Happiness Of A Mother Quotes & Sayings

Mother! what a world of affection is comprised in that single word; how little do we in the giddy round of youthful pleasure and folly heed her wise counsels. How lightly do we look upon that zealous care with which she guides our otherwise erring feet, watches with feelings which none but a mother can know the gradual expansion of our youth to the riper yours of discretion. We may not think of it then, but it will be recalled to our minds in after years, when the gloomy grave or a fearful living separation has placed her far beyond our reach, and her sweet voice of sympathy and consolation for the various ills attendant upon us sounds in our ears no more. How deeply then we regret a thousand deeds that we have done contrary to her gentle admonitions! How we sign for those days once more, that we may retrieve what we have done amiss and make her kind heart glad with happiness! Alas! once gone they can never be recalled, and we grow mournfully sad with the bitter reflection. — Fanny Kelly

The more she laughs, the more he ups the ante with his clowning. By the time he finishes he will have run through all the secret mysteries of laughter that human beings have ever understood, mobilizing everything at his disposal. There is no way for him to know how guilty it makes his mother feel, seeing such a young child go to such lengths just to wring a bit of apparent happiness from her, or that her laughter will all eventually run out. — Han Kang

i have never understood.
will
probably never understand.
the white mans lust
to eat the world.
to eat the universe. (mars is next)
why he was born with such a rabid
starvation.
why he feigns for power
like
crack rock. doing everything. and anything.
to have it.
no matter how deranged.
why he is in so much pain
he needs to rip the roots of happiness
from the earth
and
burn them into
his smile.
what happened in his relationship with our mother.
that he needs to set a person on fire.
watch them burn.
to
feel powerful.
not every white man
is
born this way,
but,
it stands to remain
there are many
who
are. — Nayyirah Waheed

Nothing in the world was more important than my daughter's happiness, even though I'd never understood why she always had to choose the most difficult and painful of paths. But a mother doesn't have to understand anything, she simply has to love and protect. And feel proud. Knowing that we could give her almost everything, she nevertheless set off early in search of her independence. She'd had her stumbles and her failures, but she insisted on facing any storms alone. — Paulo Coelho

Magic carpet rides, rune magic, Ali Baba and visions of the Holy Mother, astral travel and the future in the dregs of a glass of red wine. Buddha. Frodo's journey into Mordor. The transubstantiation of the sacrament. Dorothy and Toto. The Easter Bunny. Space aliens. The Thing in the closet. The Resur-rection and the Life at the turn of a card ... I've believed them all at one time or another. Or pretended to. Or pretended not to.
And now? What do I believe right now?
'I believe that being happy is the only important thing,' I told him at last.
Happiness. Simple as a glass of chocolate or tortuous as the hear. Bitter. Sweet. Alive. — Joanne Harris

My Selection wasn't a farce, but it wasn't that far off. My father chose all the
contestants by hand, picking young women with political alliances, influential families, or enough
charm to make the entire country worship the ground they walked on. He knew he had to make it
varied enough to seem legit, so there were three Fives thrown into the mix but nothing below that.
The Fives were meant to be little more than throwaways to keep anyone from being suspicious."
I realized my mouth was gaping open and shut it immediately. "Mom?"
"Was meant to be gone almost immediately. Truth be told, she barely made it past my father 's
attempts to sway my opinion or remove her himself. And look at her now." His whole face changed.
"Though it was hard for me to imagine, she is even more beloved as queen than my mother. She has
made four beautiful, intelligent, strong children. And she has been the source of every happiness in
my life. — Kiera Cass

Connie went slowly home to Wragby. 'Home!'...it was a warm word to use for that great, weary warren. But then it was a word that had had its day. It was somehow cancelled. All the great words, it seemed to Connie, were cancelled for her generation: love, joy, happiness, home, mother, father, husband, all these great, dynamic words were half dead now, and dying from day to day. Home was a place you lived in, love was a thing you didn't fool yourself about, joy was a word you applied to a good Charleston, happiness was a term of hypocrisy used to bluff other people, a father was an individual who enjoyed his own existence, a husband was a man you lived with and kept going in spirits. As for sex, the last of the great words, it was just a cocktail term for an excitement that bucked you up for a while, then left you more raggy than ever. Frayed! It was as if the very material you were made of was cheap stuff, and was fraying out to nothing. — D.H. Lawrence

