Caring Enough Quotes & Sayings

We think that by protecting ourselves from suffering, we are being kind to ourselves. The truth is we only become more fearful, more hardened and more alienated. We experience ourselves as being separate from the whole. This separateness becomes like a prison for us - a prison that restricts us to our personal hopes and fears, and to caring only for the people nearest to us. Curiously enough, if we primarily try to shield ourselves from discomfort, we suffer. Yet, when we don't close off, when we let our hearts break, we discover our kinship with all beings. — Pema Chodron

Love is about giving, about caring for the other person's welfare. Love is treating someone, in the Kantian sense, never as a means but as an end in themselves. Love is sacrifice, love is something you work at, something you build like a house or tend like a plant, brick by brick, drop by drop, day by day. Nonsense. Old wives' tales, old husbands' tales. That is affection they are talking about, that is companionship, that is charity, that is tickets for the Cancer Research Ball. You must ask the young if you want to know what love is. Only they are deep enough in it to describe. We older ones have clues and simulacra, we base our judgement, like pathologists do, on the dents and scars and sediments of hearts long kept in formaldehyde. It is the pulsing heart you want to probe: the pulsing, beating, leaping, dipping, fluttering heart of a seventeen-year-old. — A.P.

For the Javanese...the purpose of knowledge (kaweruh) is love, not ambition or cleverness. Knowledge comes from caring enough to suffer and learn. — Therese Walsh

If I try to make only enough money for my family' immediate needs, it may violate Scripture ... Even though earning just enough to meet the needs of my family may seem nonmaterialistic, it's actually selfish when I could earn enough to care for others as well. — Randy Alcorn

If you cherish something enough", she told me, "it doesn't matter how old or worn or useless it's become; your caring for it immediately raises its value in somebody else's eyes. It's just like rehab- a body's got to believe in their own worth before anybody can start fixing them, but most people need someone to believe in them before they can start believing in themselves. — Charles De Lint

You know, I've always hated those stories about princes and princesses with some extraordinary ability, special because they're born special.'
'Like me?' He smiled wickedly, making me laugh a little.
'I didn't see how those were happy stories, because life has given princes and princesses enough unearned advantages. I'd rather believe that anyone can accomplish remarkable things when she really tries. Maybe her accomplishments will never be recognized, but simply loving and caring for someone else, that's miraculous to me. — Marta Acosta

I want to kiss him for caring enough to be jealous, and smack the shit out of him for being so jealous he's almost blind with it. — Kristen Proby

Stop what you are doing long enough to enjoy the sunset, listen to a special song that lifts you up, or pick up the phone and share some special thought with a caring friend. — Barbara Johnson

Soon enough, Miner stopped caring who was watching - for a brief time, he and Ennek were a universe of two. — Kim Fielding

One day is not enough to green our earth. Planting caring and love is also expecting our earth from us. Do it, It will heal not only the land but also your body and mind. — Karthikeyan V

Patience isn't simply waiting, it is caring enough about the situation and those involved to remain calm and courteous throughout the wait. — Richelle E. Goodrich

I suddenly understood that even love and caring weren't always enough. They were the concrete bricks of our relationship, but unstable without the mortar of time spent together, time without the threat of imminent separation hanging over us. — Nicholas Sparks

I saw that I would never know. I would never know her well enough to know her thoughts in those last minutes, would never know if she left us on purpose. But the not-knowing would not keep me from caring, and I would always love — John Green

What's the most important right attitude to have? It's caring enough about the quality of your work to want to make it better. — Douglas O. Linder

Loving yourself means caring enough to make the hard decisions in your life. — Jennifer Hudson

I start to think, 'It's awful being too poor to even buy my own dress for homecoming.' But that's instantly swept away by another thought: 'I'm so lucky that someone cates enough to loan me a dress. — Margaret Peterson Haddix

The secret to your purpose is to find what you feel is important, and not pursue what others would think is important. When you think highly of yourself, me thinking highly of you will never be enough! — Shannon L. Alder

