What Makes A Good Life Quotes & Sayings

Holiness must have a philosophical and theological foundation, namely, Divine truth; otherwise it is sentimentality and emotionalism. Many would say later on, 'We want religion, but no creeds.' This is like saying we want healing, but no science of medicine; music, but no rules of music; history, but no documents. Religion is indeed a life, but it grows out of truth, not away from it. It has been said it makes no difference what you believe, it all depends on how you act. This is psychological nonsense, for a man acts out of his beliefs. Our Lord placed truth or belief in Him first; then came sanctification and good deeds. But here truth was not a vague ideal, but a Person. Truth was now lovable, because only a Person is lovable. Sanctity becomes the response the heart makes to Divine truth and its unlimited mercy to humanity. — Fulton J. Sheen

They say that childhood forms us, that those early influences are the key to everything. Is the peace of the soul so easily won? Simply the inevitable result of a happy childhood. What makes childhood happy? Parental harmony? Good health? Security? Might not a happy childhood be the worst possible preparation for life? Like leading a lamb to the slaughter. — Josephine Hart

Do yourself and your family a favor: Decide right now that you will write a self-help book someday. I'm serious. A self-help book is a great way to capture what you think makes a good person, a good life and a good world. It's also a "forever document" that you can pass down to future generations. We need more people sharing positive messages and books with the world. Why not be one of those people? — Brendon Burchard

Mistakes and miscalculations are human and normal, and viewed in the long run they have not damaged the company. I do not mind taking responsibilty for every managerial decision I have made. But if a person who makes a mistake is branded and kicked off the seniority promotion escalator, he could lose his motivation for the rest of his business life and depreive the company of whaever good things he may have to offer later. If the casues of the mistake are clarified and made public, the person who made the mistake will not forget it and others will not make the same mistake. I tell our people Go ahead and do what you think is right. If you make a mistake, you will learn form it. Just don't make the same mistake twice. — Akio Morita

I concluded some time ago that a major part of success of a team, or of an individual, has a great deal to do with the intangible qualities possessed. The real key is in how a person see himself (humility), how he feels about what he does (passion), how he works with others (unity), how he makes others better (servanthood), and how he deals with frustration and success, truly learning from each situations (thankfulness). I believe those concepts are the essence of a good player, team, coach, or individual in any capacity in life. — Dick Bennett

Sweetheart, listen carefully, when I say that I don't need anybody but you, what I mean is that I never have. I need you. I've never needed anyone or anything the way I need you. I need you in a way that would break me if I lost you. Being with you makes every part of my life better. Every second I get with you is the best second of my life. I'm not good at expressing myself, not like you are, but I treasure this thing between us. Don't think I don't. — R.K. Lilley

I'm actually pretty good at stripping, which makes me wonder what happened in my previous life. Funny enough, I don't wear a lot of clothes when I dance and it's very sexy, so it wasn't too hard to get into the motion of it. — Julianne Hough

On the other side, if Im playing a good guy, then he has some problems too. Thats what makes people interesting, in life and in fiction. — Beau Bridges

Let others praise justice and censure injustice, magnifying the rewards and honours of the one and abusing the other; that is a manner of arguing which, coming from them, I am ready to tolerate, but from you who have spent your whole life in the consideration of this question, unless I hear the contrary from your own lips, I expect something better. And therefore, I say, not only prove to us that justice is better than injustice, but show what they either of them do to the possessor of them, which makes the one to be a good and the other an evil, whether seen or unseen by gods and men. I — Plato

Your whole life, you are told what is right and what is wrong. What you should do and what you should not do. What makes a good citizen and what makes a traitorous one. What happens, then, when you do everything you are not meant to do? Break down each and every barrier? Find out how good you are by how evil you can be? — Laura Lam

I always think, OK, this is good, but I'll do it better next time. "And so we beat on, boats against the current ... " It may not be the recipe for a life of contentment, but that imperfectability is what makes writing such an engaging endeavor, something you can do for the rest of your life and not get bored. — Debra Dean

Many people - particularly the young - have been persuaded that such a search is futile. They have been told from their preschool days on that one person's opinion is as good as another's, that each person can pick his or her own truth from a multicultural smorgasbord. If one choice proves unsavory, pick another, and so on, until, in a consumerist fashion, we pick the truth we like best. I think the despair of Generations X, Y, and now E comes from this fundamental notion that there's no such thing as reality or the capital-T truth. Almost every new movie I see these days features a bright, good-looking, talented young man who is so downright sad, he can barely lift his head. I want to scream, "What's wrong with this guy?" Then I feel a profound compassion because his generation has been forbidden the one thing that makes life such a breathtaking challenge: truth. — Charles W. Colson

Read poetry every day of your life. Poetry is good because it flexes muscles you don't use often enough. Poetry expands the senses and keeps them in prime condition. It keeps you aware of your nose, your eye, your ear, your tongue, your hand.
And, above all, poetry is compacted metaphor or simile. Such metaphors, like Japanese paper flowers, may expand outward into gigantic shapes. Ideas lie everywhere through the poetry books, yet how rarely have I heard short story teachers recommending them for browsing.
What poetry? Any poetry that makes your hair stand up along your arms. Don't force yourself too hard. Take it easy. Over the years you may catch up to, move even with, and pass T. S. Eliot on your way to other pastures. You say you don't understand Dylan Thomas? Yes, but your ganglion does, and your secret wits, and all your unborn children. Read him, as you can read a horse with your eyes, set free and charging over an endless green meadow on a windy day. — Ray Bradbury