A mother is the one who fills your heart in the first place. She teaches you the nature of happiness: what is the right amount, what is too much, and the kind that makes you want more of what is bad for you. A mother helps her baby flex her first feelings of pleasure. She teaches her when to later exercise restraint, or to take squealing joy in recognizing the fluttering leaves of the gingko tree, to sense a quieter but more profound satisfaction in chancing upon an everlasting pine. A mother enables you to realize that there are different levels of beauty and therein lie the sources of pleasure, some of which are popular and ordinary, and thus of brief value, and others of which are difficult and rare, and hence worth pursuing. — Amy Tan

A woman is a loving mother, a gorgeous daughter, and beautiful angel of imagination. — Debasish Mridha

The married man and the mother of a Christian family, if they are faithful to their obligations, will fulfill a mission that is as great as it is consoling: that of bringing into the world and forming young souls capable of happiness and love, souls capable of sanctification and transformation in Christ. — Thomas Merton

On Christmas morning when I was a child, my mother would leave a book wrapped at the foot of the bed, which was a hint that Santa had come. It was also her way of keeping us in bed a little longer before we went downstairs. So I've always associated books with happiness and gifts. And they are. I can't get enough of them. — David McCullough

As I wade into the still-freezing stream, the wind raises goose bumps on my body. A cloud of swallows skates across the sky; the water carries a slight taste of grit; my mother hums downstream. This is not any kind of happiness that I imagined. It is not what I chose.

But it's enough. It is more than enough. — Lauren Oliver

This household happiness did not come all at once, but John and Meg had found the key to it, and each year of married life taught them how to use it, unlocking the treasuries of real home love and mutual helpfulness, which the poorest may possess, and the richest cannot buy. This is the sort of shelf on which young wives and mothers may consent to be laid, safe from the restless fret and fever of the world, finding loyal lovers in the little sons and daughters who cling to them, undaunted by sorrow, poverty, or age, walking side by side, through fair and stormy weather, with a faithful friend, who is, in the true sense of the good old Saxon word, the 'house-band,' and learning, as Meg learned, that a woman's happiest kingdom is home, her highest honor the art of ruling it not as a queen, but as a wise wife and mother. — Louisa May Alcott

Listen to these wounds of pain put in the form of questions to me by a young woman who had had two abortions: "I wonder about the spirits of those I had aborted, if they were there, if they were hurt? I was under three months each time, but a mother feels life before she feels movement." "I wonder if they are lost and alone?" "I wonder if they will ever have a body?" "I wonder if I will ever have a chance again to bring those spirits back as mine?" Alas, brothers and sisters, "wickedness never was happiness" (Alma 41:10). — Neal A. Maxwell

There is no love like a mother's - she who carries the child that God knits in the womb, she who nourishes and guides, she who teaches and inspires, she who gives of her heart and soul and self for the good and the happiness of her children and her family. — Ronald Reagan

The smile he gave me was warm, but he was still wounded by his mother's death. There was a hollowness in his eyes: a black hole of shocked grieving that swallowed all the questions and released no answers. When he returned to his work, cutting lengths of coconut-fibre rope for the men to tie around bamboo bracing poles, his young face assumed a numb expression. I knew that expression: I sometimes caught it, by chance, in the mirror: the way we look when the part of happiness that's trusting and innocent is ripped away, and we blame ourselves, rightly or wrongly, for its loss. — Gregory David Roberts

I knew she was leaving. I knew we were never going to date long-distance. I knew that we wouldn't have been able to be like this back when were were dating, so there was no use in regretting what hadn't happened. I suspected that what happens in hotel rooms rarely lasts outside of them. I suspected that when something was a beginning and an ending at the same time, that meant it could only exist in the present ...
..It was snowing outside, anointing the air with a quiet wonder shared by all passersby. When I got back to my mother's apartment, I was a mixture of giddy thrill-happiness and muddle gut-confusion
I didn't want to leave anything regarding Sofia to chance, and at the same time I was enjoying this step away from it. — David Levithan

Dr. Xia was working as a salaried doctor attached to another man's medicine shop, which did not give him much chance to display his skill. But he worked had, and gradually his reputation began to grow. Soon he was invited to go on his first visit to a patient's home. When he came back that evening he was carrying a package wrapped in a cloth. He winked at my mother and his wife and asked them to guess what was inside the package. My mother's eyes was glued to the steaming bundle, and even before she could shout out "Steamed rolls!" she was already tearing the package open. As she was devouring the rolls, she looked up and met Dr. Xia's twinkling eyes. More than fifty years later she can still remember his look of happiness, and even today she says she can remember any food as delicious as those simple wheat rolls. — Jung Chang

