A Quote A Day...

[ZenDarling 3,019]

I love good quotations, be they funny, sweet, genius, inspiring, etc. and am interested in your favorites. Please come share “A Quote A Day.” I’ll get us started:

“But he who dares not grasp the thorn
Should never crave the rose.”
― Anne Brontë

[Epictetus 19,083]

"There is a difference between an action being somewhat voluntary and completely voluntary. It is the difference between having "some" choice in a matter and willing something "wholeheartedly." The more "voluntary" an action is, the more responsible a person is for that action.

What things can "impede" an action from being "fully" voluntary? Many: Ignorance. Being honestly deceived by appearances so that what is really bad might appear good or vice versa. Strong emotions can overcome calm and careful deliberation and impede full voluntariness, emotions such as fear or loneliness. Contrary wishes are signs that a person is not acting 'wholeheartedly' as in: someone will do something but some part of the person wishes he or she would not do it. Being "divided" is a sign of a lack of full voluntariness. Being compelled to do something or doing something under duress diminishes full voluntariness. And compulsions can be subconscious as well. Illness and fatigue can impede full voluntariness This is why we can condemn an action as morally evil, but we cannot know the "heart" of another person completely enough to "judge" them as a person. All "appearances" may be that a person did what they did with completely willingness but appearances can be deceiving.

-- Karl Rahner.

[SoulSurvivor 3,949]

Our sorrows and wounds are healed only when we touch them with compassion.
-- Buddha

[ZenDarling 3,019]

“Accept who you are. Unless you're a serial killer.”
― Ellen DeGeneres, Seriously... I'm Kidding

[SoulSurvivor 3,949]

“The most important kind of freedom is to be what you really are. You trade in your reality for a role. You trade in your sense for an act. You give up your ability to feel, and in exchange, put on a mask. There can't be any large-scale revolution until there's a personal revolution, on an individual level. It's got to happen inside first.”
― Jim Morrison

[quentin360 1,326]

An attitude is like a garden,

It must be cultivated daily...

Author Unknown

[camilo 245]

I have taken some comfort in this song from Billy Joel, "You're Only Human." Joel suffers from depression as well.

"You're having a hard time and lately you don't feel so good
You're getting a bad reputation in your neighborhood
It's alright
it's alright
Sometimes that's what it takes
You're only human
you're allowed to make your share of mistakes
You better believe there will be times in your life
When you'll be feeling like a stumbling fool
So take it from me you'll learn more from your accidents
Than anything that you could ever learn at school

Don't forget your second wind
Sooner of later you'll get your second wind

It's not always easy to be living in this world of pain
You're gonna be crashing into stone walls again and again
It's alright
it's alright
Though you feel your heart break
You're only human
you're gonna have to deal with heartache

Just like a boxer in a title fight
You got to walk in that ring all alone
You're not the only one who's made mistakes
But they're the only thing that you can truly call your own

Don't forget your second wind
Wait in that corner until that breeze blows in

You've been keeping to yourself these days
Cause you're thinking everything's gone wrong
Sometimes you just want to lay down and die
That emotion can be so strong
But hold on
Till that old second wind comes along

You probably don't want to hear advice from someone else
But I wouldn't be telling you if I hadn't been there myself
It's alright
it's alright
Sometimes that's all it takes
We're only human
We're supposed to make mistakes
But I survived all those long lonely days
When it seemed I did not have a friend
Cause all I needed was a little faith
So I could catch my breath and face the world again

Don't forget your second wind
Sooner or later you'll feel that momentum kick in
Don't forget your second wind
Sooner or later you'll feel that momentum kick in"

Edited February 4, 2015 by camilo

[ZenDarling 3,019]

I have taken some comfort in this song from Billy Joel, "You're Only Human." Joel suffers from depression as well.

"You're having a hard time and lately you don't feel so good....

Thank you camilo, I love this!

[ZenDarling 3,019]

“Weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them.”
― A.A. Milne

[Epictetus 19,083]

"Each of us 'learns' to look at the world through a window of expectations. And we forget we are looking through a window of our own making. If we "expect" ourselves or others or the world in general to be flawless, we are asking, even begging to be disappointed, frustrated, angered and saddened because nothing is "really" flawless if we look at it carefully enough.

If we expect "near" flawlessess in ourselves or others or the world, we are still inviting a great deal of disappointment, frustration, anger and sadness into our life.