And even though he's the father of capitalism and wrote the most famous and maybe the best book ever on why some nations are rich and others are poor, Adam Smith in The Theory of Moral Sentiments wrote as eloquently as anyone ever has on the futility of pursuing money with the hope of finding happiness. How do you reconcile that with the fact that no one did more than Adam Smith to make capitalism and self-interest respectable? That is a puzzle I try to unravel toward the end of this book. Besides the emptiness of excessive materialism, Smith understood the potential we have for self-deception, the danger of unintended consequences, the seductive lure of fame and power, the limitations of human reason, and the unseen sources of what makes our lives both so complex and yet at times so orderly. The Theory of Moral Sentiments is a book of observations about what makes us tick. As a bonus, almost in passing, Smith tells us how to lead the good life in the fullest sense of that phrase. — Russ Roberts

WHAT MAKES A GOOD LISTENER? 1. Not interrupting. 2. Showing that you empathize: not criticizing, arguing, or patronizing. 3. Establishing a physical sense of closeness without invading personal space. 4. Observing body language and letting yours show you are not distracted but attentive. 5. Offering your own self-disclosures, but not too many, or too soon. 6. Understanding the context of the other person's life. 7. Listening from all four levels: body, mind, heart, and soul. — Deepak Chopra

A lot of people say there is no happiness in this life, and certainly there's no permanent happiness. But self-sufficiency creates happiness. Happiness is a state of bliss. Just because you're satisfied one moment - saying yes, it's a good meal, makes me happy - well, that's not going to necessarily be true the next hour. Life has its ups and downs, and time has to be your partner. Time is your soul mate. Children are happy. But they haven't really experienced ups and downs yet. I'm not exactly sure what happiness even means. I don't know if I personally could define it. — Bob Dylan

I am sorry.

I'm sorry that I feel as if you don't trust me enough to confide me.
This is me being selfish even though this isn't about me, it's about you.
I'm sorry that it makes me upset that in those times you thought about ending your life, I feel like I didn't cross your mind.
I hate myself for thinking you didn't care enough to talk to me about those toxic thoughts that's trying to push you to end everything, because I know myself that's it is hard to share.
I hate myself for thinking you didn't care enough to think about how horrible it is going to be for me once I learn what you've done.

I'm sorry for feeling like this, it is selfish, I am selfish.
I'm sorry for feeling like I'm not a good friend, I know that's now how you think, I'm sorry.

I just love you and I'm hurt. — Mari

What makes the meaning of life is people, so you try to be good to people immediately around you and in your broader community. So a lot of my projects are about how I can affect the world in the hundreds of millions. — Reid Hoffman

POPPY: 25 December 2016

POPPY (standing up to Paul): You see family life as respecting boundaries and saying what makes people happy and treating everyone like they're treasured but only in a sanitized way.

I see family life as invading everyone's privacy and saying whatever I feel and treating everyone as they're treasured because they're my family and thus special as compared to the rest of the world.

I see a good family as loud and frantic and intrusive...He fits me, and I don't want to change. Not for you or anyone. I'm deeply in love with myself, and Emmett respects that...

"I'm not her (Christine). I don't have a dream to fix animal boo-boos. Loving Emmett and living close to my family are the only dreams I see as worth having. — Bijou Hunter

What makes 'The Wire' a beautiful story is how true to life it is. In other shows, you have a good guy and a bad guy. In 'The Wire,' bad guys are trying to be good, good guys are doing bad. You have real life. The people who do bad get bad things done to them. — Tristan Wilds

Carol would not be a bad one to [settle down] with. She's pretty and bright, and maybe this is what love is. She's good company: her interests broaden almost every day. She reads three books to my one, and I read a lot. We talk far into the night. She still doesn't understand the first edition game: Hemingway, she says, reads just as well in a two-bit paperback as he does in a $500 first printing. I can still hear myself lecturing her the first time she said that. Only a fool would read a first edition. Simply having such a book makes life in general and Hemingway in particular go better when you do break out the reading copies. I listened to myself and thought, This woman must think I'm a government-inspected horse's ass. Then I showed her my Faulkners, one with a signature, and I saw her shiver with an almost sexual pleasure as she touched the paper where he signed. Faulkner was her most recent god[.] — John Dunning

I am married, and the one charm of marriage is that it makes a life of deception absolutely necessary for both parties. I never know where my wife is, and my wife never knows what I am doing. When we meet--we do meet occasionally, when we dine out together, or go down to the Duke's--we tell each other the most absurd stories with the most serious faces. My wife is very good at it--much better, in fact, than I am. She never gets confused over her dates, and I always do. But when she does find me out, she makes no row at all. I sometimes wish she would; but she merely laughs at me. — Oscar Wilde

He promised to love me. And for once in my life, I'm going to do the impractical, unwise, ill-advised thing. I'm going to make a decision based upon the feeling I have in my heart, and not what looks good on paper or makes anyone else happy. I'm going to do something for me, and I'll live with whatever Ciro brings into my life and be happy that I did. — Adriana Trigiani

And what makes me happy now has changed as well ... Its one thing to play in a bar or at a biker festival, and hear a guy who's been drinking beer all day come up and tell you how good you are. For a long time in your life that will make you happy. — Rick Derringer

Age was no guide then, nor is it now. The old and the young defy their endings, while others go too soon. Neither is it good or evil in the veins that seems to protect them. This is a brief and bitter life, the mere proving crucible for what lies beyond. That is all that makes sense of it, or I would rage at the heavens themselves. — Conn Iggulden

The Myth of Sisyphus makes us wonder if we too are like the ones who are so distracted making friends with important people, staying on top of the latest technology, getting good marks in school, and making lots of money, that we never pause to think:

What are we actually living for?