When my mother didn't come back I realized that any moment could be the last. Nothing in life should simply be a passage from one place to another. Each walk should be taken as if it is the only thing you have left. You can demand something like this of yourself as an unattainable ideal. After that, you have to remind yourself about it every time you're sloppy about something. For me that means 250 times a day. — Peter Hoeg

It is far more important to love your wife than to love God, and I will tell you why. You cannot help him, but you can help her. You can fill her life with the perfume of perpetual joy. It is far more important that you love your children than that you love Jesus Christ. And why? If he is God you cannot help him, but you can plant a little flower of happiness in every footstep of the child, from the cradle until you die in that child's arms. Let me tell you to-day it is far more important to build a home than to erect a church. The holiest temple beneath the stars is a home that love has built. And the holiest altar in all the wide world is the fireside around which gather father and mother and the sweet babes. — Robert G. Ingersoll

"Mom, Arnie Welsh keeps calling me a geek. He says it like it's a bad thing. Is being a geek a bad thing?"
"Of course not, Soda Pop. And don't listen to labels. They don't matter."
"What are labels?"
"It's an imaginery sticker people slap on you with the word they think you are written on it. It doesn't matter who they think you are. It matters who you think you are."
"I think I might be a geek."
She laughed. "Then you be a geek. Just be whatever makes you happy, Soda Pop, and I'll be happy too. — Samantha Young

Your happiness, you're wasting your time. You must be fearless enough to give yourself the love you didn't receive. Begin noticing how every day brings a new opportunity for your growth. How buried disagreements with your mother show up in arguments with your spouse. How unconscious feelings of unworthiness appear in everything you do (and don't do). All these experiences are your life's way of urging you to leave the past behind and make yourself whole. Pay attention. Every choice gives you a chance to pave your own road. Keep moving. Full speed ahead. — Oprah Winfrey

There is no life without regrets. Every important choice has its benefits and its deficits, whether or not people admit it or even recognize the fact: no mother has the radical, lifelong freedom that is essential for my happiness. I will never know the intimacy with, or have the impact on, a child that a mother has. Losses, including the loss of future possibilities, are inevitable in life; nobody has it all. — Jeanne Safer

I am your mother. The first mile of your road. Me, and all of my obvious and hidden limitations. That means that in addition to possibly wrecking you, I have the chance to give you what was given to me. A decent childhood. More good memories than bad. Some values. A sense of tribe. A run at happiness. — Kelly Corrigan

Miss Bates ... had never boasted either beauty or cleverness. Her youth had passed without distinction, and her middle of life was devoted to the care of a failing mother, and the endeavour to make a small income go as far as possible. And yet she was a happy woman, and a woman whom no one named without good-will. It was her own universal goodwill and contented temper which worked such wonders. She loved every body, was interested in every body's happiness and quick-sighted to every body's merits; thought herself a most fortunate creature, and surrounded with blessings in such an excellent mother and so many good neighbours and friends, and a home that wanted for nothing. The simplicity and cheerfulness of her nature, her contented and grateful spirit, were a recommendation to every body and a mine of felicity to herself. — Jane Austen

This tug-of-war often obscures what's also happening between us. I am your mother, the first mile of your road. Me and all my obvious and hidden limitations. That means that in addition to possibly wrecking you, I have the chance to give to you what was given to me: a decent childhood, more good memories than bad, some values, a sense of tribe, a run at happiness. You can't imagine how seriously I take that - even as I fail you. Mothering you is the first thing of consequence that I have ever done. — Kelly Corrigan

A woman is a mother, daughter, and sister of every man; how she could be wrong? — Debasish Mridha

Happiness, she would explain, was when a person felt good, light, creative, content, loving and loved, and free. An unhappy person felt as if there were barriers crushing her desires and the talents she had inside. A happy woman was one who could exercise all kinds of rights, from the right to move to the right to create, compete, and challenge, and at the same time could be loved for doing so. Part of happiness was to be loved by a man who enjoyed your strength and was proud of your talents. Happiness was also about the right to privacy, the right to retreat from the company of others and plunge into contemplative solitude. Or sit by yourself doing nothing for a whole day, and not give excuses or feel guilty about it either. Happiness was to be with loved ones, and yet still feel that you existed as a separate being, that ou were not just there to make them happy. Happiness was when there was a balance between what you gave and what you took. — Fatema Mernissi

