Loving Friends Quotes & Sayings

I think one of the keys to happiness is accepting that I am never going to be perfectly happy. Life is uncomfortable. So I might as well get busy loving the people around me. I'm going to stop trying so hard to decide whether they are the "right people" for me and just take deep breaths and love my neighbors. I'm going to take care of my friends. I'm going to find peace in the 'burbs. I'm going to quit chasing happiness long enough to notice it smiling right at me. — Glennon Doyle Melton

He ran his nose along my jaw, breathing on me. "We're friends, right? This is going well, don't you think?"
The man was demented . "By what criteria are we judging it? If going well means we've both lost our ever-loving minds, then yes, I guess it's going well?! If we're basing it on us being just friends, we're failing epically."
He pulled back from me and grinned. — R.K. Lilley

It's a lot harder to get someone OUT of your life than it is to let them IN, so please ... be selective. — Mandy Hale

We are but the veriest, sorriest slaves of our stomach. Reach not after morality and righteousness, my friends; watch vigilantly your stomach, and diet it with care and judgment. Then virtue and contentment will come and reign within your heart, unsought by any effort of your own; and you will be a good citizen, a loving husband, and a tender father - a noble, pious man. — Jerome K. Jerome

My smile faded as we reached Ellsberg and I realized I would see Farah within minutes. Suddenly, I was terrified.
"We've been apart for a month," I said after Judd called Cooper to say we were nearly there. "While Farah made a great life for herself, I was letting myself starve to death in a shit motel. I'll ruin everything for her and she'll stop loving me."
"Angel, your sister needs you too."
"No, she doesn't," I said, panicking now. "She's got Cooper. She's got school and friends. I'm not good at anything. I'll mess everything up."
"Farah sees what I do and that's why she needs you. — Bijou Hunter

My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we'll change the world. — Jack Layton

Friends create the world anew each day.
Without their loving care, courage would not
suffice to keep heartsstrong for life. — Helen Keller

Do you know what makes the prison disappear? Every deep, genuine affection. Being friends, being brothers, loving, that is what opens the prison, with supreme power, by some magic force. Without these one stays dead. But whenever affection is revived, there life revives. — Vincent Van Gogh

I don't want to be reincarnated, that's for sure. When you've had rewarding experiences in your life - a loving family, friends - you don't need additional reassurances that you're going to do something with a new cast of characters. I'd just as soon pass. — Lewis Thomas

I want people to feel safe around me. Calm and at peace and I want to make people feel accepted. I want to express confidence on my own path, and spread confidence to other people on theirs. — Charlotte Eriksson

I have friends who wear Star Wars costumes and act like the characters all day. I may not be that deep into it, but there's something great about loving what you love and not caring if it's unpopular. — Kristen Bell

Not everyone has to be the Chosen One. Not everyone has to be the guy who saves the world. Most people just have to live their lives the best they can, doing things that are great for them, having great friends, trying to make their lives better, loving people properly. All the while knowing that the world makes no sense but trying to find a way to be happy anyway. — Patrick Ness

Alive to the loving past She conjures her own. Nothing is wholly lost - Sun on the stone. And lilacs in their splendor Like lost friends Come back through grief to tell her Love never ends. — May Sarton

Do not save your loving speeches
For your friends till they are dead;
Do not write them on their tombstones,
Speak them rather now instead. — Anna Mickelson

I think people should be who they are. If someone is a great mother, or a great personal friend to their friends and just a loving person, that's all they should be, if that's what they want to be, 'cause it's genuine. — Teresa Heinz

I cannot help feeling there is something essentially wrong about love. Friends may quarrel or drift apart, close relations too, but there is not this pang, this pathos, this fatality which clings to love. Friendship never has that doomed look. Why, what is the matter? I have not stopped loving you, but because I cannot go on kissing your dim dear face, we must part, we must part. — Vladimir Nabokov

He ever offer to walk you home?"
"I've never asked," Cath said quickly. "I've never asked you either."
"That's true," Levi said.
More quiet. More cold.
The air stung Cath's throat when she finally spoke again. "So maybe you shouldn't."
"Don't be ridiculous," Levi said. "That wasn't my point. — Rainbow Rowell