Sisyphus ended up opening his heart to questions of meaning, value and purpose. He himself decided it was best to just make the most of his short time on earth, however meaningless it all may be. Through Sisyphus, Camus is telling us that life is a joke, and the courageous ones will accept that and have a laugh along the way. I know many movies released these days that operate under the same premise. — Jon Morrison

Any accolades that anybody puts toward this band really makes me feel good, because I have devoted such a big part of my life to this band, making it what I want it to be. — Charlie Daniels

Will you ever forgive me? " I shot back, leveling my gaze directly into his eyes.
He stared into them for a few moments and then got up silently and headed for the door. He didn't turn around when he reached it. Just grabbed the doorknob and held it.
"No," he said, without facing me. "Maybe it makes me a bad parent, but I don't know if I can. No matter what the police found, you were involved in that shooting, Valerie. You wrote those names on that list. You wrote my name on that list. You had a good life here. You may not have pulled the trigger, but you helped cause the tragedy."
Hate List — Jennifer Brown

As changes take place in my life, I continue to watch them truly work out for my good-if I can just wait on God to see me through. What makes all the difference is trust-the understanding that God has a much bigger plan than mine even if I don't understand it. I'm grateful, yet sorry, that I have had to learn so many lessons by hindsight. — Kathy Troccoli

To live a good life: We have the potential for it. If we can learn to be indifferent to what makes no difference. This is how we learn: by looking at each thing, both the parts and the whole. Keeping in mind that none of them can dictate how we perceive it. They don't impose themselves on us. They hover before us, unmoving. It is we who generate the judgments - inscribing them on ourselves. And we don't have to. We could leave the page blank - and if a mark slips through, erase it instantly. Remember how brief is the attentiveness required. And then our lives will end. And why is it so hard when things go against you? If it's imposed by nature, accept it gladly and stop fighting it. And if not, work out what your own nature requires, and aim at that, even if it brings you no glory. None of us is forbidden to pursue our own good. — Marcus Aurelius

Pause and remember - Life is a process of surrendering. Make the decision to let go of what no longer serves you or makes you feel good. Know that you are worth more and something better will arrive once you create the space. — Jennifer Young

What a difference it makes in my life and yours when we believe that the trials as well as the accomplishments, the difficulties as well as the joys, are not simply the products of brute forces in the universe but actually are all part of God's eternal plan for his glory and our good. Do we have any assurance that such astounding truths do apply to us? Yes. — Bryan Chapell

I'm pretty laidback as a dad anyway. I just trust her so much. She has a great head on her shoulders and she makes pretty good decisions most of the time. She even has enough common sense that if she makes a bad one she makes adjustments and knows that's what life is. It's a day-by-day, step-by-step journey through life, as she says in the movie. — Billy Ray Cyrus

I think it's important to have a good hard failure when you're young. I learned a lot out of that. Because it makes you kind of aware of what can happen to you. Because of it I've never had any fear in my whole life when we've been near collapse and all of that. I've never been afraid. I've never had the feeling I couldn't walk out and get a job doing something. — Walt Disney Company

That's what a powerful story does. It creates a more intense experience of life for you to watch. That's what a good film does for me, anyway. That process, I enjoy. It just makes for entertaining characters and entertaining films. — Sharlto Copley

The problem may be a literary one: we are given a single story line about what makes a good life, even though not a few who follow that story line have bad lives. We speak as though there is one good plot with one happy outcome, while the myriad forms a life can take flower - and wither - all around us.
Even those who live out the best version of the familiar story line might not find happiness as their reward. This is not necessarily a bad thing. I know a woman who was lovingly married for seventy years. She has had a long, meaningful life that she has lived according to her principles. But I wouldn't call her happy; her compassion for the vulnerable and concern for the future have given her a despondent worldview. What she has had instead of happiness requires better language to describe. There are entirely different criteria for a good life that might matter more to a person - honor, meaning, depth, engagement, hope. — Rebecca Solnit

. . . death isn't anything I need to be afraid of. I'm not a perfect man. But I think I'm a good man. I've lived a hell of a life, even with all the heartache. Millie told me once that the ability to devastate is what makes a song beautiful. Maybe that's what makes life beautiful too. The ability to devastate. Maybe that's how we know we've lived. How we know we've truly loved."