I'll accept your apology on one condition." He folded his arms across his chest.
"Anything?"
"You trust me."
I cocked my head to the side. "I trust you, Cam."
"No, you don't." He walked over to my small table and pulled out a chair. "Have a seat."
Sitting down, I tugged the hem of his shirt down as he headed back to the stove, putting the tiny skillet over the burner.
"If you trusted me, you wouldn't have reacted the way you did," he simply said, cracking an egg. "And that's not me judging you or any of that kind of shit. You got to trust me that I'm not going to be an ass or freak out over that kind of stuff. You have to trust that I care enough about you. — Jennifer L. Armentrout

The philosopher Socrates said, "An unexamined life is not worth living." If a common philosopher could think that, how much more we Christians ought to listen to the Holy Spirit when He says, "Examine yourself." An unexamined Christian lies like an unattended garden. Let your garden go unattended for a few months, and you will not have roses and tomatoes but weeds. An unexamined Christian life is like an unkempt house. Lock your house up as tight as you will and leave it long enough, and when you come back you will not believe the dirt that got in from somewhere. An unexamined Christian is like an untaught child. A child that is not taught will be a little savage. It takes examination, teaching, instruction, discipline, caring, tending, weeding and cultivating to keep the life right. — A.W. Tozer

She was pleased her husband still thought her attractive, despite her beached-whale state, but was finding it increasingly awkward to accommodate him. The spirit was willing but the flesh was swollen. Still, she enjoyed the compliment and understood that there was no real demand behind the caresses. The earl knew her well enough to realize she valued his desire almost as much as his love. After a lifetime of feeling ugly and unworthy, Alexia was now tolerably assured that Conall genuinely did want her, even if they could do nothing about it at present. She also understood that he was expressing his conjugal interest partly out of knowledge of her own need for such assurances. A werewolf and a buffoon, her husband, but wonderfully caring once he'd blundered into the way of it. — Gail Carriger

Passion is caring enough about your art that you will do almost anything to give it away, to make it a gift, to change people. — Seth Godin

It is not enough to be loving, you have to be sympathetic, kind, caring, and compassionate. — Debasish Mridha

Caring for small things had to start with caring for big things, and maybe the world wasn't big enough. — Terry Pratchett

Dylan Jerome," the lawyer admits, "wanted to sue God for not caring enough about him. — Jodi Picoult

It was not enough to be the last guy she kissed. I wanted to be the last one she loved. And I knew I wasn't. I knew it, and I hated her for it. I hated her for not caring about me. I hated her for leaving that night, and I hated myself , too, not only because I let her go but because if I had been enough for her, she wouldn't have even wanted to leave. She would have just lain with me and talked and cried, and I would have listened and kissed at her tears as they pooled in her eyes. — John Green

He was gone, and I did not have time to tell him what I had just now realized: that I forgave him, and that she forgave us, and that we had to forgive to survive in the labyrinth. There were so many of us who would have to live with things done and things left undone that day. Things that did not go right, things that seemed okay at the time because we could not see the future. If only we could see the endless string of consequences that result from our smallest actions. But we can't know better until knowing better is useless. And as I walked back to give Takumi's note to the Colonel, I saw that I would never know. I would never know her well enough to know her thoughts in those last minutes, would never know if she left us on purpose. But the not-knowing would not keep me from caring, and I would always love Alaska Young, my crooked neighbor, with all my crooked heart. — John Green

When Love Was New

When love was new
and life was young,
and once we walked
in gracious sun,
I never dreamt of darker days,
or feared that fate had cruel ways.

When life was strong
and love was free,
and time was once
eternity -
we never planned for more or less,
nor stopped to think we should digress.

When love was young
and life was new,
and everything
was once our due,
I never doubted what I owned,
nor knew the cost was merely loaned.

Now love is tried
and life is old,
and still my feet
drag down the road -
not knowing where it all has gone,
nor how much more it still goes on.

