Life For Christmas Quotes & Sayings

In our open society, we are inclined to give to the less fortunate for the pure goodness of giving. We open our home to those who are alone on this holiday to spread some warmth into the life of another. — Jeff Miller

When it comes to referring to Dickens's life, performing plays with your nine children for friends and family during Christmas is Dickensian. — Matthew Pearl

No matter what you do with your life during the day, there's always that moment when you have to wake up with yourself, with yourself and with the person that's sleeping beside you. That's the person that you make a home with, discuss life's big decisions with, share your finances, eat, shop, maybe parent with. That's the person you share your body with forever, kiss, touch, the one you sit on the couch with and watch movies, the one who gives you a hug when you've had a rough day. That's the person you put up a Christmas tree with and arrive home with for the holidays, the person you watch grow old and who still loves you when you're not as nice to look at, the one who holds your hand when you're dying. And none of that had anything to do with wrestling. — Eli Easton

Want to keep Christ in Christmas? Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, forgive the guilty, welcome the unwanted, care for the ill, love your enemies, and do unto others as you would have done unto you. — Steve Maraboli

The thing you don't realize, my dear girl, is that I have been forced by the economic realities to start taking publishing very seriously. For example, it has been brought to my attention that our ability to continue to pay the hordes of people employed by M&S (God knows how many mouths have to be fed) depends directly on the number of copies of your new book [Life Before Man] that we are able to sell between September and Christmas. In past I have been able to treat this whole thing as a fun game. I have never been troubled by the cavalier explanations about lost manuscripts and fuck-ups of various sorts. Now I have learned that this is a deadly serious game. I don't laugh at jokes about the Canadian postal service. I cry. (in a letter to author Margaret Atwood, dated February, 1979) — Jack McClelland

Well ... yes, and here we go again. But before we get to The Work, as it were, I want to make sure I know how to cope with this elegant typewriter - (and, yes, it appears that I do) - so why not make this quick list of my life's work and then get the hell out of town on the 11:05 to Denver? Indeed. Why not? But for just a moment I'd like to say, for the permanent record, that it is a very strange feeling to be a 40-year-old American writer in this century and sitting alone in this huge building on Fifth Avenue in New York at one o'clock in the morning on the night before Christmas Eve, 2000 miles from home, and compiling a table of contents for a book of my own Collected Works in an office with a tall glass door that leads out to a big terrace looking down on The Plaza Fountain. Very strange. — Hunter S. Thompson

Christmas is about the coming of the Son of Man who "came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." These words in Mark 10:45, as a brief expression of Christmas, are what I hope God will fix in your mind and heart this Advent. Open your heart to receive the best present imaginable: Jesus giving himself to die for you and to serve you all the rest of eternity. Receive this. Turn away from self-help and sin. Become like little children. Trust him. Trust him. Trust him with your life. — John Piper

It was through this odor that he saw the museums and discovered the mystery and the profusion of baroque genius which filled Prague with its gold magnificence. The altars, which glowed softly in the darkness, seemed borrowed from the coppery sky, the misty sunlight so frequent over the city. The glistening scrolls and spirals, the elaborate setting that looked as if it were cut out of gold paper, so touching in its resemblance to the creches made for children at Christmas, the grandiose and grotesque baroque perspectives affected Mersault as a kind of infantile, feverish, and overblown romanticism by which men protect themselves against their own demons. The god worshipped here was the god man fears and honors, not the god who laughs with man before the warm frolic sea and sun. — Albert Camus

It's true, Christmas can feel like a lot of work, particularly for mothers. But when you look back on all the Christmases in your life, you'll find you've created family traditions and lasting memories. Those memories, good and bad, are really what help to keep a family together over the long haul. — Caroline Kennedy

One of my favorite movies of all time is 'It's A Wonderful Life,' which is a pretty interesting choice for a seasonal Christmas favorite, because it's about a guy who wants to commit suicide and is presented with reasons not to. — Frank Darabont

Life is the season for loving and caring,
for laughing and caroling, giving and sharing.

