""You want to know what hell is? What brimstone and burining really is?"
"Yes"
"Hell is the perfect recollection of every evil thing you've done in your life, every thoughtless word, every cruel, evil thought or action. It's knowing that you could have helped your brother and didn't. Hell is clarity, Bob. It's nothing more than clarity." He leaned forward as if to confide in me, his gaze intense. "Do you want to know what heaven is?"
I was locked into his gaze. "Yes."
His voice was barely above a whisper, "It's the same thing.""
— Richard Paul Evans (A Perfect Day)

"But to mourn, that's different. To mourn is to be eaten alive with homesickness for the person."
— Olive Ann Burns (Cold Sassy Tree)

"They's a heap more to God's will than death, disapoint-ment, and like thet. Hit's God's will for us to be good and do good, love one another, be forgivin'..." He laughed. "I reckon I ain't very forgivin', son. I can forgive a fool, but I ain't inner-rested in coddlin' hypocrites. Well anyhow, folks who think God's will jest has to do with sufferin' and dyin', they done missed the whole point.""
— Olive Ann Burns (Cold Sassy Tree)

""Hit ain't sacrilege. Miss Effie Belle says when she cain't think what to have for dinner, she asts God and right off He gives her an idea. To my thinkin', thet's sacrilege."
Miss Love really laughed. "There's not a woman in the world who hasn't prayed what to cook for dinner, Rucker!""
— Olive Ann Burns (Cold Sassy Tree)

""'Ask and it shall be given you,'" I began. "'Seek and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you; For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.' We have the same message in the Book of Saint John," I said, sounding for all the world like a preacher...."
Well, but how could I just stop there? Those words were worse than nothing if I didn't tell what they meant to Grandpa. Looking at the long rough box, I spoke timid, in a mumbled voice. Not preachified at all. "Grandpa didn't think Jesus meant, by that, that we should ast God for things, or for special favors. He said we could trust that in the nature of things, without astin', we'll get lots of blessin's and happy surprises and maybe a miracle or two. When Jesus said ast and you'll get it, He meant things of the spirit, not the flesh. Right now for instance, I could ast, 'Lord please raise Grandpa from the dead,' but it wouldn't happen. But I can say, 'Please, God, comfort me,' and I'll get heart's ease. Grandpa said Jesus meant us to ast for hope, forgiveness, and all that. Ast, 'Hep us not be scared, hep us not be greedy, give us courage to try." I was really carried away. "Ast any such and God will give it to you. But don't ast Him not to let fire burn, or say spare me from death. At least, uh, that's what Grandpa said.""
— Olive Ann Burns (Cold Sassy Tree)

"And so seated next to my father in the train compartment, I suddenly asked, "Father, what is sexsin?"
He turned to look at me, as he always did when answering a question, but to my surprise he said nothing. At last he stood up, lifted his traveling case off the floor and set it on the floor.
"Will you carry it off the train, Corrie?" he said.
I stood up and tugged at it. It was crammed with the watches and spare parts he had purchased that morning.
"It's too heavy," I said.
"Yes," he said, "and it would be a pretty poor father who would ask his little girl to carry such a load. It's the same way, Corrie, with knowledge. Some knowledge is too heavy for children. When you are older and stronger, you can bear it. For now you must trust me to carry it for you.""
— Corrie Ten Boom (The Hiding Place)

"It's the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist)

"When you really want something to happen, the whole universe conspires so that your wish comes true."
— Paulo Coelho

"There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure."
— Paulo Coelho

"It is said that the darkest hour of the night comes just before the dawn."
— Paulo Coelho

"That’s what alchemists do. They show that, when we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better, too."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist)

"We are afraid of losing what we have, whether it's our life or our possessions and property. But this fear evaporates when we understand that our life stories and the history of the world were written by the same hand."
— Paulo Coelho

"Don't give in to your fears. If you do, you won't be able to talk to your heart."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist)

"The secret of life, though, is to fall seven times and to get up eight times."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist)

"My heart is afraid that it will have to suffer," the boy told the alchemist one night as they looked up at the moonless sky.
"Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And that no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams, because every second of the search is a second's encounter with God and with eternity."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist)

"When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better too."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist)

"No matter what he does, every person on earth plays a central role in the history of the world. And normally he doesn't know it."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist)

"If you start by promising what you don't even have yet, you'll lose your desire to work towards getting it."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist - Gift Edition)

"What you still need to know is this: before a dream is realized, the Soul of the World tests everything that was learned along the way. It does this not because it is evil, but so that we can, in addition to realizing our dreams, master the lessons we’ve learned as we’ve moved toward that dream. That’s the point at which, as we say in the language of the desert, one "dies of thirst just when the palm trees have appeared on the horizon."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist - Gift Edition)

"The wise men understood that this natural world is only an image and a copy of paradise. The existence of this world is simply a guarantee that there exists a world that is perfect. God created the world so that, through its visible objects, men could understand his spiritual teachings and the marvels of his wisdom."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist)

"But if you believe yourself worthy of the thing you fought so hard to get, then you become an instrument of God, you help the Soul of the World, and you understand why you are here."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist)

"The boy reached through to the Soul of the World, and saw that it was part of the Soul of God. And he saw that the Soul of God was his own soul. And that he, a boy, could perform miracles."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist)

"Every second of the search is an encounter with God. When I have been truly searching for my treasure, every day has been luminous...I've discovered things along the way that I never would have seen had I not had the courage to try things that seemed impossible for a shepherd to achieve."
— Paulo Coelho (The Alchemist - Gift Edition)

"I'm convinced true fulfillment is living in God's world one day at a time, savoring it, leaving today's disapointments behind and borrowing no troubles from tomorrow. It's done not only by accepting life, fever, and things that go bump in the night, but also by cultivating love and new and old friendships, and especially by finding a new work or project that makes it exciting just to get up in the morning."
— Olive Ann Burns (Leaving Cold Sassy: The Unfinished Sequel to Cold Sassy Tree)