But life grows new
and love gets old,
and this tired heart
stays off the cold -
not caring it compares with fools,
nor wise enough to fear the rules.
-Drea Damara — Drea Damara

Bringing up a child and caring for a sick person have this in common: both require an energy that is not really yours. You are instilled with it by them, by their eager love, their expectant fear. And they clamor for it as though scenting fresh meat. I sometimes feel that motherhood is a black hole. Whatever you put in is never enough, and you've no idea where it goes. At other times, though, I feel like a vampire feeding off her own child. Devouring his enthusiasm in order to carry on believing in life. — Andres Neuman

Self-love means caring for ourselves enough to forgive people in our past so that the wounds can no longer damage us - for our wounds do not hurt the people who hurt us, they hurt only us. — Caroline Myss

Being a little nervous when you present means that you really care about what you have to say. Audience members see this as a signal that you are solicitous of their esteem - there is a graceful humility this - and that you care enough to want to do a great job. Caring for your audience almost always has a boomerang effect. — Bruna Martinuzzi

Without public pressure from caring people, our lawsuits will not be enough to stop this widespread abuse. — Morris Dees

It's what we wrestle with every single day. The intersection of comfort, danger, and safety. The balancing act between vulnerability and shame. The opportunity (or the risk) to do art. The willingness to take responsibility for caring enough to make a difference and to have a point of view. — Seth Godin

When armies benefit from being perceived as necessary, and war provides a means of gaining prestige and leverage over the government," said Loaf. "Then victory ends a very profitable game. So you play the game of war only fervently enough to keep your military budget high. Nations can get used to a fairly high level of combat attrition without noticing or caring that nobody's actually trying to win, and nothing but the lives of a few soldiers is at stake. — Orson Scott Card

What is hard work? It takes strength, energy, and stress to truly care about others enough to place oneself last, but it is easy to wrap oneself up and selfishly scramble on the heads of others. — Criss Jami

Since Monday, it has been raining buoyant summer rain shot through with sun, but dark at night and full of sound, full of dripping leaves, watery chimings, sleepless scuttlings. Billy Bob is wide-awake, dry-eyed, though everything he does is a little frozen and his tongue is as stiff as a bell tongue. It has not been easy for him, Miss Bobbit's going. Because she'd meant more than that. Than what? Than being thirteen years old and crazy in love. She was the queer things in him, like the pecan tree and liking books and caring enough about people to let them hurt him. She was the things he was afraid to show anyone else. And in the dark the music trickled through the rain: won't there be nights when we will hear it just as though it were really there? And afternoons when the shadows will be all at once confused, and she will pass before us, unfurling across the lawn like a pretty piece of ribbon? — Truman Capote

Show me you care about our common tongue. Bring to your [writing] passion, deeply informed by knowledge of your subject. Stay me, not with apples and flagons, but with wit and grace, humor and intense caring about your discipline. Don't slack, don't give it a lick and a promise, don't make it evident that you posted what was 'good enough for government work,' don't try and fake it. Give it your best, your all, not for pence, but for the love of the craft.
Do these things, as these writers and scores I have not named do, bring to your work your self, your heart, your voice, motherly or youthful, lawyerly or priestly, conservative or liberal, it matters not. Do this and I and hundreds of others will return again and again to your work, not merely because we may have a burning need for a new printer or an abiding interest in college newspapers or what have you, but because we wish to spend time with your mind and voice. — Markham Shaw Pyle

When birth control pills were available in Europe but not in the United States, American women created an uproar about how the unwillingness to make the pill available showed a contempt for the lives of women ... When the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) released birth control pills with high dosages of hormones that were later found to be unnecessarily high, they were attacked for not caring about women enough to do the necessary tests. — Warren Farrell

Caring too much for objects can destroy you. Only - if you care for a thing enough, it takes on a life of its own, doesn't it? And isn't the whole point of things - beautiful things - that they connect you to some larger beauty? — Donna Tartt

Once upon a time there was a man with no heart. Drifting through black-and-white life, caring naught for those hurt, and never, ever allowing another near enough to hurt him. Until, on the least likely day, the most unlikely place, the man with no heart met the most surprising person. He was fearless. He was strength and power. He wore his heart boldly on his sleeve. The man with no heart began, shockingly, to feel a movement in his breast. A stretching, a slow, steady beat ... — Shannon Noelle Long