Have you ever seen a child sitting on its mother's knee listening to fairy stories? As long as the child is told of cruel giants and of the terrible suffering of beautiful princesses, it holds its head up and its eyes open; but if the mother begins to speak of happiness and sunshine, the little one closes its eyes and falls asleep with its head against her breast ... I am a child like that, too. Others may like stories of flowers and sunshine; but I choose the dark nights and sad destinies. — Selma Lagerlof

When I tell her about the expression "MILF" ("Mom I'd like to Fuck"), she thinks it's hilarious. There's no French-language equivalent. In France, there's no a priori reason why a woman wouldn't be sexy just because she happens to have children. It's not uncommon to hear a Frenchman say that being a mother gives a woman an appealing air of plentitude (happiness and fulness of spirit). — Pamela Druckerman

People say a mother is only as happy as her least happy child. But what if the state of that child's happiness has become a mystery? What if that child is no longer a child but a young man who has removed himself to a great distance and encased himself in silence? — Jan Ellison

The mental agony I have suffered, during the last two days, wrings from me the avowal to you of a passion which, as you well know, is not one of yesterday, nor one I have lightly formed. On Rose, sweet, gentle girl! my heart is set, as firmly as ever heart of man was set on woman. I have no thought, no view, no hope in life, beyond her; and if you oppose me in this great stake, you take my peace and happiness in your hands, and cast them to the wind. Mother, think better of this, and of me, and do not disregard the happiness of which you seem to think so little. — Charles Dickens

It's nothing compared to happiness."
I snorted through gritted teeth. "What happiness?"
"Exactly."
"Reality interrupts - " Jaw clenching, my nostrils flared as I felt a gush of blood flow.
A whisper. "Life." His blink was slow. "The mother of all bitches."
"And the beauty?"
"Its absence is duly noted."
"Only to be found by those later."
Another swipe of my cheeks. "Once they've suffered to the point they scream for death."
"Full circle."
His hand found mine in a gentle hold. "Pain needs to be felt. — Scarlett Dawn

Love and compassion are the mother and father of a smile. We need to create more smiles in our world today. Smiles, after all, pave the way to a happy world. — Steve Maraboli

She was quite pretty too in those days; indeed, perhaps she still was. But for some reason none of her boyfriends remained boyfriends for long. She had a very decided personality and fairly soon took to telling them what they should do with their lives and studies and work. She began to mother them or perhaps brother them (since she was something of a tomboy) - and this sooner or later took the edge off their romantic excitement. They even began to find her vivacity over-powering, and sooner or later edged away from her - with guilt on their side and pain on hers. This was a great pity, for Kalpana Gaur was a lively, affectionate, and intelligent woman, and deserved some recompense for the help and happiness she gave others — Vikram Seth

In the West, for example, people believe they must 'pursue happiness' as if it were some kind of a flighty bird that is always out of reach. In the East, we believe we are born with happiness and one of life's important takes, my mother told me, is to protect it. — Le Ly Hayslip

I sit quietly and think about my mom. It's funny how memory erodes, If all I had to work from were my childhood memories, my knowledge of my mother would be faded and soft, with a few sharp memories standing out. — Audrey Niffenegger

His mother's words faded to myth, concocted by a gentle soul to delight the imagination of a boy.

Until one day, they were no longer a myth. One day, he would wish he had never heard them at all because they spelled his happiness--and his eternal sorrow. — Natalia Marx

A mother's happiness is like a beacon, lighting up the future but reflected also on the past in the guise of fond memories. — Honore De Balzac

The realities of motherhood are often obscured by a halo of illusions. The future mother tends to fantasize about love and happiness and overlooks the other aspects of child-rearing: the exhaustion, frustration, loneliness, and even depression, with its attendant state of guilt. — Elisabeth Badinter

Peace is a beautiful flower of love, harmony and joy
Peace is a dancing bird, a joyful smile of a poor boy
Peace is a little child's innocent smile and loving kiss
For a war torn mother, peace is a divine bliss.
Peace starts with a heart that is caring
Peace starts with a smile that is loving
Peace starts with power of love not with love of power
Peace starts with a desire to bloom like a flower. — Debasish Mridha

The death of my mother permanently affects my happiness, more even than I should have anticipated, though I always knew that I must feel the separation at first as a severe wrench. But I did not apprehend, during her life, to what a degree she prevented me from feeling heart-solitude ... — Sara Coleridge