"Cancer teaches that life is too short to be lived like that; you take you knocks when they come, not in advance."
— Olive Ann Burns (Leaving Cold Sassy: The Unfinished Sequel to Cold Sassy Tree)

"Life bullies us son, but God don't. He had good reasons for fixin' it where if'n you git too sick or too hurt to live, why, you can die, same as a sick chicken. I've knowed a few really sick chickens to git well, and lots a-folks git well thet nobody ever thought to see out a-bed agin cept in a coffin. Still and all, common sense tells you this much: everwhat makes a wheel run over a track will make it run over a boy if'n he's in the way. If'n you'd a got kilt, it'd mean you jest didn't move fast enough, like a rabbit that gits caught by a hound dog... When it comes to prayin' we got it all over the other animals, but we ain't no different when it comes to livin' and dyin'. If'n you give God the credit when somebody don't die, you go'n blame Him when they do die? Call it His Will? Ever noticed we git well all the time and don't die but once't? Thet has to mean God always wants us to live if'n we can. "
— Olive Ann Burns (Leaving Cold Sassy: The Unfinished Sequel to Cold Sassy Tree)

"There's a lot of talk these days about giving children self-esteem. It's not something you can give; it's something they have to build. Coach Graham worked in a no-coddling zone. Self-esteem? He knew there was really only one way to teach kids how to develop it: You give them something they can't do, they work hard until they find they can do it, and you just keep repeating the process."
— Randy Pausch (The Last Lecture)

"My colleague told me; "It took a long time, but I've finally figured it out. When it comes to men who are romantically interested in you, it's really simple. Just ignore everything they say and only pay attention to what they do.""
— Randy Pausch (The Last Lecture)

"Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted."
— Randy Pausch (The Last Lecture)

"It's not about how to achieve your dreams, it's about how to lead your life, ... If you lead your life the right way, the karma will take care of itself, the dreams will come to you."
— Randy Pausch (The Last Lecture)

"Brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want something badly enough. They are there to keep out the other people"
— Randy Pausch (The Last Lecture)

"Showing gratitude is one of the simplest yet most powerful things humans can do for each other."
— Randy Pausch (The Last Lecture)

"A lot of people want a shortcut. I find the best shortcut is the long way, which is basically two words: work hard."
— Randy Pausch (The Last Lecture)

"Someone who thinks death is the scariest thing doesn't know a thing about life."
— Sue Monk Kidd (The Secret Life of Bees)

"I hadn't been out to the hives before, so to start off she gave me a lesson in what she called 'bee yard etiquette'. She reminded me that the world was really one bee yard, and the same rules work fine in both places. Don't be afraid, as no life-loving bee wants to sting you. Still, don't be an idiot; wear long sleeves and pants. Don't swat. Don't even think about swatting. If you feel angry, whistle. Anger agitates while whistling melts a bee's temper. Act like you know what you're doing, even if you don't. Above all, send the bees love. Every little thing wants to be loved."
— Sue Monk Kidd

"...some things don't matter much. Like the color of a house. How big is that in the overall scheme of life? But lifting a person's heart--now, that matters. The whole problem with people is...they know what matters, but they don't choose it...The hardest thing on earth is choosing what matters."
— Sue Monk Kidd (The Secret Life of Bees)

"Knowing can be a curse on a person's life. I'd traded in a pack of lies for a pack of truth, and I didn't know which one was heavier. Which one took the most strength to carry around? It was a ridiculous question, though, because once you know the truth, you can't ever go back and pick up your suitcase of lies. Heavier or not, the truth is yours now."
— Sue Monk Kidd (The Secret Life of Bees)

"After you get stung, you can't get unstung
no matter how much you whine about it."
— Sue Monk Kidd (The Secret Life of Bees)

"Sunset is the saddest light there is."
— Sue Monk Kidd (The Secret Life of Bees)

"It is the peculiar nature of the world to go on spinning no matter what sort of heartbreak is happening."
— Sue Monk Kidd (The Secret Life of Bees)

"There's nothing like a song about lost love to remind you how everything precious can slip from the hinges where you've hung it so careful."
— Sue Monk Kidd (The Secret Life of Bees)

""Books are the most tolerant of friends.""
— Richard Paul Evans

""...even the most horribl e of nightmares is laced with the promise of dawn.""
— Richard Paul Evans

"Love is never convenient-and rarely painless"
— Richard Paul Evans (The Sunflower: A Novel)

"“I have learned a great truth of life. We do not succeed in spite of our challenges and
difficulties, but rather, precisely because of them.”
"
— Richard Paul Evans (The Looking Glass: A Novel)

"We carry around in our heads these pictures of what our lives are supposed to look like, painted by the brush of out intentions. It's the great, deep secret of humanity that in the end none of our lives look the way we thought they would. As much as we wish to believe otherwise, most of life is a reaction to circumstances."
— Richard Paul Evans (The Sunflower: A Novel)

""The noble causes of life have always seemed foolish to the uninspired. But that is of small conern. I worry less about the crucified than those who pounded the nails.""
— Richard Paul Evans, "The Letter"

"Denial, perhaps, is a necessary human mechanism to cope with the heartaches of life. "
— Richard Paul Evans (The Christmas Box)

"The smells of Christmas are the smells of childhood [p. 53]"
— Richard Paul Evans (The Christmas Box)

"If relationships were hard, mariage was even harder... it seemed like most couples struggled. It went with the territory. What did Nana always say? Stick two different people with two different sets of expectations under one roof and it ain't always going to be shrimp and grits on Easter."
— Nicholas Sparks (The Lucky One)