I realized early that despite her gregarious and inherently buoyant disposition, a certain sadness resided in my mother. Even I, her only child, whom she loved more than anything in the world, could do little to soothe the sorrow that has taken root with the separation from her parents, her two sisters and her brother. The contrast in the life my mother experienced before and after leaving Tibet was so extreme, it must have been impossible for her to make sense of her life and to escape the inexhaustible longing for the past. Caring for me on her own inside crowded rooms of tenement buildings in towns and cities, she must have felt she had dreamt her past or that she was dreaming her present existence. The places and residences we lived in were never quite home to her and led her to cling, more tenaciously, to the past. My mother had guarded her past sorrows from me because she knew me well enough to sense I would carry her grief as my own. — Tsering Wangmo Dhompa

Sci-fi uses the images that sf - starting with H.G. Wells - made familiar: space travel, aliens, galactic wars and federations, time machines, et cetera, taking them literally, not caring if they are possible or even plausible. It has no interest in or relation to real science or technology. It's fantasy in space suits. Spectacle. Wizards with lasers. Kids with ray guns. I've written both, but I have to say I respect science fiction enough that I wince when people call it sci-fi. — Ursula K. Le Guin

I said I wasn't your Prince Charming. You don't enjoy being banged like a ragdoll because I pranced into your life. You didn't discover hot sex just because I happen to exist. I don't want you thinking of me as your savior. As someone you're beholden to because now you know what you like. You told me what to do that night. You were just drunk enough to stop caring about what I would think of you. — Santino Hassell

Time slowed, and stilled. It was just the two of us, me murmuring in the empty, sunlit room. Will didn't say much. He didn't answer back, or add a dry comment, or scoff. He nodded occasionally, his head pressed against mine, and murmured, or let out a small sound that could have been satisfaction at another good memory.
"It has been, the best six months of my entire life."
"Funnily enough, Clark, mine too."
And then, just like that, my heart broke. My face crumpled, my composure went and I held him tightly and I stopped caring that he could feel the shudder of my sobbing body because grief swamped me. It overwhelmed me and tore at my heart and my stomach and my head and it pulled me under, and I couldn't bear it. — Jojo Moyes

I think for a time I was unsure what love meant. And now at least I AM sure that a very big part of it involves caring about someone SO much, that you find yourself using Your energy to make their life the BEST it can possibly be. And in turn they do the same for you. Until you both are strong enough to overcome whatever struggles you might have battled on your own, and also struggles you still have yet to face. — Bethany Brookbank

In all outward aspects he remained patient and mild now, not caring even to speak against heretics; he knew that he was likely to die soon enough, but the prospect of death was not an unwelcome one ( ... ). More retained his hair shirt as he dwelled in his chamber, and is reported to have whipped himself for penitence; he fasted on the appointed days, sang hymns and prayed both day and night. — Peter Ackroyd

Imagine Cara caring enough to make a police report about an abused child knowing the information will likely be unwelcome to the police, enraging to the parent, and unappreciated by the child, knowing nothing might happen, or worse, that the kid may be beaten for the trouble it causes - yet hoping this case is one where the child is actually helped. There's nothing depressing about the heroism teachers show every day. — Gavin De Becker

I would never know her well enough to know her thoughts in those last minutes, would never know if she left us on purpose. But not-knowing would not keep me from caring, and I would always love Alaska Young, my crooked neighbour, with all my crooked heart — John Green

But he couldn't feel self-pity in the face of the memorial. He hadn't lost nearly enough as these children, who'd lost their homeland and, in many cases,their whole families. Perhaps they had gained something, too, though. They had at least escaped the concentration camps, been taken in by good, caring families, and had grown up to live their lives in relative freedom. — Peter Robinson

Thought it has certainly taken you long enough to realize what should have truly been precious to you. Not your own self-importance, nor how clever you thought you were, but the affections of those who cared for you, and that you should have cared for in return. e become truly great only when we work for others as well as ourselves. By your own light, you can only illuminate a small part of the world, but when your light is reflected and shared, it is magnified. — Mercedes Lackey

We need the courage to create ourselves daily, to be bodacious enough to create ourselves daily - as Christians, as Jews, as Muslims, as thinking, caring, laughing, loving human beings. I think that the courage to confront evil and turn it by dint of will into something applicable to the development of our evolution, individually and collectively, is exciting, honorable. — Maya Angelou