A heart worth loving is one you understand, even in silence. — Shannon L. Alder

Inside the narrow skull of the miner pinned beneath the fallen timber, there lives a world. Parents, friends, a home, the hot soup of evening, songs sung on feast days, loving kindness and anger, perhaps even a social consciousness and a great universal love, inhabit that skull. By what are we to measure the value of a man? His ancestor once drew a reindeer on the wall of a cave; and two hundred thousand years later that gesture still radiates. It stirs us, prolongs itself in us. Man's gestures are an eternal spring. Though we [may] die for it, we shall bring up that miner from his shaft. Solitary he may be, universal he surely is. — Antoine De Saint-Exupery

Acquire the habit of speaking to God as if you were alone with Him, familiarly and with confidence and love, as to the dearest and most loving of friends. — Alphonsus Liguori

He stands apart with Patroclus, his beloved through all eternity, and Patroclus - who loves Achilles but not as much as he is loved - waits for Achilles to move. His deference to Achilles is different from that of others, They honour and respect him, keep a wise distance, because Achilles was better than the rest. Better at being human. Fighting, singing, speaking, raging (oh, he is good at that still). Killing. But Patroclus alone is humbled by Achilles' love. Only a fool thinks that to be more loved than loving gives you power. Only a fool vaunts it and displays his own littleness by bragging to his friends and making capricious demands of his lover. Patroclus isn't a fool. He knows that he is less than Achilles even in this. Humbled by the intensity of Achilles' love he loves him back with all his large, though lesser, heart. — Elizabeth Cook

It is a wonderful thing to see a first-rate philosopher at prayer. Tough-minded thinking and tenderhearted reverence are friends, not enemies. We have for too long separated the head from the heart, and we are the lesser for it. We love God with the mind and we love God with the heart. In reality, we are descending with the mind into the heart and there standing before God in ceaseless wonder and endless praise. As the mind and the heart work in concert, a kind of loving rationality pervades all we say and do. This brings unity to us and glory to God. — Soren Kierkegaard

I never thought of myself as anything but plain and ordinary until you came along. The way you look at me, the way you see me ... you pull something out of me. When I want to hide, you urge me forward. When I think I'm not good enough, you make me believe I am. When I feel anything but pretty, you convince me I'm beautiful. Just being around you makes me feel special. You don't think you're good at loving people, but you are. Your friends, your family ... the level of love that you have for people astounds me. You don't think people love you back, but they do. They fiercely love you. I fiercely love you. I've never met anyone as passionate as you, as kindhearted as you ... as amazing as you. You love with every fiber of your soul. You inspire me every day. And if you'll agree to be my husband, I'll do my best to make you proud of me, to inspire you. — S.C. Stephens

Many of the network television shows have done takeoffs on 'Family Circus,' including 'David Letterman,' 'Friends,' 'Roseanne,' and others, and, in my estimation the use of them is a compliment to the popularity of the feature, which just by mentioning it's name sets up the image of a warm, loving family-type feature. — Bil Keane

I have many friends who are married - not many who are happily married, but many married friends. The few happy ones are like my parents: They're baffled by my singleness. A smart, pretty, nice girl like me, a girl with so many interests and enthusiasms, a cool job, a loving family. And let's say it: money. They knit their eyebrows and pretend to think of men they can set me up with, but we all know there's no one left, no one good left, and I know that they secretly think there's something wrong with me, something hidden away that makes me unsatisfiable, unsatisfying. — Gillian Flynn

Love for family and friends, great as it may be, is much more profound when anchored in the love of Jesus Christ. Parental love for children has more meaning here and hereafter because of Him. All loving relationships are elevated in Him. Love of our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ provides the illumination, inspiration, and motivation to love others in a loftier way. — Russell M. Nelson

I'm hanging out with my New York friends, my Jersey boys, my family and loving every single second of it. — Zach Braff

The formal practice of loving-kindness or maitri has seven stages. We begin by engendering loving-kindness for ourselves and then expand it at out own pace to include loved ones, friends, "neutral" persons, those who irritate us, all of the above as a group, and finally, all beings throughout time and space. We gradually widen the circle of loving-kindness. — Pema Chodron

Friendship by its very nature consists in loving, rather than in being loved. — Henry Clay Trumbull