So when do we get married?" Rio asked, nuzzling her cheek. "This Bond thing is telling me to hurry up."
"You truly want it?"
He caught her gaze, his own softening. "Yes."
Nella's heart swelled with warmth, happiness. "Right away. Tomorrow, if you want."
"Good. We'll do it fast, then break it to your mother and father that you Bonded with a Shareem."
"They will already know," Nella said, laughing. "Everything that happens in the Gallery of Light is broadcast throughout the palace. The news of our Bonding will probably be all over the feeds by morning."
"Shit," Rio said, then he grinned. "Good thing I've got a great ass."
"It's beautiful."
"Glad you like it. — Allyson James

"Take my own father! You know what he said in his last moments? On his deathbed, he defied me to name a man who had enjoyed a better life. In spite of the dreadful pain, his face radiated happiness," said Mother, nodding her head comfortably. "Happiness drives out pain, as fire burns out fire." — Mary Lavin

One little second of pleasure, a whole life of pain ... my mother knew nothing of the pleasures of a good roll in the hay ... she missed out on all that ... like me, her son ... a lifetime of sacrifice! ... the woman who can grunt and rave in the throes of a deep fuck can die happy ... — Louis-Ferdinand Celine

To students: I pray that all those young people who have graduated, do not carry just a piece of paper with them but that they carry with them love, peace and joy. That they become the sunshine of God's love to our people, the hope of eternal happiness and the burning flame of love wherever they go. That they become carriers of God's love. That they be able to give what they have received. For they have received not to keep, but to share. — Mother Teresa

mother would say, "Stop making happiness some kind of concrete goal. It's a side effect. It's a secondary happening, but not the main event. Happiness is what you feel when you've been kind, fair, or loving in the face of hardness. It is the feeling of light that comes after behaving in the way you ultimately want." But — Ann Wertz Garvin

My favorite book is The Mysterious Island. I order my books from a flimsy catalog the teacher hands out to every student in the class. Emil and the Detectives. White Fang. Like that. Money is tight for us, but when it comes to books my mother is a spendthrift; I can order as many as I like. I sit here day after day, waiting for my books to arrive. My books. It takes a month or more, but when they finally do, when the teacher opens the big box and passes out the orders to the kids, checking the books against a form taken from her desk, I glow with happiness. I've never had the newest dress, or the prettiest, but I always have the tallest stack of books. Little paperbacks that smell of wet ink. I lay my cheek against their cool covers, anticipating the stories inside, knowing all the other girls wonder what I could possibly want with those books. — Greg Iles

Violet pulled a face. "Of course I have great ambition that my children marry well and happily, but I am not the sort who'd marry her daughter off to a seventy-year-old man just because he was a duke!"
"Did the dowager countess do that?" Benedict couldn't recall any seventy-year-old dukes making recent trips to the altar.
"No," Violet admitted, "but she would. Whereas I - "
Benedict bit back a smile as his mother pointed to herself with great flourish.
"I would allow my children to marry paupers if it would bring them happiness."
Benedict raised a brow.
"They would be well-principled and hardworking paupers, of course," Violet explained. "No gamblers need apply."
Benedict didn't want to laugh at his mother, so instead he coughed discreetly into his handkerchief. — Julia Quinn

Who are the happiest people on earth? A craftsman or artist whistling over a job well done. A little child building sand castles. A mother, after a busy day, bathing her baby. A doctor who has finished a difficult and dangerous operation, and saved a human life. Happiness lies in a constructive job well done. Get your happiness out of your work or you will never know what happiness is. — Elbert Hubbard

Mind you, I've always been musical ... Mother used to sit me on her knee and I'd whisper, 'Mummy, Mummy, sing me a lullaby do,' and she'd say: 'Certainly my angel, my wee bundle of happiness, hold my beer while I fetch me banjo.' — Les Dawson

That was during the time of her lost happiness, when his love had built round her a protective wall, which for a brief period had seemed unassailable, indestructible, just the two of them together inside, everything intimate and secure. She'd felt so blissfully safe and happy in those days. What strength, what confidence he had instilled in her. As long as he loved her, she could laugh at the world outside. With him she had even laughed at her domineering mother, who in the past had reduced her to nothing. It had been so miraculous not to feel inferior any longer, but a real person with her own place in life
above all, secure, loved and wanted. — Anna Kavan

It takes a tremendous amount of strength to be a single mother. To hold down the forte of a home, a life and your child's entire happiness. — Nikki Rowe