Philanthropy is not about money ... its about feeling the pain of others and caring enough about their needs to help. — Timothy Pina

I knew, deep down, that love, though a beautiful beginning, isn't enough. It's the practice of honoring and caring for another that's noble, not the emotion of love itself. The emotion is the easy part. — Megan McCafferty

She'd so believed he could - that decades marked by disdain for emotion could have been nothing more than a faint memory in his checkered past. That she could love him enough to prove to him that the world was worth his caring, his trust. That she could turn him into the man of whom she had dreamed for so long.
That was perhaps the hardest truth of all - that Ralston, the man she'd pined over for a decade, had never been real. He'd never been the strong and silent Odysseus; he'd never been aloof Darcy; never Antony, powerful and passionate. He had only ever been Ralston, arrogant and flawed and altogether flesh and blood. — Sarah MacLean

The problem is not finding the needs of people in our lives; the problem is caring enough to act in a manner that is far different than perhaps we have acted previously. — Ted Rivera

If I can get out of the way, if I can be pure enough, if I can be selfless enough, and if I can be generous and loving and caring enough to abandon what I have in my own preconceived silly notions of what I think I am - and become truly who in fact I am, which is really just another child of God - then the music can really use me. And therein lies my fulfillment. That's when the music starts to happen. — John McLaughlin

A sound intruded. It was barely discernable, the rub of fur against a leaf,but it was enough to elicit a frustrated groan from Julian. He leaned his forhead against her crown. "This family unit you have is driving me over the edge.We have no privacy,piccola, none whatsoever."
She laughed softly with the same frustration. "I know,Julian. But it is one of the small sacrifices we all pay for caring for one another. We help each other through any crisis."
"Who is going to help me through this one? Believe me,cara, I am definitely having a crisis. I need you before I start to go insane."
"I know.It is the same for me," she whispered, her lips against the corner of his mouth, teasing, tempting. There was an ache in her voice, an answer to the ache in his. "We will have our time."
"It had better be soon," he growled, meaning it. — Christine Feehan

The boy nodded, unperturbed that his father, his mentor, could always find fault, even in success. The boy knew that his beloved father did so only because it forced him to strive for perfection. And in a dangerous galaxy, perfection allowed for survival. The boy loved his father even more for caring enough to criticize. — R.A. Salvatore

Yet the denial of feelings is one way of blocking the chronic depression that can descend like a dense fog on those who deal day after day with sickness and death. It is better than not caring at all, better than burning out. Only a few are tough enough to maintain both equanimity and caring for a lifetime; these renowned nurses and legendary physicians are saints of the medical profession. Copper knew a few of them, and he wished he could be more like them. It took a lot of growing up. — Richard S. Weeder

Life, ongoing life, is really what death rituals are about. Mourners who are fortunate enough to be enveloped in familiar traditions by family and caring friends can become revitalized and newly sustained by the process. Mourning traditions revive and animate memories and feelings. They satisfy a human need of validation and inclusiveness; that is, we need to feel that we are an acceptable part of a larger whole. We bid farewell to those who have gone to another dimension, and by sharing memories of the deceased, people reinforce feelings and even beliefs about the deceased after the veil of death is drawn closed. — Jacqueline S. Thursby

I was thinking that if it really was my fault, if every reaction could be traced to an action before, then at the very beginning would be me at the canteen queue with my twenty-dollar note instead of my packed lunch. In turn I could blame my mother for not caring enough and maybe I could blame my father for making my mum stop caring. Maybe all this was supposed to happen. It had been happening all along. It was too hard to try and stop it now. In a twisted way, there was cold comfort in that. — Shirley Marr

I was suddenly very aware of the fact it was me standing up in that tunnel with the wind over my face. Not caring if I saw downtown. Not even thinking about it. Because I was standing in the tunnel. And I was really there. And that was enough to make me feel infinite. — Stephen Chbosky

It became clear to me that simply caring is not enough. To drive real progress, you have to change both hearts and laws. You need both understanding and action. — Hillary Clinton

It's really easy to insist that people read the manual. It's really easy to blame the user/student/prospect/customer for not trying hard, for being too stupid to get it, or for not caring enough to pay attention. — Seth Godin