Christmas is meant for the same, people say,
which makes life like Christmastime every day. — Richelle E. Goodrich

Easter may seem boring to children, and it is blessedly unencumbered by the silly fun that plagues Christmas. Yet it contains the one thing needful for every human life: the good news of Resurrection. — Frederica Mathewes-Green

The shelves were supposed to be loaded with books - but they were, of course, really doors: each book-lid opened as exciting as Alice putting her gold key in the lock. I spent days running in and out of other worlds like a time bandit, or a spy. I was as excited as I've ever been in my life, in that library: scoring new books the minute they came in; ordering books I'd heard of - then waiting, fevered, for them to arrive, like they were the word Christmas. — Caitlin Moran

Yeah she celebrated Christmas, she'd been to church a handful of times, and even when her life made her and everyone around her miserable, she still had faith that there was someone or something up their worth believing in. That had always been enough for her. — Lauren Kate

When you have kids, you instantly feel that you do not want to do them wrong. Those dads that go off to Florida and start a new life, I couldn't imagine that: seeing my kid once every Christmas, every three years. If I'm gone for six days it feels like too much. — Adam Carolla

A heartwarming tale of Christmas past that's chock full of all the wit and hilarity we admire in America's favorite humorist
Mark Twain. Carlo DeVito brings us back one hundred years to a magical time in Twain's family life, revealing a house that's brimming with love and laughter, as well as the profound heartbreaks of life. A Mark Twain Christmas only deepens our understanding and respect for both the man and his work. — Gilbert King

Unbreakable, would you thought they called me Mr. Glass
Look back on my life like the ghost of Christmas past
Toys R Us where I used to spend that Christmas cash
And I still won't grow up, I'm a grown ass kid
Swear I should be locked up for stupid shit that I did
But I'm a champion, so I turned tragedy to triumph
Make music that's fire, spit my soul through the wire — Kanye West

The tree screamed Jingle Bells and the snow whispered Silent Night, but for the first time in her life she felt strangely Grinch-like. — Nicki Edwards

One important thing was not to forget what he hoped to achieve in life. Another important thing was not to confuse a romantic picture of himself - as a doctor in Africa, for example - with a real possibility. And he tried not to lose sight of the fact that he was an adult in an adult world, with responsibilities. This was not easy: he would find himself sitting in the sun cutting out paper stars for a Christmas tree at the very moment other men were working to support large families or representing their countries in foreign places. When in moments of difficult truth-seeking he saw this incongruity, he felt sick that he should be saddled with himself, as though he were his own unwanted guest. — Lydia Davis

My voice of reason is always Lola. "You're a jackass."
"You only say that when I'm being your voice of reason."
"Out of my head, witch. And don't piss me off, I tell her. "I'll buy you underwear one size too small for Christmas and make you hate life. — Christina Lauren

As for my faith: I've become my father's son-that is, I've become the kind of believer that Pastor Merrill used to be. Doubt one minute, faith the next-sometimes inspired, sometimes in despair. Canon Campbell taught me to ask myself a question when the latter state settles upon me. Whom do I know who's alive whom I love? Good question-one that can bring you back to life. These days, I love Dan Needham and the Rev. Katherine Keeling; I know I love them because I worry about them-Dan should lose some weight, Katherine should gain some! What I feel for Hester isn't exactly love; I admire her-she's certainly been a more heroic survivor than I've been, and her kind of survival is admirable. And then there are those distant, family ties that pass for love-I'm talking about Noah and Simon, about Aunt Martha and Uncle Alfred. I look forward to seeing them every Christmas. — John Irving

He told himself that he was a clown clean through. Every time a fly ball had been hit to him with men on the bases, he'd muffed it. Hoping for one thing, then another, and when he did get his chances -- foul ball.

Girls, too. He'd never held one. Twice Lucy had given him the cold shoulder. That girl he'd knelt next to at Christmas Mass in Saint Patrick's once -- cold shoulder. Never got beyond wishing with her. Now Catherine.

Football. He'd wanted to be a star high-school quarterback and he'd not had the guts to stay in school. Fighting. His kid brother had even cleaned him up. In the war when he'd tried to enlist, a leather-necked sergeant had laughed at him.