"The ability to devastate," I repeated. And my voice broke. If that wasn't a perfect description of the agony of love, I didn't know what was. — Amy Harmon

Reading is a sage way to bump up against life. Reading may be an escape, but it is not an escape from my own life and problems. It is an escape from the narrow boundaries of being only me. Reading in some wonderful ways helps me find out who I am. When she was a young girl Patricia MacLachlan's mother encouraged her to "read a book and find out who you are." And it is true that in some ways reading defines me as it refines me. Reading enlarges my vision of the world; it helps me understand someone who is different from me. It makes me bigger on the inside. We tend to see the world from our own perspective; it is good to see it from the eyes of others. Good literature helps me understand who I am in relation to what others experience. Far from being an escape from reality, good literature is a window into reality. I read to feel life. — Gladys M. Hunt

Boundaries define us. They define what is me and what is not me. A boundary shows me where i end and someone else begins, leading me to a sense of ownership. Knowing what I am to own and take responsibility for gives me freedom. Taking responsibility for my life opens up many different options. Boundaries help us keep the good in and the bad out. Setting boundaries inevitably involves taking responsibility for your choices. You are the one who makes them. You are the one who must live with their consequences. And you are the one who may be keeping yourself from making the choices you could be happy with. We must own our own thoughts and clarify distorted thinking. — Henry Cloud

Life is not interested in good and evil. Don Quixote was constantly choosing between good and evil, but then he was choosing in his dream state. He was mad. He entered reality only when he was so busy trying to cope with people that he had no time to distinguish between good and evil. Since people exist only in life, they must devote their time simply to being alive. Life is motion, and motion is concerned with what makes man move - which is ambition, power, pleasure. What time a man can devote to morality, he must take by force from the motion of which he is a part. He is compelled to make choices between good and evil sooner or later, because moral conscience demands that from him in order that he can live with himself tomorrow. His moral conscience is the curse he had to accept from the gods in order to gain from them the right to dream. — William Faulkner

I fall upon the thorns of life, I bleed. And then? I fall upon the thorns of life, I bleed. And what next? I get laid, I take a short holiday, but very soon after I fall upon those same thorns with gratification in pain, or suffering in joy - who knows what the mixture is! What good, what lasting good is there in me? Is there nothing else between birth and death but what I can get out of this perversity - only a favorable balance of disorderly emotions? No freedom? Only impulses? And what about all the good I have in my heart - does it mean anything? Is it simply a joke? A false hope that makes a man feel the illusion of worth? And so he goes on with his struggles. But this good is no phony. I know it isn't. I swear it. — Saul Bellow

The ethics of reverence for life makes no distinction between higher and lower, more precious and less precious lives. It has good reasons for this omission. For what are we doing, when we establish hard and fast gradations in value between living organisms, but judging them in relation to ourselves, by whether they seem to stand closer to us or farther from us. This is a wholly subjective standard. How can we know what importance other living organisms have in themselves and in terms of the universe? — Albert Schweitzer

What the church should be telling the worker is that the first demand religion makes on him is that he should be a good workman. If he is a carpenter he should be a competent carpenter. Church by all means on Sundays-but what is the use of church if at the very center of life a man defrauds his neighbor and insults God by poor craftsmanship. — Dwight D. Eisenhower

What I mean is, things like that happen. They may seem might cruel and unfair, but that's how life is a part of the time. But that isn't the only way life is. A part of the time, it's mighty good. And a man can't afford to waste all the good part, worrying about the bad parts. That makes it all bad — Fred Gipson

I do not know what, in the end, makes a person who they are. If we're all born one way, or if we only arrive there after as series of chioces. The bible claims that the wicked act on their own desires and impulses, because God is good, only good, and He would never compel a soul to wickedness. That I'm supposed to count on justice in the next life, even if I can't have it in this one. — Alexandra Bracken

If you're lucky, at the right time you come across music that is not only "great," or interesting, or "incredible," or fun, but actually sustaining. Though some elusive but tangible process, a piece of music cuts through all defenses and makes sense of every fear and desire you bring to it. As it does so, it exposes all you've held back, and then makes sense of that, too. Though someone else is doing the talking, the experience is like a confession. Your emotions shoot out to crazy extremes; you feel both ennobled and unworthy, saved and damned. You hear that this is what life is all about, that this is what it is for. Yet it is this recognition itself that makes you understand that life can never be this good, this whole. With a clarity life denies for its own good reasons, you see places to which you can never get. — Greil Marcus

Good food and a warm kitchen are what makes a house a home. I always tried to make my home like my mother's, because Mom was magnificent at stretching a buck when it came to decorating and food. Like a true Italian, she valued beautification in every area of her life, and I try to do the same. — Rachael Ray

What makes this danger so terrible is that humans tip the balance of your world. No other species can make such a difference, for good or ill. If humans can live in harmony with other forms of life, the world rejoices. If not, the world suffers
and may not survive. — T.A. Barron

And I know, knew for sure, with an absolute certainty, that this is rock bottom, this what the worst possible thing feels like. It is not some grand, wretched emotional breakdown. It is, in fact, so very mundane: ... Rock Bottom is an inability to cope with the commonplace that is so extreme it makes even the grandest and loveliest things unbearable ... Rock bottom is feeling that the only thing that matters in all of life is the one bad moment ... Rock bottom is everything out of focus. It's a failure of vision, a failure to see the world how it is, to see the good in what it is, and only to wonder why the hell things look the way they do and not - and not some other way. — Elizabeth Wurtzel

That's the only real life, the only thing that makes you know you're alive - the backward ache. That's what music is. The trouble - for me - is that at some stage I realized those miracles, those aches, they have a history. They're not private. The music's always about what someone's lost. That's what you hear, when it's good: the worlds people lost, the ones they want back. And once you hear it that way, you can't avoid it - that it's somehow about justice. — Adam Haslett