There is another life both for you and for me,' said I. 'If it be the will of God that we should sow in tears now, it is only that we may reap in joy hereafter. It is His will that we should not injure others by the gratification of our own earthly passions; and you have a mother, and sisters, and friends who would be seriously injured by your disgrace; and I, too, have friends, whose peace of mind shall never be sacrificed to my enjoyment, or yours either, with my consent; and if I were alone in the world, I have still my God and my religion, and I would sooner die than disgrace my calling and break my faith with heaven to obtain a few brief years of false and fleeting happiness - happiness sure to end in misery even here - for myself or any other! — Anne Bronte

of yourself and of other people. If you wish to attain to lasting happiness you must be ready to hate father, mother, even your own life and to take leave of all your possessions. How? Not by renouncing them or giving them up because what you give up violently you are forever bound to. But rather by seeing them for the nightmare they are; and then, whether you keep them or not, they will have lost their grip over you, their power to hurt you, and you will be out of your dream at last, out of your darkness, your fear, your unhappiness. So spend some time seeing each of the things you cling to for what it really is, a nightmare that causes you excitement and pleasure on the one hand but also worry, insecurity, tension, anxiety, fear, unhappiness on the other. — Anthony De Mello

He had been raised on a few bedrock certainties: the Victorian spirit of duty, the personal need for responsibility, for doing what had to be done. He had demonstrated his adherence to this code by taking on his father's debts, as well as the burdens of his aging and ailing mother and of his manic-depressive sister. That same code now had him at war with himself. Happiness was within his grasp, but seizing it meant abandoning his responsibility to Mayo. If he cut her loose, he could save himself. But he would also cut her lifeline. — A.M. Sperber & Eric Lax

All I want is all what my mother wanted for me when she raised me - to be happy. For that, I don't need to be in a relationship. I don't need to have a certain level of respect. I just want to care very much about what I do and be kind to everyone in the process. It's important that I can feel that. That's happiness. — Hayden Christensen

Anna was grateful for Ursula - really she was. But Ursula, who was usually never blatantly unkind to Anna, still treated her as a foreign object, a means to the end of her son's happiness (if indeed "happy" was the word for what Bruno was, and Anna was almost sure it wasn't) and the vessel by which her grandchildren - whom she deeply loved - were carried into the world. The help that Ursula offered was for the children's sake, not Anna's. — Jill Alexander Essbaum

It is the liveliest time in life, the happiest of the irresponsible times in life. Mothers echo its happiness - nothing is like a mother who has a son home from college, except another mother with a son home from college. Bloom does actually come upon these mothers; it is a visible thing; and they run like girls, walk like athletes, laugh like sycophants. Yet they give up their sons to the daughters of other mothers, and find it proud rapture enough to be allowed to sit and watch. — Booth Tarkington

Often we imagine that we will work hard until we arrive at some distant goal, and then we will be happy. This is a delusion. Happiness is the result of a life lived with purpose. Happiness is not an objective. It is the movement of life itself, a process, and an activity. It arises from curiosity and discovery. Seek pleasure and you will quickly discover the shortest path to suffering. Other people, friends, brothers, sisters, neighbors, spouses, even your mother and I are not responsible for your happiness. Your life is your responsibility, and you always have the choice to do your best. Doing your best will bring happiness. Do not be overconcerned with avoiding pain or seeking pleasure. If you are concentrating on the results of your actions, you are not dedicated to your task. — Ethan Hawke

Providence has so ordained it, that only two women have a true interest in the happiness of a man
his own mother, and the mother of his children. Besides these two legitimate kinds of love, there is nothing between the two creatures except vain excitement, painful and vain delusion. — Octave Feuillet

Employment, which Galen calls 'Nature's Physician,' is so essential to human happiness that indolence is justly considered as the mother of misery. — Robert A. Burton

Women often forget that the man she is complaining about is a creation of a mother like her. — Debasish Mridha

My mother is a big believer in being responsible for your own happiness. She always talked about finding joy in small moments and insisted that we stop and take in the beauty of an ordinary day. When I stop the car to make my kids really see a sunset, I hear my mother's voice and smile. — Jennifer Garner

Happy we were then, for we had a good house, and good food, and good work. There was nothing to do outside at night, except chapel, or choir, or penny-readings, sometimes. But even so, we always found plenty to do until bedtime, for if we were not studying or reading, then we were making something out back, or over the mountain singing somewhere. I can remember no time when there was not plenty to be done.
I wonder what has happened in fifty years to change it all ... But when people stop being friends with their mother and fathers, and itching to be out of the house, and going mad for other things to do, I cannot think. It is like an asthma, that comes on a man quickly. He has no notion how he had it, but there it is, and nothing can cure it. — Richard Llewellyn