He was just an all-around no soap guy. — James T. Farrell

One Christmas at the very beginning of your twenties when your mother gives you a warm coat that she saved for months to buy, don't look at her skeptically after she tells you she thought the coat was perfect for you. Don't hold it up and say it's longer than you like your coats to be and too puffy and possibly even too warm. Your mother will be dead by spring. That coat will be the last gift she gave you. You will regret the small thing you didn't say for the rest of your life.
Say thank you. — Cheryl Strayed

With some stories, you really can't rush things. And it's often best just to sit back and enjoy the journey for what it is. — Melissa Hill

Before, if I thought Christmas, I would have remembered my past on Earth and would have succumbed to the aching sadness for a life I can never have again.
Now, I can think the word and not feel anything but a dull ache, a phantom pain for a part of my life that's been amputated. [p.244] — Beth Revis

It struck him that how you spent Christmas was a message to the world about where you were in life, some indication of how deep a hole you had managed to burrow for yourself — Nick Hornby

Not only weight loss surgery is unnecessary but also it deprives human being a normal life. People after surgery would never be able to enjoy their food ever for the rest of their life whether it is Christmas or they are on their holidays or their child birthday or any other festival.
List of problems and complications after the weight loss surgery operation are endless as one may get additional problems such as Hernia, Internal Bleeding, Swelling of the skin around the wounds, etc. I wonder how many weight loss surgeons advice about weight loss surgery to their own family members. — Subodh Gupta

I know the mall is just a lot of fake plants and fake food and people buying crap for too much money, and at Christmas people pay for their kids to talk to Santa, learning greed the way some kids learn piano. I know all that. I can hear the Muzak, smell the waffle fries. Like everybody else, I walk around stuck inside a cliche, like we're stars of some TV show we plan to watch later, if nothing else is on. But still, there's something hopeful about this place, too, and maybe it takes having a crazy mother to get that. People buy stuff, because they think they are going to need it, because they think their lives are going to keep skipping down the same old path, and I want so much for that to be true for them that it nearly makes me cry. The mall says, Nothing is terrible. The mall says, Life is small and adequate. — Heather Hepler

There is probably no greater anxiety in life than going home to visit your mother for Christmas. — Suzanne Falter-Barns

He may be doing it for you in this Advent season - graciously and tenderly frustrating you with life that is not centered on Christ and filling you with longings and desires that can't find their satisfaction in what this world offers, but only in the God-man. What a Christmas gift that might be! Let all your frustrations with this world throw you onto the Word of God. It will become sweet - like walking into paradise. — John Piper

Death for [the Buddhist] is the shadow on the face of life, for the opposite of death is birth, not life; that which is born must die. Life has no opposite, for life goes on; only its forms must change unceasingly. It is life which creates, uses and then destroys each form of life, whether yours or mine or that of the mountain, the empire or the fly. — Christmas Humphreys

Have you ever known anyone who bought a fruitcake for himself? Of course not. They are purchased as Christmas gifts, mostly for people you don't particularly like. — Phyllis Diller

Ruins and basilicas, palaces and colossi, set in the midst of a sordid present, where all that was living and warm-blooded seemed sunk in the deep degeneracy of a superstition divorced from reverence; the dimmer but yet eager titanic life gazing and struggling on walls and ceilings; the long vistas of white forms whose marble eyes seemed to hold the monotonous light of an alien world - all this vast wreck of ambitious ideals, sensuous and spiritual, mixed confusedly with the signs of breathing forgetfulness and degradation ... the vastness of St. Peter's the huge bronze canopy, the excited intention in the attitudes and garments of the prophets and evangelists in the mosaics above, and the red drapery which was being hung for Christmas spreading itself everywhere like a disease of the retina. — George Eliot

Godot is whatever it is in life that you are waiting for: 'I'm waiting to win the lottery. I'm waiting to fall in love'. For me, as a child, it was Christmas. At least that eventually came. — Ian McKellen