Good discipline is more than just punishing or laying down the law. It is liking children and letting them see that they are liked. It is caring enough about them to provide good, clear rules for their protection. — Stanley Greenspan

Why are terms of endearment always food? Honey, cookie, sugar, pumpkin. Its not like caring about someone is enough to actually sustain you. — Jodi Picoult

I do have at home the most ridiculous number of awards for what I have done, which is nice in terms of being patted on the back, yet it does cure you of caring about what other people say about you. Ultimately, you must have your own standard of what is good enough. — John Lloyd

Before Kiki and I headed toward the Keep, I thanked my friends.
"For what? We didn't do anything," Janco grumbled.
"For caring enough to follow my guards. And the next time, I might need the help."
"There better not be a next time," Ari said, giving me a stern look.
"How touching," Janco said, pretending to wipe his eyes.
"Get going, Yelena. I don't want you to see me cry." He faked a sniffle.
"I'm sure your ego can handle it," I said. "Or will you need to beat up some trainees to feel like a man again?"
"Very funny," he said. — Maria V. Snyder

I suspect that the most basic and powerful way to connect to another person is to listen. Just listen. Perhaps the most important thing we ever give each other is our attention And especially if it's given from the heart. When people are talking, there's no need to do anything but receive them. Just take them in. Listen to what they're saying. Care about it. Most times caring about it is even more important than understanding it. Most of us don't value ourselves or our love enough to know this. — Rachel Naomi Remen

Where's the nobility in patching up a bunch of old tables and chairs? Corrosive to the soul, quite possibly. I've seen too many estates not to know that. Idolatry! Caring too much for objects can destroy you. Only - if you care for a thing enough, it takes on a life of its own, doesn't it? And isn't the whole point of things - beautiful things - that they connect you to some larger beauty? Those first images that crack your heart wide open and you spend the rest of your life chasing, or trying to recapture, in one way or another? Because, I mean - mending old things, preserving them, looking after them - on some level there's no rational grounds for it - ... fateful objects. Every dealer and antiquaire recognizes them. The pieces that occur and recur. Maybe for someone else, not a dealer, it wouldn't be an object. It'd be a city, a color, a time of day. The nail where your fate is liable to catch and snag.
- Hobie, The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt — Donna Tartt

She said confidence and arrogance weren't the same, especially in a Dominant, and I'd know I had the right Dom for me when he was....when he was intimidating enough to be arousing, wise enough to keep me safe, and caring enough to help me grow, even when the right choices were hard ones. — M.Q. Barber

And she was well-enough acquainted with loneliness to understand that the worst part wasn't having nobody caring for you - it was having nobody to care for. — Tessa Dare

You don't even care enough about us to hate us, do you? — William Golding

Tiger and mountain lion. Fuck you. Fuck you for getting me out. You should have shot me. But you didn't have the guts to do it. Too weak. You just didn't care enough. You waited two years, and then you fucking stopped caring and tore out my fucking heart. Come on. Promises, Dan. Keep them. Cut it out. If you're a man. — Aleksandr Voinov

Being superficially different is the goal of so many of the products we see ... rather than trying to innovate and genuinely taking the time, investing the resources and caring enough to try and make something better. — Jonathan Ive

A song and a smile from someone I cared about could be enough to distract me from all that darkness, if only for a little while. — Ransom Riggs

When do you quit wishing for things to be different? Months? Years? Decades? You think that if a sufficient amount of time goes by, it should be enough to help you stop caring anymore. But it doesn't. Ever. — T. Torrest

We have created thousands and thousands of places in America that aren't worth caring about, and when we have enough of them, we're going to have a country that's not worth defending. — James Howard Kunstler

It's only since it's been made impossible that it's been made so damn easy. It's got like prohibition, with bums and crooks making fortunes out of hooch, everyone who might have had a palate losing it, nobody caring how you hold your liquor, you've been smart enough if you get it at all. You can't make good wine in a bathtub in the cellar, you need sun and rain and fresh air, you need pride in a job you can tell the world about. Only you can live without drink if you have to, but you can't live without love. — Mary Renault