Being with a friend in great pain is not easy. It makes us uncomfortable. We do not know what to do or what to say, and we worry about how to respond to what we hear. Our temptation is to say things that come more out of our own fear than out of our care for the person in pain. Sometimes we say things like 'Well, you're doing a lot better than yesterday,' or 'You will soon be your old self again,' or 'I'm sure you will get over this.' But often we know that what we're saying is not true, and our friends know it too.
We do not have to play games with each other. We can simply say: 'I am your friend, I am happy to be with you.' We can say that in words or with touch or with loving silence. Sometimes it is good to say: 'You don't have to talk. Just close your eyes. I am here with you, thinking of you, praying for you, loving you. — Henri J.M. Nouwen

Some said living with cancer had made them wiser, more self-realized, while others had reordered their priorities in life, grown stronger, learned to say no to activities they no longer valued and yes to things that really mattered - such as loving their family and friends, observing the beauty about them, savoring the changing seasons. — Irvin D. Yalom

Passion is such a stronge emotion that it dominates everything. It's like a strong spice in a meal, or a dominant red in a painting. Your senses are drawn to it at the expense of everything else. Dominic and I were not physical friends, so to speak. But I did love him. We can't help loving the people we do, can we? But the love doesn't have to be physical. You can be equally intimate. It doesn't matter. — James Runcie

Jesus was not SELFLESS. He did not live as if ONLY other people counted. He knew his value and worth. He had friends. He asked people to help him. At the same time Jesus was not SELFISH. He did not live as if nobody counted. He gave his life out of love for others. From a place of loving union with his Father, Jesus had a mature, healthy 'true self. — Peter Scazzero

Life is as precious to us as it is for an animal. An animal is as loving, caring, and kind to her children as we are. She might not be able to tell us but she can express it through her eyes and expressions. She feels joy and happiness. She is helpless in our cruel hands and vulnerable to our vicious greed. Let us be kind to animals. Let us learn to feel their pain. Can we kill a helpless baby to feed our greed? Then how can we kill helpless animal friends that can't talk? Often we kill just for fun. How funny would it be if an animal killed a human just for fun? Let us be kind to animals as much as possible. I know we can. It is easier to love an animal than a human being. If you love an animal, it will rarely hurt you. Let us practice kindness and compassion to animals so that we may create a peaceful world. — Debasish Mridha

When Dawn looked at Vic, she saw Vic exactly as he wanted to be seen. Whereas Vic's parents couldn't help seeing who he used to be, and so many friends and strangers couldn't help seeing who he didn't want to be anymore, Dawn only saw him. Call it a blur if you want, but Dawn didn't see a blur. She saw a very distinct, very clear person. — David Levithan

I do not believe in loving enemies; I have pretty hard work to love my friends. — Robert Green Ingersoll

You can love them, forgive them, want good things for them ... but still move on without them. — Mandy Hale

I had fun, but I didn't really have anyone i particularly loved except for loving friends. But I have a certain amount of faith that it will come. — Edie Sedgwick

He expected her to feel what she did not know how to feel. There were things that existed for him that she could not penetrate. With his close friends, she often felt vaguely lost. They were youngish and well-dressed and righteous, their sentences filled with "sort of," and "the ways in which"; they gathered at a bar every Thursday, and sometimes one of them had a dinner party, where Ifemelu mostly listened, saying little, looking at them in wonder: were they serious, these people who were so enraged about imported vegetables that ripened in trucks? They wanted to stop child labor in Africa. They would not buy clothes made by underpaid workers in Asia. They looked at the world with an impractical, luminous earnestness that moved her, but never convinced her. Surrounded by them, Blaine hummed with references unfamiliar to her, and he would seem far away, as though he belonged to them, and when he finally looked at her, his eyes warm and loving, she felt something like relief. — Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Do you love her?"
"Yeah."
"And that's a bad thing?"
"Because relationships end."
"What?"
"If I don't tell Aly how I feel, we'll stay friends. I can handle that. Friendship is real. It lasts, and it's safe."
"Loving someone, being loved ... it's worth the pain of losing them. — Rachel Harris

Kane tuned up Honey for a few minutes, then he reached into his case and pulled out his ball cap with the American flag on it. He rotated it around in his hands and worked the bill a little bit. Thought about what he'd done for his country, and the friends he lost. He didn't regret any of it, even the parts that hurt. Loving his country wasn't something that required effort on his part - it came naturally. — Bart Hopkins