The four-week period of Advent before Christmas - and the six-week period of Lent before Easter - are times of penance and life change for Christians. In our book The Last Week, we suggested that Lent was a penance time for having been in the wrong procession and a preparation time for moving over to the right one by Palm Sunday. That day's violent procession of the horse-mounted Pilate and his soldiers was contrasted with the nonviolent procession of the donkey-mounted Jesus and his companions. We asked: in which procession would we have walked then and in which do we walk now? — Marcus J. Borg

Christmas is the marriage of chaos and design. The real sound of life, for once, can burst out because a formal place has been set for it. At the moment when things have gotten sufficiently loose, the secret selves that these familiar persons hold inside them shake the room ... An undercurrent of clowning and jostling is part of the process by which we succeed finally in making our necessary noise: despite the difficulty of getting the words right, of getting the singers on the same page, of keeping the ritual from falling apart into the anarchy of separate impulses. From such clatter
extended and punctuated by whatever instrument is handy, a triangle a tambourine, a Chinese gone
beauty is born. — Geoffrey O'Brien

I felt great calmness and perfect peace. I had the feelings of a poor man who has just come under the protection of the Royal Family, and has obtained an annual pension for life-the dreadful fear of poverty and want having left his house for ever; I felt the safety and shelter which the little chickens feel under the wings of the hen. This is what it is to abide under the shadow of the Almighty, and to hide under His wings until all dangers are past. — Christmas Evans

Every second around this girl was asking for trouble and he'd never wanted to be in trouble so bad in his life. — Cindi Madsen

New York is a glorious place for clearing your head and finding inspiration. Every time you step outside, you live a dozen lives. — Lindsey Kelk

Thank you, Dear Creator, for Life. Thank you for Dreams. Thank you for Ideas and Thoughts and Feelings. Most of all, thank you for choosing me to grow - just for today - and to know the Wonder of Your World and its many Possibilities. — Janie Jasin

Welcome to apartment life," Cash breathed.
"I sure know how to make a great first impression," I muttered, following Cash as he laughed. I didn't see what was so funny. I'd been yearning for that kiss for months.
"No welcome cookies for you then. — Shaye Evans

For once in my life maybe I ought to actually think about taking God at His word, and in doing so to suddenly find myself riotously welcoming the rather shocking reality that Christmas is truly everything that He says it is. — Craig D. Lounsbrough

The very purpose of Christ's coming into the world was that He might offer up His life as a sacrifice for the sins of men. He came to die. This is the heart of Christmas. — Billy Graham

Christmas Eve, I give him packages which I open for him, since the bows and paper represent more labor than he could manage: music videos by the Nashville singers he thinks particularly sexy, fleece-lined slippers decorated with images of bacon and eggs, and a book about breeds of dogs. He says he wishes he had something for me to open, but I don't want anything except to have him here. There's nothing more he could give me than his life, right now, his being with me. — Mark Doty

Control your temper, or it will control you. Sometimes even remotely, like a toy car. Christmas is coming up, and for only $44.44 I'll sell you a gift that would be perfect for the child in your life. — Jarod Kintz

The Christmas after Mom & Dad split up, they both went crazy buying us presents. Matt, Jonny, and I were showered with gifts at home and at Dads apartment. I thought that was great. I was all in favor of my love being paid for with presents.
This year all I got was a diary and a secondhand watch.
Okay, I know this is corny, but this really is what Christmas is all about. — Susan Beth Pfeffer

When individuals reach the highest pinnacles of success, but still cannot satisfy the constant hunger to find true meaning in life, with no place higher to climb, they see it all for what it really is, a chasing after the wind. What's next suddenly turns into what's the point? The hollowness of life starts eating away at their souls. For some, the only escape is by ending their lives. Enoch - The Unannounced Christmas Visitor. — Patrick Higgins

Part of me wants to be married and have everybody around the table for Christmas. But when you're married, your life becomes integrated solely with that person. There are too many characters running around inside me. Maybe they should all be married to somebody different. — Cindy Williams

Why in the world have we never found what we're really looking for? Because what we need is often the very thing we won't accept. And sadly, in turning away the God we need, we need to understand that we have chosen to live without everything we need. — Craig D. Lounsbrough

You can either complain about how hard your life is, or you can realize that only you are responsible for it. — Glenn Beck