Blessed is a mother that would give up part of her soul for her children's happiness. — Shannon L. Alder

Working with Will Smith was one of the highlights of my career. He is so talented and has a tremendous work ethic. We are still friends, and I reach out to him and his partner to pitch ideas. He loves my mother. In fact, my mother was his son Jaden's acting coach for the movie 'Pursuit of Happiness.' — Kim Fields

The writer's only responsibility is to his art. He will be completely ruthless if he is a good one. He has a dream. It anguishes him so much he must get rid of it. He has no peace until then. Everything goes by the board: honor, pride, decency, security, happiness, all, to get the book written. If a writer has to rob his mother, he will not hesitate; the 'Ode on a Grecian Urn' is worth any number of old ladies. — William Faulkner

She played a great deal better than either of the Miss Musgroves; but having no voice, no knowledge of the harp, and no fond parents to sit by and fancy themselves delighted, her performance was little thought of, only out of civility, or to refresh the others, as she was well aware. She knew that when she played she was giving pleasure only to herself; but this was no new sensation: excepting one short period of her life, she had never, since the age of fourteen, never since the loss of her dear mother, know the happiness of being listened to, or encouraged by any just appreciation or real taste. In music she had been always used to feel alone in the world; and Mr. and Mrs. Musgrove's fond partiality for their own daughters' performance, and total indifference to any other person's, gave her much more pleasure for their sakes, than mortification for her own. — Jane Austen

I suddenly wondered whether Mother might not actually be happy now, whether the sensation of happiness might not be something like faintly glittering gold sunken at the bottom of the river of sorrow. The feeling of that strange pale light when once on as exceeded all the bounds of unhappiness - if that can be called a sensation of happiness, the Emperor, my mother, and even I myself may be said to be happy now. — Osamu Dazai

... if you refuse to let your own suffering lie upon you for an hour and if you constantly try to prevent and forestall all possible stress way ahead of time; if you experience suffering and displeasure as evil, hateful, worthy of annihilation, and as a defect of existence, then it is clear that besides your religion of pity you also harbor another religion in your heart that is perhaps the mother of the religion of pity: the religion of comfortableness. How little you know of human happiness, you comfortable and benevolent people, for happiness and unhappiness are sisters and even twins that either grow up together or, as in your case, remain small together. — Friedrich Nietzsche

Because this is how it was with them: the boy's father had dark skin, darker even than my own, and the boy's mother was a white woman. They were holding hands and smiling at their boy, whose skin was light brown. It was the color of the man and the woman joined in happiness. It — Chris Cleave

I think about my mother singing after lunch on a Summer afternoon, twirling in blue dress across the floor of her dressing room — Audrey Niffenegger

All my life I have written letters - to our mother, our relatives, a wide circle of friends and acquaintance, to my husband, to you. Correspondence has always been as necessary to my happiness as a well-cooked dinner, and I've found it more sustaining for its generosity: an act of charity that returned to me a hundredfold ... — Delia Sherman

How strange was the relation between parents and children! When they were small the parents doted on them, passed through agonies of apprehension at each childish ailment, and the children clung to their parents with love and adoration; a few years passed, the children grew up, and persons not of their kin were more important to their happiness than father or mother. Indifference displaced the blind and instinctive love of the past. Their meetings were a source of boredom and irritation. Distracted once at the thought of a month's separation they were able now to look forward with equanimity to being parted for years. — W. Somerset Maugham

I wanted to live. For the father and brother who I never knew and for my mother who was cheated of a life of happiness. I wanted to live for them. And I wanted to live for me. — Abbi Glines

Marriage was an economic institution in which you were given a partnership for life in terms of children and social status and succession and companionship. But now we want our partner to still give us all these things, but in addition I want you to be my best friend and my trusted confidant and my passionate lover to boot, and we live twice as long. So we come to one person, and we basically are asking them to give us what once an entire village used to provide: Give me belonging, give me identity, give me continuity, but give me transcendence and mystery and awe all in one. Give me comfort, give me edge. Give me novelty, give me familiarity. Give me predictability, give me surprise. And we think it's a given, and toys and lingerie are going to save us with that. Ideally, though, we're lucky, and we find our soul mate and enjoy that life-changing mother lode of happiness. But a soul mate is a very hard thing to find. — Aziz Ansari

My mother once told me that a lifetime of good enough was a fair price to pay for a single moment of pure happiness. This is my moment. Don't take that away from me. — Beatriz Williams