'Point Break' is a movie that I and all of my friends grew up loving, watching all the time, quoting, living and being. — Luke Bracey

A dog is adorable and noble, a dog is a true and loving friend. A dog is also a hedonist. — Mary Oliver

Luckily for me I have a very supportive family and a loving group of friends. — Andrew Rannells

What ideals, when followed, will bring to you those blessings you so much seek, even a quiet conscience, a peace-filled heart, a loving family, a contented home? May I suggest these three: Choose your friends with caution. Plan your future with purpose. Frame your life with faith. — Thomas S. Monson

Books are more than doctors, of course. Some novels are loving, lifelong companions; some give you a clip around the ear; others are friends who wrap you in warm towels when you've got those autumn blues. And some...well, some are pink candy floss that tingles in your brain for three seconds and leaves a blissful voice. Like a short, torrid love affair. — Nina George

Depression seems to be related to fear, anger and frustration. When you're in a bad mood, even if you meet with your friends, you don't take pleasure in their company. But when you're in a good mood, even if things go wrong, you can cope with them without difficulty. This is why putting yourself in a good mood, making a point of developing a sense of loving kindness gives you greater inner strength. — Dalai Lama

Abolition is not some disstant future but something we create in every moment when we say no to the traps of empire and yes to the nourishing possibilities dreamed of and practiced by our ancestors and friends. Every time we insist on accessible and affirming health care, safe and quality education, meaningful and secure employment, loving and healing relationships, and being our full and whole selves, we are doing abolition. Abolition is about breaking down things that oppress and building up things that nourish. Abolition is the practice of transformation in the here and now and the ever after. — Eric A. Stanley

I'm pretty caring, loyal and loving to those who are close to me. Two of my friends are from school, so I've known them for more than 30 years. My best friend, Paul Fisher, sat next to me in English when I was ten or 11. If you asked him, he'd say I was loyal. I don't think I've changed over the years. — Marc Warren

Something has spoken to me in the night ... and told me that I shall die, I know not where. Saying: [Death is] to lose the earth you know for greater knowing; to lose the life you have, for greater life; to leave the friends you loved, for greater loving; to find a land more kind than home, more large than earth. — Thomas Wolfe

I must confess, as the experience of my own soul, that the expectation of loving my friends in heaven principally kindles my love to them while on earth. — Richard Baxter

My story starts with me as a fan. And to be a fan is to know that loving trumps being beloved. All the affection I poured into bands, into films, into actors and musicians, was about me and my friends. — Carrie Brownstein

By nature man without woman can feel no joy. She is his mother, his sister, his loving friend. She is seldom his enemy. — Christine De Pizan

The detachment of the artist is kind of creepy. It's kind of rude, and yet really it's where art comes from. It's not the same as courage. It's closer to bad manners than to courage. [ ... ] if you're going to be a writer, you basically have to say, 'this is just who I am [ ... ]'. There's a certain indefensibility about it. It's not about loving your community and taking care of it - you're not attached to the chamber of commerce. It's a little unsafe. You have to be willing to have only four friends, not 11. — Lorrie Moore

When you're younger, you don't appreciate your parents and all that they've done for you. Loving your parents is seen as uncool, and all that matters is your friends, booze, and girls, girls, girls. But the older you get, you realize that your parents are going to be there for you when your friends and girlfriends are long gone. Friendship comes and goes, but family is forever. — Monica James

Universe pays every man in his own coin. If you smile, it smiles with you in return. If you frown, you will be frowned at. If you sing, you will be invited in gay company. If you think, you will be entertained by thinkers. If you love the world and earnestly seek for the good therein you will be surrounded by loving friends, and nature will pour into your lap the treasures of the earth. Zimmerman. — William Walker Atkinson

Let dissolution come when it will, it can do the Christian no harm, for it will be but a passage out of a prison into a palace; out of a sea of troubles into a haven of rest; out of a crowd of enemies, to an innumerable company of true, loving, and faithful friends; out of shame, reproach, and contempt, into exceeding great and eternal glory. — John Bunyan

Conniving at your friends' vices, passing them over, being blind to them and deceived by them, even loving and admiring your friends' egregious faults as if they were virtues -- does not this seem pretty close to folly? — Erasmus

I am very blessed to have a great group of long-term friends and a huge family that has been very loving and supportive. I try to stay connected to that and contribute as much as I can. — Jim James

We do not make friends with God; God makes friends with us, bringing us to know him by making his love known to us ... The word know, when used of God in this way, is a sovereign-grace word, pointing to God's initiative in loving, choosing, redeeming, calling and preserving. — J.I. Packer

As I come to understand the many talents and characteristics of women, I realize how needed their strengths are in this dispensation. We must remember that we are daughters of God here to provide nurturing care for one another, family and friends--loving care to soften the changes of life felt by all.