For all of life is Christmas, an eternal gift from God. — James Behrens

I had this idea when I was in the hospital, .. It seems like every year I always have different people come and ask for a Christmas song and it seemed strangely appropriate for me this year because Christmas is the time that I am supposed to be sort of back and up and running and whatnot. So I just wrote a song about returning from this very interesting journey and kind of getting back to normal and getting back to work and my regular life. — Andrew McMahon

The star of Bethlehem was a star of hope that led the wise men to the fulfillment of their expectations, the success of their expedition. Nothing in this world is more fundamental for success in life than hope, and this star pointed to our only source for true hope: Jesus Christ. — D. James Kennedy

What was once a time for celebration of life and love has now become about getting the biggest and best gifts. Most mortals have become spoiled and ungracious, and fail to appreciate the things right around them. They forget that Christmas is about love, and God's perfect, selfless gift. So, ultimately ... Lucifer's ploy is working, — Cameo Renae

Coincidentally, a good age for a Japanese girl is younger than twenty five, because that's when she turns into a 'Christmas Cake'. Christmas cakes, as everyone knows, are desirable before the twenty fifth but afterward quickly become stale and are put on the shelf. — Andrew Davidson

Harry had never in all his life had such a Christmas dinner. A hundred fat, roast turkeys; mountains of roast and boiled potatoes; platters of chipolatas; tureens of buttered peas, silver boats of thick, rich gravy and cranberry sauce - and stacks of wizard crackers every few feet along the table. These fantastic party favors were nothing like the feeble Muggle ones the Dursleys usually bought, with their little plastic toys and their flimsy paper hats inside. Harry pulled a wizard cracker with Fred and it didn't just bang, it went off with a blast like a cannon and engulfed them all in a cloud of blue smoke, while from the inside exploded a rear admiral's hat and several live, white mice. Up at the High Table, Dumbledore had swapped his pointed wizard's hat for a flowered bonnet, and was chuckling merrily at a joke Professor Flitwick had just read him. Flaming — J.K. Rowling

Do you remember those times as a kid when you could hardly sleep on Christmas Eve because you were so excited about opening presents in the morning? That anticipation showed that you had no doubt. We should have an even greater anticipation of Jesus. If you are not "eagerly waiting for Him" (Heb. 9:28), something is off. Ask God to restore hope in your life. Not the kind of "hope" where you vaguely wish something would happen, but the kind of hope that anchors your soul (Heb. 6:19). Meditate on His promises and pray for faith. — Francis Chan

But now, sitting on this airplane on my way back to the life I went on to fashion after she left, I think of her differently. I see her so many ways: sitting back on her heels at the side of the bathtub, singing softly as she washes Sharla and my backs; watching at the window for the six o'clock arrival of our father; wrapping Christmas presents on the wide expanse of her bed; biting her lip as she stood before the open cupboards, making out the grocery list; leaning out the kitchen window that last summer to call Sharla and me in for supper. Most clearly, though, I see her sitting at the kitchen table, in her old, usual spot. There is a cup of coffee before her, but she doesn't drink it. Instead, she stares out the window. I see the sharp angle of her cheekbone, the beautiful whitish down at the side of face, illuminated by the sun. Her hands are quiet, resting in the cloth bowl of her apron. She sits still as a statue - waiting, I can see now; she was always waiting. -What We Keep — Elizabeth Berg

Nor is it the spirit of those Christians - alas, they are many - whose ambition in life seems limited to building a nice middle-class Christian home, and making nice middle-class Christian friends, and bringing up their children in nice middle-class Christian ways, and who leave the sub-middle-class sections of the community, Christian and non-Christian, to get on by themselves.
The Christmas spirit does not shine out in the Christian snob. For the Christmas spirit is the spirit of those who, like their Master, live their whole lives on the principle of making themselves poor - spending and being spent - to enrich their fellowmen, giving time, trouble, care and concern to do good to others - and not just their own friends - in whatever way there seems need. — J.I. Packer

I admit I have Mental Illness so please no more 'Fruit Cakes' for Christmas Please — Stanley Victor Paskavich