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

My father was always in good spirits, he loved football. It makes me a bit sad because if he could enjoy seeing me now, what I have achieved, that would be a highlight in his life. But I'm sure that he watches over me from above. — Cristiano Ronaldo

Don't be fooled by clever hands, sir" the Sunlight Man said. He'd be lying with the back of his head on his hands, as he always lay. "Entertainment's all very well, but the world is serious. It's exceedingly amusing, when you think about it: nothing in life is as startling or shocking or mysterious as a good magician's trick. That's what makes stagecraft deadly. Listen closely, friend. You see great marvels performed on the stage - the lady sawed in half, the fat man supported by empty air, the Hindu vanishing with the folding of a cloth - and the subtlest of poisons drifts into your brain: you think the earth dead because the sky is full of spirits, you think the hall drab because the stage is adazzle with dimestore gilt. So King Lear rages, and the audience grows meek, and tomorrow, in the gray of old groceries, the housewife will weep for Cordelia and despair for herself. They weren't fools, those old sages who called all art the Devil's work. It eats the soul. — John Gardner

But the thing that stands eternally in the way of really good writing is always one: the virtual impossibility of lifting to the imagination those things which lie under the direct scrutiny of the senses, close to the nose. It is this difficulty that sets a value upon all works of art and makes them a necessity. The senses witnessing what is immediately before them in detail see a finality which they cling to in despair, not knowing which way to turn. Thus this so-called natural or scientific array becomes fixed, the walking devil of modern life. — William Carlos Williams

What do I miss, as a human being, if I have never heard of the Second Law of Thermodynamics? The answer is: Nothing. And what do I miss by not knowing Shakespeare? Unless I get my understanding from another source, I simply miss my life. Shall we tell our children that one thing is as good as another-- here a bit of knowledge of physics, and there a bit of knowledge of literature? If we do so, the sins of the fathers will be visited upon the children unto the third and fourth generation, because that normally is the time it takes from the birth of an idea to its full maturity when it fills the minds of a new generation and makes them think by it.

Science cannot produce ideas by which we could live. — Ernst F. Schumacher

They made us believe that each one of us is the half of an orange, and that life only makes sense when u find that other half.
They did not tell us that we were born as whole, and that no-one in our lives deserve to carry on his back such responsibility of completing what is missing on us: we grow through life by ourselves. If we have a good company it's just more pleasant. — John Lennon

Now the whole offer which Christianity makes is this: that we can, if we let God have His way, come to share in the life of Christ. If we do, we shall then be sharing a life which was begotten, not made, which always existed and always will exist. Christ is the Son of God. If we share in this kind of life we also shall be sons of God. We shall love the Father as He does and the Holy Ghost will arise in us. He came to this world and became a man in order to spread to other men the kind of life He has - by what I call "good infection." Every Christian is to become a little Christ. The whole purpose of becoming a Christian is simply nothing else. — C.S. Lewis

Experience makes good people better." She was staring at the lake. "How does it do that?" "Through their suffering." "I had enough of that," he said in disgust. "We have two lives, Roy, the life we learn with and the life we live with after that. Suffering is what brings us toward happiness All it taught me was to stay away from it. I am sick of all I have suffered." She shrank away a little. — Bernard Malamud

Literature is a way in which we can learn to live deeper lives
husband with wife, parent with child, brother with sister, fellow member with fellow member. Most good authors are better than we are. They are much better company than our own friends.
What comes from good company? What comes from good company is better manners, greater sensitivity, greater sensibility, greater empathy, great sympathy. Reading good literature makes us more capable of understanding other people, of loving other people, those whom we don't particularly want to love, even our enemies, as well as those closest to us. How can we expect to have full marriages when we are not going into those marriages with full minds and fine sensibilities? We are ignoring the tremendous possibilities of a delicate, well-poised, rich, sensitive life if we ignore the literature of the past. There is no substitute. — Arthur Henry King

This is what I call understanding. If you understand, insecurity is an intrinsic part of life - and good that it is so, because it makes life a freedom, it makes life a continuous surprise. One never knows what is going to happen. It keeps you continuously in wonder. Don't call it uncertainty - call it wonder. Don't call it insecurity - call it freedom. — Rajneesh

Cancer stops you in your tracks. It really makes you think about what's important. In a second, life can change. Don't ever forget to say thank you for love and family. What good is your success without them? — Jaclyn Smith

[...] I talk to the dead although I don't believe in ghosts. But it makes me feel good to speak with them. Maybe that is what God is. A good God wouldn't have let my babies die. I can't believe in that. My babies did nothing wrong."

"I agree. They did nothing wrong." He looked at her thoughtfully.

