great dance of life. You don't have to sit back and wait for it. The most powerful gateway to the universe you have is the present. All the work of so many lifetimes is ultimately completed in a single instant - and you can choose whenever that will be. — David Wilcock

Love doesn't keep a score of wrongs. Love doesn't bring up past failures. None of us is perfect. In marriage we do not always do the right thing. We have sometimes done and said hurtful things to our spouses. We cannot erase the past. We can only confess it and agree that it was wrong. We can ask for forgiveness and try to act differently in the future. Having confessed my failure and asked forgiveness, I can do nothing more to mitigate the hurt it may have caused my spouse. When I have been wronged by my spouse and she has painfully confessed it and requested forgiveness, I have the option of justice or forgiveness. If I choose justice and seek to pay her back or make her pay for her wrongdoing, I am making myself the judge and her the felon. Intimacy becomes impossible. If, however, I choose to forgive, intimacy can be restored. Forgiveness is the way of love. — Gary Chapman

You don't get to pick your family, but you can pick your teachers and you can pick your friends and you can pick the music you listen to and you can pick the books you read and you can pick the movies you see. You are, in fact, a mashup of what you choose to let into your life. You are the sum of your influences. The German writer Goethe said, We are shaped and fashioned by what we love. — Austin Kleon

The fact that Ridge has been honest in his conversations with me is not something he did wrong. The fact that he has feelings for me also isn't wrong, when you know exactly how much he's fought those feelings. People can't control matters of the heart, Warren.
They can only control their actions, which is exactly what Ridge did. He lost control once for ten seconds, but after that, every single time temptation reared its ugly head, he walked in the other direction. The only thing Ridge has done wrong is fail to delete his messages, because by doing so, he failed to protect Maggie. He failed to protect her from the harsh truth that people don't get to choose who they fall in love with. They only get to choose who they stay in love with." I look up at the ceiling and blink back tears. "He was choosing to stay in love with her, Warren. Why can't she see that? This will kill him so much more than it's killing her. — Colleen Hoover