I looked at the place on my finger again. This time it really was an empty space. And silent. It was big. For the first time I faced a loss with a sense of curiosity. What would come to fill up this space? Would I make another ring? Or would I find another ring in a secondhand shop, or even in another country? Perhaps someday someone I had not even met would give me a ring because he loved me. I was thirty-five and I had never trusted life before. I had never allowed any empty spaces. I had believed that empty spaces remained empty. Life had been about hanging on to what you had and medical training had only reinforced the avoidance of loss at all costs. Anything I had ever let go of had claw marks on it. Yet this empty space had become different. It held all the excitement and anticipation of a wrapped Christmas present. — Rachel Naomi Remen

At the top of the slope on the perimeter of the site, overlooking six lanes of motorway, is a diner frequented by lorry drivers who have either just unloaded or or are waiting to pick up their cargo. Anyone nursing a disappointment with domestic life would find relief in this tiled, brightly lit cafeteria with its smells of fries and petrol, for it has the reassuring feel of a place where everyone is just passing through
and which therefore has none of the close-knit or convivial atmosphere which could cast a humiliating light on one's own alienation. It suggests itself as an ideal location for Christmas lunch for those let down by their families. — Alain De Botton

At the age of 12, my parents gave me a chemistry set for Christmas, and experimentation soon became a consuming passion in my life. — John Vane

I buy an ice-cream sandwich at the Stop-N-Go on my way home. The taste takes me back to childhood. Back when life was dreaming about things to come and believing that if you really wanted something bad enough, it could and would be yours. I remember praying for a bike for Christmas, and there it was. We prayed for Minnie's gerbil to live and it did. Later, in high school, I asked God for guidance about where to go to college, and that very day, like a kite floating straight from heaven, the acceptance letter came from UNC-Charlotte. — Alice J. Wisler

Tax cuts should be for life, not just for Christmas. — George Osborne

For me, there isn't some miracle cure, this is my life, or my disease will progress and my life will change focus again, and I'll have another new life.
I need C to stay right where he is now because for now, I don't know enough to move from where I am.
My hypothesis is that the light will come back, both outside and inside me.
I'm afraid and angry, but the light is a theory I want to prove.
Until then, I just have to keep the experiment going with as many controls as possible.
One bus, back and forth.
One store.
One man, his words under glass. — Mary Ann Rivers

January was the season for house robberies and violence. Christmas was over, and the new year just reminded you of how little your life had changed, and man, people got angry in January. — Gillian Flynn

That's right, I am the unenthusiastic girl people avoid making eye contact with when they buy their spank mags and twelve-inch rubber cocks. I'm the one in full HAZMAT gear cleaning up the "accidental" shot spots they leave behind in one of our twenty-five cent porn booths. For what it's worth, there's a reason I don't fill in the glory holes, they all think they're so sneaky, getting their dick sucked by some anonymous stranger on the other side. I see it as less clean up, let the cock sucking stranger slurp up their spunk. It saves me running a disinfectant wipe along the wall, hoping that none of it touches any part of me. So keep up the good work anonymous strangers, keep gobbling cock and making my life easier. If you want, leave your address at the store and I'll add you to my fucking Christmas card list. — Jaden Wilkes

As I remember my grandfather and those Christmas mornings he gave for a little girl's pleasure, I know that often a big life starts with doing small things. — Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

It's been said that love is all there is; that a lack of love causes people to do evil things. I can buy that. Take it a step further: capitalism, by itself, is not a bad thing; but when taken to an extreme, as it has been in America - when Christmas is but a measuring stick for how well the economy is doing, when Wall Street and the banking industry turn nescient heads to morality in pursuit of the Almighty Dollar, when love of money overshadows love of self and others - what then?
In the grand scheme of the universe - whatever that scheme may be - when one considers its immensity, that it has existed for billions of years, some of us realize how insignificant our seventy or eighty years is; while others, for whatever reason (selfishness?) pursue materialism to a vulgar degree. In the end, what does all that matter, really?
It's nice to spoil oneself from time to time; but really, life's true gift to oneself is doing and giving to others. That's love. — J. Conrad Guest, Novelist

