#ness

For as long as I could remember, I had been transparent to myself, unselfconscious, learning, doing, most of every day. Now I was in my own way; I myself was a dark object I could not ignore. I couldn't remember how to forget myself. I didn't want to think about myself, to reckon myself in, to deal with myself every livelong minute on top of everything else - but swerve as I might, I couldn't avoid it. I was a boulder blocking my own path. I was a dog barking between my own ears, a barking dog who wouldn't hush. So this was adolescence. Is this how the people around me had died on their feet - inevitably, helplessly? Perhaps their own selves eclipsed the sun for so many years the world shriveled around them, and when at least their inescapable orbits had passed through these dark egoistic years it was too late, they had adjusted. Must I then lose the world forever, that I had so loved? Was it all, the whole bright and various planet, where I had been so ardent about finding myself alive, only a passion peculiar to children, that I would outgrow even against my will? ↗

— Annie Dillard

#awakening #consciousness #selfconsciousness #love

And then, every time I didn't see her, there was a fall involved. I thought about dancing on the fifth-floor ledge outside out apartment. Every train she wasn't on felt something like hitting the pavement from five floors up. So maybe my father was right about that. Maybe happiness and excitement really are dangerous things. ↗

— Catherine Ryan Hyde

#dangerous #excited #excitement #fall #happiness

Lord, behold our family here assembled. We thank You for this place in which we dwell, for the love accorded us this day, for the hope with which we expect the morrow; for the health, the work, the food and the bright skies that make our lives delightful; for our friends in all parts of the earth. Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind. Spare us to our friends, soften us to our enemies. Bless us, if it may be, in all our innocent endeavors; if it may not, give us strength to endure that which is to come that we may be brave in peril, constant in tribulation, temperate in wrath and in all changes of fortune and down to the gates of death, loyal and loving to one another. We beseech of you this help and mercy for Christ's sake. ↗

— Robert Louis Stevenson

#friendship #inspirational #prayer #thankfulness #change

Bobby Tom told me he’s not afraid of the Chargers’ defense.” “Bobby Tom’ll tell you he’s not afraid of nuclear war, so I wouldn’t put too much stock in his opinion. ↗

— Susan Elizabeth Phillips

#football #fearless

For two days I went about my business. I travelled the globe as always, handing souls to the conveyor belt of eternity. ↗

— Markus Zusak

#business

Happiness is not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort. ↗

— Franklin D. Roosevelt

#happiness #wealth #wisdom #money

The only time we waste is the time we spend thinking we are alone. ↗

— Mitch Albom

#self-pity #alone

Your joy can be the impetus that motivates others to find their way to joy. ↗

— Molly Friedenfeld

#inspiration #inspirational-quotes #joy #kindness #spreading-sunshine

Words of love cast from thy lips reach another heart at lightning speed. ↗

— Molly Friedenfeld

#heart #inspiration #inspirational-quotes #joy #lightning-speed

Love and kindness are the hammer and chisel that gently chip through barriers and long-held beliefs to reveal the magnificent soul contained within every human. ↗

— Molly Friedenfeld

#belief #chisel #hammer #human #inspiration