What a great opportunity we have to fill our God-given role. He has given us the privilege to shape the lives of those entrusted to our care. Even those of us who have not been blessed to have children of our own can still be influential as trainers and nurturers. It does not matter where we live, whether we are rich or poor, whether our family is large or small. Each of us can share that Christ-like love in our "motherly ministry. — Barbara W. Winder

I speak, I speak, and truth at that. Writers are a curious breed: brooding, fickle, alternately loving and hating their work - and each other. You're my friend? Don't pick up that pen! — Chila Woychik

To Jesus she already is somebody. Like the loving father of the prodigal son, Jesus is frantically scanning the horizon, watching for Madonna to return to him. He's absolutely convinced that she's so valuable that she's worth dying for. 'Greater love has no one than this,' said Jesus in John 15:13, 'that one lay down his life for his friends.' That's what He did for her on the cross! — Lee Strobel

I don't want enemies. I want friends, and I want them in all shapes, sizes, and colors, and loving whoever they want to. — Kevin Hart

In a life filled with great good fortune of health, of creativity, of friends, living in safety and privilege with the loving partner. There was just one bit of misfortune in his life and that was that Peter Morrow seemed to have no idea how very fortunate he was. — Louise Penny

And there was a real shedding of the old dogma, like boundaries of morality were being broken down and everybody was into the new party mode of just loving on each other. Which destroyed thousands of us. I lost 16 of my personal friends through that lifestyle. — Barry McGuire

And if the criticized person takes it quietly without rancor, not striking back but constantly loving, he will gather in friends faster than his critics can manufacture enemies. — Norman Vincent Peale

Eliza," said George, "people that have friends, and houses, and lands, and money, and all those things, can't love as we do, who have nothing but each other ... And your loving me, - why, it was almost like raising one from the dead! I've been a new man ever since! And now, Eliza, I'll give my last drop of blood, but they shall not take you from me. Whoever gets you must walk over my dead body. — Harriet Beecher Stowe

You may feel like your future is slipping from your grasp, that if you don't rush now to greet your dreams you might lose out on them, but please wait. If you are coming from an unsupportive environment with regards to your sexual orientation, the best thing to do is to establish your independence. Make sure you have a support network of loving and loyal friends. Make sure you have somewhere to live. Make sure you have an income to sustain you. Place a premium on your life. Always, always place a premium on your life.

When all these elements have been configured and your psychic compass is at the ready, go forth in the knowledge that you've created a self-preserving future for yourself. Go forth in the knowledge that you have a safe space to call home. Go forth in the knowledge that not only are you kicking ass but you are kicking ass on a major scale. Go forth in the knowledge that not only are you winning at life but you have already won. — Diriye Osman

I have a family, loving aunts, and a good home. No, on the surface I seem to have everything except my one true friend. All I think about when I'm with friends is having a good time. I can't bring myself to talk about anything but ordinary everyday things. We don't seem to be able to get any closer, and that's the problem. — Anne Frank

It is for people we care nothing about that we demand happiness on any terms: with our friends, our lovers, our children we are exacting and would rather see. them suffer much than be happy in contemptible and estranging modes. If God is Love, He is, by definition something more than mere kindness. And it appears, from all the records that though He has often rebuded us, condemned us, He has never regarded us with contempt. He has paid us the intolerable compliment of loving us, in the deepest, most tragic, most inexcusable sense. — C.S. Lewis

A woman isn't just one thing. The past is in us, constantly changing us. Heartache and failure shift our perspectives as do joy and triumphs. At any moment, on any given day, we can be friends, competitors, or enemies. We can be generous or stingy, loving or petty, helpful or untrustworthy. — Lisa See