We do not now stand in the middle; in every aspect of our life we have, deliberately or by the 'conditioning' of birth, education or environment, allowed ourselves to stand on one bank of the river of life, with some intolerance of those who were foolish enough to choose or be led to stand on the other. Thus we are male or female, old or young, of the East of West. By temperament we are introvert or extrovert, leaders of followers, all for action or striving rather to be. It surely follows that we should be more tolerant of the other fellow, equally right/wrong, and be less swift to judge him with our ignorant, lop-sided view and definite disapproval. In any event, do we have to express an opinion, presume to judge? — Christmas Humphreys

A Teddy Bear is for life - not just for Christmas — Lorraine Hitchings

Just before you went into the ICU, I started to feel this ache in my hip." "No," I said. Panic rolled in, pulled me under. He nodded. "So I went in for a PET scan." He stopped. He yanked the cigarette out of his mouth and clenched his teeth. Much of my life had been devoted to trying not to cry in front of people who loved me, so I knew what Augustus was doing. You clench your teeth. You look up. You tell yourself that if they see you cry, it will hurt them, and you will be nothing but A Sadness in their lives, and you must not become a mere sadness, so you will not cry, and you say all of this to yourself while looking up at the ceiling, and then you swallow even though your throat does not want to close and you look at the person who loves you and smile. He flashed his crooked smile, then said, "I lit up like a Christmas tree, Hazel Grace. The lining of my chest, my left hip, my liver, everywhere. — John Green

What they say is, life goes on, and that is mostly true. The mail is delivered and the Christmas lights go up and the ladders get put away and you open yet another box of cereal. In time, the volume of my feelings would be turned down in gentle increments to a near quiet, and yet the record would still spin, always spin. There was a place for Rose so deeply within myself that it was another country, another world, with its own light and time and its own language. A lost world. Yet its foundations and edges were permanent-the ruins of Pompeii, the glorious remnants or the Forum. A world that endured, even as it retreated into the past. A world visited, imagined, ever waiting, yet asleep — Deb Caletti

They had been married for three days.
Lauren stirred, moving closer to him for warmth. Careful not to disturb her, he drew the satin quilt up around her shoulders. Reverently he touched her cheek, tracing its elegant curve. Lauren had brought joy to his life and laughter to his home.She thought he was beautiful. When she looked at him, he felt beautiful.
Somewhere in another part of the big house a clock began chiming the hour of midnight. Lauren's lashes slowly flickered open, and he looked into her enchanting blue eyes. "It's Christmas," he whispered.
His wife smiled up at him, and her answer made his throat tighten. "No," she said softly, laying her fingers against his jaw. "Christmas came three days ago. — Judith McNaught

The tree burst into color and we all gasped at the red, yellow, green, white and the blue lights boldly growing in the cold night, the only lights for miles around in the inmense darkness of the range. — Jeannette Walls

A great talk can potentially be applied to a kid's life in an unlimited number of ways. A talk on gratitude might mean one thing for the kid who has five ponies and a rollercoaster in his backyard and something entirely different for the kid who will be lucky to get a single Christmas present this year. There's no way a communicator can unpack every scenario or give examples that relates to every kid in the room! — Kenny Conley

Want to create the best Christmas ever? Forgive someone who doesn't deserve your forgiveness. Hug a stranger. Pass on something that you want to keep for yourself. Spend time with the ones you love. Spend time on your knees. Decorate your life with light and laughter. Love yourself while you're loving others. Christmas is about Christ and Christ is all about your joy and happiness. — Toni Sorenson

The entirety of his life to this point had merely been to prepare him for what he was to do next: bring hope to the hopeless and joy to the joyless. He would serve mankind by reminding them every year that a King had been born who had died for thier sins. — Glenn Beck

Christmas is a holy time to rekindle our love for another. — Lailah Gifty Akita

The whole life of Christ was a continual Passion; others die martyrs but Christ was born a martyr. He found a Golgotha even in Bethlehem, where he was born; for to his tenderness then the straws were almost as sharp as the thorns after, and the manger as uneasy at first as his cross at last. His birth and his death were but one continual act, and his Christmas day and his Good Friday are but the evening and morning of one and the same day. And as even his birth is his death, so every action and passage that manifests Christ to us is his birth, for Epiphany is manifestation. — John Donne

