#nation

Mamma says if we stay so focused on our past failings, we won't be able to move beyond them and learn what we need to know. ↗

— Annette Bridges

#regrets #self-condemnation #self-esteem #life

The national interest cannot be defined as a common interest of the industrial, commercial, and financial companies of a country, because there is no such common interest; nor can it be defined as the life, liberty, and well-being of the citizens, because they are continually being adjured to sacrifice their well-being, their liberty, and their lives to the national interest. In the end a study of modern history leads to the conclusion that the national interest of every State consists in its capacity to make war. ↗

— Simone Weil

#national-interest #war #life

Mornings at Blackwater" For years, every morning, I drank from Blackwater Pond. It was flavored with oak leaves and also, no doubt, the feet of ducks. And always it assuaged me from the dry bowl of the very far past. What I want to say is that the past is the past, and the present is what your life is, and you are capable of choosing what that will be, darling citizen. So come to the pond, or the river of your imagination, or the harbor of your longing, and put your lips to the world. And live your life. ↗

— Mary Oliver

#imagination

That didn't happen, of course. Things never happened like I imagined them. ↗

— John Green

#imagination

Every man has within him only one life and one nature ... It behooves a man to look within himself and turn to the best dedication possible those endowments he has from his Maker. You do no wrong in questioning what once you held to be right for you, if now it has come to seem wrong. Put away all thought of being bound. We do not want you bound. No one who is not free can give freely. ↗

— Ellis Peters

#conduct-of-life #free-will #freedom #giving #life

If I were flying, I would travel to a perfect place. A place with frosted cakes and beautiful flowers and excellent trees to climb and absolutely no doldrums. ↗

— Kyo Maclear

#children-s-books #dreams #happiness #imagination #kids-books

Life was never meant to be difficult, we just make it that way so that it fits into societies and our indoctrinated concept of what things should be like. ↗

— Steven Redhead

#difficult #indoctrination #life #societies #things

Most of life's actions are within our reach, but decisions take willpower. ↗

— Robert McKee

#capability #decisions #determination #life #willpower

We do not remember days, Shemei, we remember moments, and the richness of life lies in memories we have forgotten. ↗

— Terri Herman-Poncé

#paranormal #paranormal-series #paranormal-suspense #past-lives #reincarnation

The union of the mind and intuition which brings about illumination, and the development which the Sufis seek, is based upon love. ↗

— Idries Shah

#love #sufism #love