Somehow, I cannot see anyone describing me as gracious, loving, and happy." He frowned at his sandwich as if in puzzlement. "You are loving," Anna replied staunchly, though she hadn't exactly planned for those words to leave her mouth. "Now that is beyond surprising." The earl eyed her in the deepening shadows. "How do you conclude such a thing, Mrs. Seaton?" "You have endless patience with your family, my lord," she began. "You escort your sisters everywhere; you dance attendance on them and their hordes of friends at every proper function; you harry and hound the duke so his wild starts are not the ruination of his duchy. You force yourself to tend to mountains of business which you do not enjoy, so your family may be safe and secure all their days." "That is business," the earl said, looking nonplussed that his first sandwich had disappeared, until Anna handed him a second. — Grace Burrowes

Have gracious thoughts of your neighbors,
kind thoughts of your friends,
loving thoughts of your family,
and humble thoughts of yourself. — Matshona Dhliwayo

Between loving friends there need be no secrets ... the trusting heart is always safe with another who truly cares. — Joan Walsh Anglund

Don't risk your life for those that doesn't love your life, lest you end up in regrets if not death. — Michael Bassey Johnson

When two members of a family or two intimate friends are separated, and one goes abroad and one remains at home, the return of the relative or friend who has been travelling always seems to place the relative or friend who has been staying at home at a painful disadvantage when the two first meet. The sudden encounter of the new thoughts and new habits eagerly gained in the one case, with the old thoughts and old habits passively preserved in the other, seems at first to part the sympathies of the most loving relatives and the fondest friends, and to set a sudden strangeness, unexpected by both and uncontrollable by both, between them on either side. — Wilkie Collins

Is that a cow?"
Harley laughed out loud. "What do you suppose our barbecue-loving Texas friends are going to say to that?"
"Actually," Sasha said, "I'll be more interested in what our friends from Bangalore will say to what our Texas friends will say. — David S.Goyer

These women lived their lives happily. They had been taught, probably by loving parents, not to exceed the boundaries of their happiness regardless of what they were doing. But therefore they could never know real joy. Which is better? Who can say? Everyone lives the way she knows best. What I mean by 'their happiness' is living a life untouched as much as possible by the knowledge that we are really, all of us, alone. That's not a bad thing. Dressed in their aprons, their smiling faces like flowers, leaning to cook, absorbed in their little troubles and perplexities, they fall in love and marry. I think that's great. I wouldn't mind that kind of life. Me, when I'm utterly exhausted by it all, my skin breaks out, on those lonely evenings when I call my friends again and again and nobody's home, then I despise my own life - my birth, my upbringing, everything. I feel only regret for the whole thing. — Banana Yoshimoto

By surrounding yourself with people who are positive, caring, intelligent, loving, and open-minded, you create a personal environment that is conducive to your emotional and personal growth. By surrounding yourself with the opposite, you create a personal environment that is conducive to the opposite. Choose accordingly. — Steve Maraboli

To those who scare peace loving people with phantoms of lost liberty, my message is this: your tactics aid terrorists for they erode our national unity and diminish our resolve. They give ammunition to America's enemies and pause to America's friends. — John Ashcroft

You've told me repeatedly now that you find me blindingly attractive." "That doesn't mean I like you. Besides, your brand of pretty is like a weapon. You reel victims in with it, just like a vampire does. I wouldn't be surprised if you sparkle in the sun." "I cannot believe I'm arguing with a woman who references Twilight." "The fact that you know I'm referencing Twilight betrays you as a secret Edward-loving fanboy." His snort is loud and scathing. "Team Jacob all the way." I can't help it, my eyes fly open, and I lift a corner of my mask to glare at him. "That's it. We can never be friends. — Kristen Callihan

It"s good to keep wide-open ears and listen to what everybody else has to say, but when you come to make a decision, you have to weigh all of what you"ve heard on its own, and place it where it belongs, and come to a decision for yourself; you"ll never regret it. But if you form the habit of taking what someone else says about a thing without checking it out for yourself, you"ll find that other people will have you hating your friends and loving your enemies. — Malcolm X

Ours was a very progressive Protestant family, but my parents were God-loving rather than God-fearing. We went to church, and I still go with my mum and dad when I return home - it's a family thing. I played flute in my dad's marching band, but I had an integrated upbringing. We had a lot of Catholic friends. — James Nesbitt