The truth is that I understood very little of what she was saying. Before Alex, what thrills I'd experienced I'd found in my imagination, the result of burying myself in book after book. I depended, I mean, on escape for my various joys. It had never occurred to me that real life might offer the smallest portion of the happiness I found in reading, the ordinary scaffolding of my day to day a thing I'd made a habit of burying under a thousand imagined lives, each more inviting than the last. And then she came along and it was as though life were a Christmas tree and I'd discovered the hidden switch, the whole thing lighting up in a blaze of color. — Aria Beth Sloss

A homosexual is for life, not just for Christmas. — Alexis Hall

The creek was hers now and yet she felt nothing. It had been the longest walk of her life for no one was at the end waiting for her. She slept through winter. Missed Christmas and awoke to a New Year. She felt so lost. Until the first bluebells and ramsons colored the green-brown floor of her world. — Sarah Winman

Sometimes it's easy to get caught up in life and take things for granted. — Karli Perrin

They played, not beautifully but deep, ignoring their often discordant strings and striking right into the heart of the music they knew best, the true notes acting as their milestones. On the poop above their heads, where the weary helmsmen tended the new steering-oar and Babbington stood at the con, the men listened intently; it was the first sound of human life that they had heard, apart from the brief Christmas merriment, for a time they could scarcely measure. — Patrick O'Brian

Sara reached over and rubbed Holly's arm for a moment. Then she pulled back and asked, "Have you ever heard the Christmas song, Mary, Did You Know?" Holly looked up, into her friend's clear blue eyes. She shook her head and Sara continued. "It's a beautiful song about the Savior's mother, Mary. The singers ask if when she held baby Jesus, if she knew what His life would be like or that He would be her Savior and the Savior of the world. I think every mother is like Mary. Not in the fact that we gave birth to the Savior, but that when we have a child, we never know what his future holds, how he'll change our lives or someone else's life. — Danyelle Ferguson

The human life cycle no less than evolves around the box; from the open-topped box called a bassinet, to the pine box we call a coffin, the box is our past and, just as assuredly, our future. It should not surprise us then that the lowly box plays such a significant role in the first Christmas story. For Christmas began in a humble, hay-filled box of splintered wood. The Magi, wise men who had traveled far to see the infant king, laid treasure-filled boxes at the feet of that holy child. And in the end, when He had ransomed our sins with His blood, the Lord of Christmas was laid down in a box of stone. How fitting that each Christmas season brightly wrapped boxes skirt the pine boughs of Christmas trees around the world. — Richard Paul Evans

Rory's big labradoodle made a snap judgement that Frankie was everything her life had been missing up until now. She flung herself into the girl's arms, wiggling and whining, a shaggy mass of chocolate-colored enthusiasm.
"Mistral likes you, I see." While he, the one who filled the dog's food dish, had gotten nothing but suspicious glances since he arrived two days earlier.
"of course you like me" she said, baby-talking into the dog's fur, "I'm extremely likeable."
If the dog's expression was any indication, Frankie was about to get nominated for sainthood....
She glanced at him. "Maybe she'd like you more if you weren't so... testosterone-y."
"But then you might like me less — Roxanne Snopek

114I'll wager at the very end a body realizes the Lord has already shown Himself. That things as they are "
her hand circles in a gesture that gathers clouds and kites and grass and Queenie pawing earth over her bone
"just what they've always seen, was seeing Him. As for me, I could leave the world with today in my eyes."
This is our last Christmas together. Life separates us. — Truman Capote

He had neither companions nor friends, church nor creed. He lived his spiritual life without any communion with others, visiting his relatives at Christmas and escorting them to the cemetery when they died. He performed these two social duties for old dignity's sake but conceded nothing further to the conventions which regulate the civic life. — James Joyce

Mr. Snow.'
'Detective Winter.'
'Do you give all of the men in your life a murder case for Christmas, or just the really special ones? — C.S. Poe