"But a God that did everything we thought was right and good wouldn't be the creator of the universe. He would be our puppet. He wouldn't be God. There's more to everything than we can know. — Min Jin Lee

What ever happened to happy endings?
They got them on shows at Saturday matinees.
Sure, but what about life?
All I know is I feel good going to bed nights, Doug. That's a happy ending once a day. Next morning I'm up and maybe things go bad. But all I got to do is remember that I'm going to bed that night and just lying there a while makes everything okay. — Ray Bradbury

And what does Jubilee Chase want to do with her life, if she's not hunting down rebel leaders and skinning them alive?"
"I don't know. Something extremely boring. I could go to night school and learn dentistry." That makes him laugh, a quick burst of a chuckle that makes my own lips curve.
"Oh, God no. No way could you be a dentist."
"I could! I'd be a damn good dentist. — Amie Kaufman

An angel and a devil are always beside us, and the one we listen to more will prevail. This confrontation is what makes life so magical because you are always challenged by the circumstances - we are good and evil depending on how we act — Paulo Coelho

I'm a very sensitive person, and I feel what makes me vulnerable. But I see that as a good thing. I really enjoy experiencing all the different emotions in life. — Gisele Bundchen

It needs a good deal of philosophy not to be mortified by the thought of persons who have voluntarily abandoned everything that for the most of us makes life worth living and are devoid of envy of what they have missed. I have never made up my mind whether they are fools or wise men. — W. Somerset Maugham

The child will grow up and find out things for herself. She will know that I lied. She will be disappointed."
"That is what is called learning the truth. It is a good thing to learn the truth one's self. To first believe with all your heart, and then not to believe, is good too. It fattens the emotions and makes them to stretch. When as a woman life and people disappoint her, she will have had practice in disappointment and it will not come so hard. In teaching your child, do not forget that suffering is good too. It makes a person rich in character. — Betty Smith

Outside there a lot of powerful stuff, starting from mind movies up to movies like drama, real life, horror, mysteries and many other. Music which makes your day interesting, quotes which change your thought, books which provoke and many other stuff... (So now you know what's everything about, Good Luck with the other Stuff!) — Deyth Banger

People ask: Why should I care about the ocean? Because the ocean is the cornerstone of earth's life support system, it shapes climate and weather. It holds most of life on earth. 97% of earth's water is there. It's the blue heart of the planet - we should take care of our heart. It's what makes life possible for us. We still have a really good chance to make things better than they are. They won't get better unless we take the action and inspire others to do the same thing. No one is without power. Everybody has the capacity to do something. — Sylvia A. Earle

It's total bullshit. I hate it when people make sadness all deep and beautiful and, like- profound. That's the word it's not profound. It's not beautiful. It sucks. It sucks balls. I think it makes non-sad people feel better. Like, they think if must be a good thing to be sad, because you're getting all this insight into real life and pain or whatever. Like how people say tears are like rain. Fuck off. Tears are just tears and they make your eyes hurt and they won stop when you want them to and ugh you get all those arty photos of girls crying - it's always girls, have you noticed?- and it's so beautiful and tasteful and moving. When the reality is your face goes all blotchy and your nose runs and you can taste it every time you breathe'
'Taste what?'
'It. Pain. Sadness. I'm just saying that sadness isn't beautiful and if it looks that way, it's a lie. — Sara Barnard

The good news of the kingdom is not freedom from hardship, suffering, and loss. It is the news of a Redeemer who has come to rescue me from myself. His rescue produces change that fundamentally alters my response to these inescapable realities. The Redeemer turns rebels into disciples, fools into humble listeners. He makes cripples walk again. In him we can face life and respond with faith, love, and hope. And as he changes us, he allows us to be a part of what he is doing in the lives of others. As you respond to the Redeemer's work in your life, you can learn to be an instrument in his hands. — Paul David Tripp

Which makes his good manners the more valuable. The older a person grows, Harriet, the more important it is that their manners should not be bad - the more glaring and disgusting any loudness, or coarseness, or awkwardness becomes. What is passable in youth, is detestable in later age. Mr. Martin is now awkward and abrupt; what will he be at Mr. Weston's time of life? — Jane Austen

The only artists I have ever known who are personally delightful are bad artists. Good artists exist simply in what they make, and consequently are perfectly uninteresting in what they are. A great poet, a really great poet, is the most unpoetical of all creatures. But inferior poets are absolutely fascinating. The worse their rhymes are, the more picturesque they look. The mere fact of having published a book of second-rate sonnets makes a man quite irresistible. He lives the poetry that he cannot write. The others write the poetry that they dare not realize. — Oscar Wilde

Don't stop talking to me, Makenna. I need your words. Your voice."
"I don't know what to say is all. I want to take away your hurt."
His cheek lifted into a smile under her hand. "Thank you. But sometimes I think I need it. It reminds me I'm alive. And it makes the good times that much better. Like right now, being here, with you. — Laura Kaye

Leah: "That is easily the freakin' grossest thing I've ever heard in my life. Yuck. If there was anything in my stomach, it would be coming back."
Seth: "They are vampires, I guess. I mean, it makes sense, and if it helps Bella, it's a good thing, right?"
Leah and Jake stare at Seth.
Seth: "What?"
Leah: "Mom dropped him a lot when he was a baby."
Jake: "On his head apparently."
Leah: "He used to gnaw on the crib bars, too."
Jake: "Lead paint?"
Leah: "Looks like it."
Seth: "Funny. Why don't you two shut up and sleep? — Stephenie Meyer

A true thing about seeds is that they don't always stay seeds. In addition, most seeds grow up to be something. Some become plants or trees that then go about producing more seeds. Some seeds get popped and eaten and ... well, you probably have a pretty good idea of what happens to things after they get eaten.
Some seeds are dried, some are pressed for oil, and some simply end up in bean bags or as the rattle in a baby's toy. It's probably fair to say that the life and times of a seed isn't necessarily the most exciting thing in the world, but what the seed lacks in excitement, it makes up for in miracles.
It's a miracle that a tiny seed can change from a dot in your palm into a towering tree whose wood can be made into the home you live in or the paper books are printed on. — Obert Skye