Joy is prayer; joy is strength: joy is love; joy is a net of love by which you can catch souls. — Mother Teresa

Went down into a modest life of usefulness and happiness. Went down to give a mother's care, in the fulness of time, to Fanny's neglected children no less than to their own, and to leave that lady going into Society for ever and a day. — Charles Dickens

The president is not at all like the powerful icon I imagined her to be. She's more like I remember Amma: small and delicate with a sari that dances behind her as she walks. Of course, the president is clad in white, the color that shows eternal mourning of a lost child, while Amma never wore white. She wore reds and oranges and deep greens. Colors of celebration, of happiness. Perhaps she wears white now. Now that I am dead to her. — Holly Bodger

Life is a walking, a journey. So, if life upon Mother Earth is a journey, there are two ways to walk. We can choose to walk forward or we can choose to walk backward. Forward Walking choices are rewarded with consequences that light the way to peace, happiness, joy, comfort, knowledge, and wisdom. Backward Walking choices bring to the Two-Legged beings consequences of misery despair, and darkness. — Anasazi Foundation

A joyful heart is like the sunshine of God's love, the hope of eternal happiness. — Mother Teresa

But heart's desires? My dear, I see by your misery - by this very request you are making - that you know more of true men's and women's hearts than once you did, than your mother's world permitted you to see. Such chipped and cracked and outright broken things they are, are they not? They have their illnesses too, and their impulses. And hearts are not always connected well to minds, and even if they are, minds are not always clear and commonsensical. A heart may desire a thing powerfully indeed, but that heart's desire might be what a person least needs, for her health, for her continuing happiness. — Margo Lanagan

Sleep tight in the secure arms of your daddy. I know I have. He'll be good at making you feel safe.
When you're scared, let him remind you that he's right there, always ready to hold you when you need it.
More than anything, I want to tell you this: You are a fighter. You are strong. You are brave. You can accomplish anything you set your mind to. This world is yours to make the most of, and I believe you will live a life so full of happiness that I will feel it from above.
Never let others bring you down. Their words don't change who you are. You are in control of who you are. You, my sweet Lila Kate, are your mother's daughter. We fight for what we want and what we believe in. We don't listen to others, and we are secure in who we are. Show the world how amazing Lila Kate Carter is, and climb mountains, baby girl. Climb them all. — Abbi Glines

Sonnet III: Black Coffin opened wide for all to See

Black Coffin opened wide for all to See,
The lifeless form of one I loved so dear.
O, listen! mournful knells that soon shall be
All night long tolling for the folk to hear.
The lanterns overlight the old churchyard
To watch the coffin lowered into the ground;
Soon Frost shall grasp the turf already hard,
Decay ye have to face without a sound.
But years have pass'd herein do I relate
My dear sweet mother's form within my mind.
Still happiness fills all my heart and state,
As I see my small family so kind.
Love cannot be withheld by death or grave,
It stays alive within the heart so brave. — Timothy Salter

Well,' you may ask, 'how may I know when I am in love?'

. . . George Q. Morris [who later became a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, gave this reply]: 'My mother once said that if you meet a girl in whose presence you feel a desire to achieve, who inspires you to do your best, and to make the most of yourself, such a young woman is worthy of your love and is awakening love in your heart. — David O. McKay

My mother and father were married this way and are quite happy. I hope to find happiness, too. To find a woman that all of Illea can love, someone to be my companion and to help entertain the leaders of other nations. Someone who will befriend my friends and be my confidante. I'm ready to find my wife.
Something in his voice struck me. There wasn't a trace of sarcasm. This thing that seemed like little more than a game show to me was his only chance for happiness. He couldn't try with a second round of girls. Well, maybe he could, but how embarrassing. He was so desperate, so hopeful. I felt my distaste for him lessen. Marginally. — Kiera Cass

The greatest mission of woman is to give life, earth-life, through honorable marriage, to the waiting spirits, our Father's spirit children who anxiously desire to come to dwell here in this mortal state. All the honor and glory that can come to men and women is but a dim thing whose luster shall fade in comparison to the high honor, the eternal glory, the ever-enduring happiness that shall come to the woman who fulfils the first great duty and mission that devolves upon her to become the mother of the sons and daughters of God — Melvin J. Ballard

To say that a family is happy I think is to diminish it, taking out what is interesting. Growing up, I don't think my family was any happier or unhappier than anyone else's. My mother and father should have been divorced or never even married. On the other hand, I remember many moments of happiness. — Per Petterson