Two things can help. One; is realizing that one is causing one's own suffering because of one's unrealistic expectations. It is unrealistic to expect finite, limited things to be flawless. So to "expect" flawlessness is by definition unrealistic. After realizing this, one can "lower" or "eliminate" one's unrealistic expectations and experience less disappointment, frustration, anger and sadness in one's life. One can substitute the words "I wish" for "I expect." I wish people were more polite. A wish is "softer" than an expectation. The fall from a unfulfilled wish is less painful than the fall from an unrealized expectation. One can often "realistically" work for improvement. Perfection is beyond mortals.

If happiness and peace depending on making finite things infinite, those feelings would be impossible. But happiness and peace depend on not expecting the impossible; not expecting any finite thing to be infinite and perfect.

- Lucius Flavius Arrianus [ Arrian of Nicodemia ] Modern translation

Edited February 4, 2015 by Epictetus

[SoulSurvivor 3,949]

“Everything will be okay in the end. If it’s not okay, it’s not the end.”

≈ John Lennon

[ZenDarling 3,019]

“How do you spell 'love'?" - Piglet
"You don't spell it...you feel it." - Pooh”
― A.A. Milne

[ZenDarling 3,019]

“Everything will be okay in the end. If it’s not okay, it’s not the end.”

≈ John Lennon

Thank you SoulSurvivor. John Lennon said so many profound and beautiful things.

[SoulSurvivor 3,949]

"I find hope in the darkest of days, and focus in the brightest. I do not judge the universe."
√Dalai Lama

[ZenDarling 3,019]

"Be the person your dog thinks you are". ~ Mary Ann Evans

[Levi 164]

What a great thread Idea!

“I find that the further I go back, the better things were, whether they happened or not” - Mark Twain

[ZenDarling 3,019]

What a great thread Idea!

“I find that the further I go back, the better things were, whether they happened or not” - Mark Twain

Thanks Levi! I hope that you'll help us keep it going!

[Epictetus 19,083]

"There will be depressed and anxious moods as long as people believe that there are some mistakes that make it either impossible or immoral to love one's own brain.

The truth is that there are no mistakes which make it impossible or immoral to love one's brain; no mistakes that require punishing, getting revenge upon or withholding love from one's own brain.

Even if one has failed at everything or is spending one's last days on death row in prison: it is always right to keeping loving one's brain. There is no circumstance or situation that makes it right to hate the brain, brutalize it mentally or seek revenge against it." - Patrick Gates.

Edited February 6, 2015 by Epictetus

[ZenDarling 3,019]

“The so-called ‘psychotically depressed’ person who tries to **** herself doesn’t do so out of quote ‘hopelessness’ or any abstract conviction that life’s assets and debits do not square. And surely not because death seems suddenly appealing. The person in whom Its invisible agony reaches a certain unendurable level will **** herself the same way a trapped person will eventually jump from the window of a burning high-rise. Make no mistake about people who leap from burning windows. Their terror of falling from a great height is still just as great as it would be for you or me standing speculatively at the same window just checking out the view; i.e. the fear of falling remains a constant. The variable here is the other terror, the fire’s flames: when the flames get close enough, falling to death becomes the slightly less terrible of two terrors. It’s not desiring the fall; it’s terror of the flames. And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling ‘Don’t!’ and ‘Hang on!’, can understand the jump. Not really. You’d have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling.”
― David Foster Wallace

[Gisele 1,094]

"I'd rather regret the things I have done than the things I have not." Lucille Ball

Edited February 7, 2015 by Gis

[SoulSurvivor 3,949]

"What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?"
**Vincent Van Gogh

[shio 3,676]

Our sorrows and wounds are healed only when we touch them with compassion.

-- Buddha

Forgiveness comes from the heart and only you can forgive yourself --- a doctor friend

[shio 3,676]

"Be the person your dog thinks you are". ~ Mary Ann Evans

I love this one!

[shio 3,676]

The truth will set you free but first it will p!$$ you off - Gloria Steinem

[Epictetus 19,083]

"You're only as good as the worst thing you've done in your life" is not true. But sadly, it is often an axiom of those who are depressed about the past and present or anxious about the future. It is like the story of the little boy on the beach who was crying. When asked the reason for his tears, the boy said: "I poured my glass of milk into the ocean and now the whole ocean is ruined!"

-- Anonymous