[The] insistence on the absolutely indiscriminate nature of compassion within the Kingdom is the dominant perspective of almost all of Jesus' teaching.
What is indiscriminate compassion? 'Take a look at a rose. Is is possible for the rose to say, "I'll offer my fragrance to good people and withhold it from bad people"? Or can you imagine a lamp that withholds its rays from a wicked person who seeks to walk in its light? It could do that only be ceasing to be a lamp. And observe how helplessly and indiscriminately a tree gives its shade to everyone, good and bad, young and old, high and low; to animals and humans and every living creature
even to the one who seeks to cut it down. This is the first quality of compassion
its indiscriminate character.' (Anthony DeMello, The Way to Love) ...
What makes the Kingdom come is heartfelt compassion: a way of tenderness that knows no frontiers, no labels, no compartmentalizing, and no sectarian divisions. — Brennan Manning

Why would you want to make them happy?" Amberdrake turned back to his little friend, and sat with a sad smile on his face. "Because they are bitter, unhappy people, and very little else makes them happy. They say what they do out of envy, for any number of reasons. It may be because I lead a more luxurious life than they, or at least they believe I do. It may be because there are many people who do call me friend, and those are all folk of great personal worth; a few of them are people that occupy high position and deservedly so. Perhaps it is because they cannot do what I can, and for some reason, this galls them. But they have so little else that gives them pleasure, I see no reason to deprive them of the few drops of enjoyment they can extract from heaping scorn and derision on me." Gesten shook his head. "Drake, you're crazy. But I already knew that. I'm getting some sleep; this is all too much for me. Good night." "Good night, Gesten," Amberdrake said — Mercedes Lackey

Success isn't what makes you happy. It really isn't. Success is doing what makes you happy and doing good work and hopefully having a fruitful life. If I've felt like I've done good work, that makes me happy. The success part of it is all gravy. — Philip Seymour Hoffman

No matter what advantages you are born with
money, intelligence, an appealing personality, a sunny outlook, or good social connections
none of these provides a magic key to an easy existence. Somehow life manages to bring difficult problems, the causes of untold suffering and struggle. How you meet your challenges makes all the difference between the promise of success and the specter of failure. — Deepak Chopra

Cling, therefore, to this sound and wholesome plan of life; indulge the body just so far as suffices for good health ... Your food should appease your hunger, your drink quench your thirst, your clothing keep out the cold, your house be a protection against inclement weather. It makes no difference whether it is built of turf or variegated marble imported from another country: what you have to understand is that thatch makes a person just as good a roof as gold. — Seneca.

To live in the midst of danger is to know how good life is," his father replied.
"But if we are lost in the danger?" Kino asked anxiously.
"To live in the presence of death makes us brave and strong," Kino's father replied. "That is why our people never fear death. We see it too often and we do not fear it. To die a little later or a little sooner does not matter. But to live bravely, to lobe life, to see how beautiful the trees are and the mountains, yes, even the sea, to enjoy work because it produces food for life - in these things we Japanese are a fortunate people. We love life because we live in danger. We do not fear death because we understand that life and death are necessary to each other."
"What is death?" Kino asked.
"Death is the great gateway," Kino's father said. — Pearl S. Buck

Writing is such an industry now. In many ways, that's a good thing, in that it removes all the muse-like mystique and makes it a plain old job, accessible to everyone. But with industry comes jargon. I was aware that jargon was starting to fill those growing shelves of Writer's Self Help books, not to mention the blogosphere. Wherever I looked, the writing of a script was being reduced to A, B, C plots, Text and Subtext, Three Act Structure and blah, blah, blah. And I'd think, that's not what writing is! Writing's inside your head! It's thinking! It's every hour of the day, every day of your life, a constant storm of pictures and voices and sometimes, if you're very, very lucky, insight. — Russell T. Davies

You're afraid? But that's what life is. There are bad surprises, yes. Awful surprises sometimes. But what makes the good surprises so good is that they're unexpected. — A.L. Player

You do me proud, Captain. But, dear, I want to say one thing and then I'm done; for you don't need much advice of mine after my good man has spoken. I read somewhere that every inch of rope in the British Navy has a strand of red in it, so wherever a bit of it is found it is known. That is the text of my little sermon to you. Virtue, which means honour, honesty, courage, and all that makes character, is the red thread that marks a good man wherever he is. Keep that always and everywhere, so that even if wrecked by misfortune, that sign shall still be found and recognized. Yours is a rough life, and your mates not all we could wish, but you can be a gentleman in the true sense of the word; and no matter what happens to your body, keep your soul clean, your heart true to those who love you, and do your duty to the end. — Louisa May Alcott

A very good career choice would be to gravitate toward those activities and to embrace those desires that harmonize with your core intentions, which are freedom and growth - and joy. Make a 'career' of living a happy life rather than trying to find work that will produce enough income that you can do things with your money that will then make you happy. When feeling happy is of paramount importance to you - and what you do 'for a living' makes you happy - you have found the best of all combinations. — Esther Hicks