True love, the good, beautiful, one-and-only kind, the kind between loving friends and family and partners who are mostly just trying hard to do their best, it manages to overlook some pieces of its story. It overlooks what he can't give you or how she failed you or what mistakes he made when he was struggling. It stays steady at its center. It evolves, through drought and storm. It grows. It survives. — Deb Caletti

Good health, longevity, happiness, a loving family, self-reliance, fine friends ... if you [have] five, you're a rich man ... . — Thomas J. Stanley

What greater restoratives have we poor mortals than a good meal taken in the company of loving friends? — Flora Thompson

Today's young people have gay friends whom they love. If they view the church as an unsafe for them, a place more focused on politics than on people, we just might be raising the most anti-Christian generation America has ever seen, a generation that believes they have to choose between loving and being Christian. — Justin Lee

Thoughts mold your features. Thoughts lift your soul heavenward or drag you toward hell. ... As nothing reveals character like the company we like and keep, so nothing foretells futurity like the thoughts over which we brood. ... To have the approval of your conscience when you are alone with your thoughts is like being in the company of true and loving friends. To merit your own self-respect gives strength to character. Conscience is the link that binds your soul to the spirit of God. — David O. McKay

Maybe love isn't meant to be bliss never-ending.
Maybe love is unwavering support and befriending. — Richelle E. Goodrich

Loving everybody is polygamy. I care for no friend who loves his enemy equally well. — E.W. Howe

My golf-loving friend Bob Hope asked me what my handicap was, so I told him - the Congress. — Ronald Reagan

I can't understand people being rude to their spouses. Your husband or wife should be the one person in the world you treat with loving patience. He or she chose you above all others-for a lifetime! And yet I see women who are nicer to their girlfriends, and men who are more thoughtful toward their employees. That's meshuganeh. Friends come and go. Employees move on. Your partner is there for the long haul. He deserves your best every day of your life. — Joanna Campbell Slan

What do you do when you don't know what to do about something?
I talk to Mr. Sugar and my friends. I make lists. I attempt to analyze the situation from the perspective of my "best self" - the one that's generous, reasonable, forgiving, loving, bighearted, and grateful. I think really hard about what I'll wish I did a year from now. I map out the consequences of the various actions I could take. I ask what my motivations are, what my desires are, what my fears are, what I have to lose, and what I have to gain. I move toward the light, even if it's a hard direction in which to move. I trust myself. I keep the faith. I mess up sometimes. — Cheryl Strayed

My best chosen friend, companion, guide, to walk through life, Linked hand-in-hand, two equal, loving friends, true husband and true wife. — Charles Gavan Duffy

I think being raised by a single mother put me on the outside, and I would watch my mother's married friends and think, 'Why does she put him down in public?' or, 'Why is he so rude to her?' It seemed to me that there were very few marriages where the couple were genuinely in a supportive, loving partnership. — Cherie Lunghi

Loving friends let kindness grow in their hearts, creating a oneness with their souls. — Tom Baker

Children with heaven in their eyes and an air of mystery about them, meditative and quiet, friends of God, friends of all, loved and loving and asking very little from the outer world, because they have more than enough within. They are classed as the dreamers, but they are really seers. They do not ask much and they do not need much beyond a reverent guardianship and to be let alone and allowed to grow; they will find this way for they are 'taught of God. — Janet Erskine Stuart

And you and I know you're the best thing that ever happened to me, and, yes, that's an expression, something people say, that has no meaning, but what I mean is there isn't anybody in the whole world who has loved me the way you have, not my mother, not my old man, not my friends.
There's nothing preventing me and you from loving each other and being some kinda world-class shining beacon of love except how bad do we want it and what are we willing to do for it?
Now, I know I did you wrong, and I was freaking out and being stupid and I was mean to you. You know sometimes I get all fucking confused and I can't see outside of my own asshole. I'm unhappy. Why am I unhappy? It's gotta be somebody's fault, right? It couldn't just be that I'm a self-centered fuck spinning around inside my own dank cloud of concerns.
There isn't anything I can think of that I really want or that the best part of me wants, that loving you won't start doing. I love you. — Ethan Hawke

Intimate, loving, and enduring relationships with our family and close friends will be among the sources of the deepest joy in our lives. — Clayton M Christensen