What makes a good leader is that they eschew the spotlight in favor of spending time and energy to do what they need to do to support and protect their people. And when we feel the Circle of Safety around us, we offer our blood and sweat and tears and do everything we can to see our leader's vision come to life. The only thing our leaders ever need to do is remember whom they serve and it will be our honor and pleasure to serve them back. — Simon Sinek

Every so often, you have to do a show that makes you walk to your car with your head down, wondering what you're doing with your life. It's good for you, as long as you're not feeling that way every night. — Lauren Lapkus

It's not that people like sad movies that make us feel like, "Oh, my god, what a bummer." We like emotionally moving experiences, where you feel like a slightly different person and you see the world a little different, after you finish. It lets you see your own life, in a different way, and it actually makes you feel really good. And even though there might be sad content making this happen, the feeling that you're left with is one that is quite good, quite hopeful, clarifying and uplifting. — Gayle Forman

When I see myself on film it makes me smile, I mean making a good living doing what I enjoy is soo much fun. I just hope that everyone has the chance to enjoy life like I do. — Adrienne Barbeau

What a hypocrite I am; I spend my whole life reading books that allude to happiness, when I refuse to experience it. Sadness is an emotion you can trust. It is stronger than all of the other emotions. It makes happiness look fickle and untrustworthy. It pervades, lasts longer, and replaces the good feelings with such an eloquent ease you don't even feel the shift until you are suddenly wrapped in its chains. How hard we strive for happiness, and once we finally have the elusive feeling in our grasp, we hold it briefly, like water as it trickles through our fingers. I don't want to hold water. I want to hold something heavy and solid. Something I can understand. I understand sadness, and so I trust it. We are meant to feel sadness, if only to protect us from the brief spiels of happiness. Darkness is all I'll ever know; maybe the key is to make poetry out of it. — Tarryn Fisher

The good thing about books is that they remain themselves. What happens in their pages stays there. Harriet does not like the idea of the story bleeding through into real life. She trusts a story, and doesn't trust real life. But what makes her trust a story is the knowledge that it will stay where it is, that she can visit it but that there is no chance it will visit her. — Helen Humphreys

I know what this is," he whispers, his voice faint above the music. I've known it from that first night I saw you at the show, but now there's no doubt in my mind."

My gaze is entwined with his. Our eyes are locked and the key is gone. My heart feels full in my chest, heavy but in a good way.

"It's love," he says, letting the words slip freely from his mouth. And when they do, they fill the air and multiply like musical notes in a cartoon.

"Love," I say as the record crackles and skips.

"Love," he whispers back, weaving his fingers in mine.

And when I set my head on his pillow, and our bodies become one, for the first time in my life I feel as if everything in this crazy, complicated world makes complete and utter sense. — Sarah Jio

That's what makes it a good photograph. You think you know what's going on in her head. but the truth? No matter how good a photograph is, you can never tell what's going on in the person's mind. There's no way to get from here to there. — David Levithan

Here's the core problem we have with the Sermon on the Mount: it isn't that Jesus' teachings are absurd; it's that we don't see the world that Jesus sees. We see a world of injustice and anger and hatred and violence--a world where everything good is in short supply and life itself is fragile. But Jesus saw a world in which his father was in control, in which justice was guaranteed, in which goodness was breaking forth, and in which life itself is without end. And if you see that world through the lens of the gospel, then what Jesus tells us to do and how he informs us to live makes perfect sense. — Skye Jethani

Life is depressing and hopeless enough, without imbibing further depression and hopelessness through story. I don't care how realistic people like to think that is. It's not what inspires me, or makes me love and cherish a book or a television show or a movie. When I am imbibing fiction, I want to be inspired. I want bold tales, told boldly. I want genuine Good People who, while not perfect, are capable of rising beyond their ordinary beginnings. To make a positive difference in their world. Even when all hope or purpose might seem lost. Because this is what I think fiction - as originally told around the campfires, through verbal legend - ought to do, more than anything else: Illuminate the way, shine a spiritual beacon, tell us that there is a bright point in the darkness, a light to guide the way, when all other paths are cast in shadow. — Brad R. Torgersen

People don't care about what someone says about you in a movie - or even what you say, right? They care about what you build. And if you can make something that makes people's life better, then that's something that's really good. — Mark Zuckerberg

The Bible is not a book like any other. It makes a claim that God spoke and speaks through its message. It argues that as his creatures, we are accountable to him for what he has revealed. The trustworthiness of Scripture points to its authority as well. Scripture is far more than a history book, as good and trustworthy as that history is. It is a book that calls us to examine our lives and relationship to God. Beyond the fascinating history, it contains vital and life-transforming truths about God and us. — Darrell Bock

You can say the Jesus Prayer from now till doomsday, but if you don't realize that the only thing that counts in the religious life is detachment, I don't see how you ever move an inch. Detachment, buddy, and only detachment. Desirelessness. 'Cessations from all hankerings.' It's this business of desiring, if you want to know the goddam truth, that makes an actor in the first place. Why're you making me tell you things you already know? Somewhere along the line - in one damn incarnation or another, if you like - you not only had a hankering to be an actor or an actress but to be a good one. You're stuck with it now. You can't just walk out on the results of your own hankerings. Cause and effect, buddy, cause and effect. The only thing you can do now, the only religious thing you can do, is act. Act for God, if you want to - be God's actress, if you want to. What could be prettier? — J.D. Salinger