Lisa > Lisa's Quotes

“Happiness is the consequence of personal effort. You fight for it, strive for it, insist upon it, and sometimes even travel around the world looking for it. You have to participate relentlessly in the manifestations of your own blessings. And once you have achieved a state of happiness, you must never become lax about maintaining it. You must make a mighty effort to keep swimming upward into that happiness forever, to stay afloat on top of it.”
― Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love

“Uniqueness is wasted on youth. Like fine wine or a solid flossing habit, you'll be grateful for it when you're older.”
― Sloane Crosley, I Was Told There'd Be Cake: Essays

“All endings are also beginnings. We just don't know it at the time.”
― Mitch Albom, The Five People You Meet in Heaven

“You see, you closed your eyes. That was the difference. Sometimes you cannot believe what you see, you have to believe what you feel. And if you are ever going to have other people trust you, you must feel that you can trust them, too--even when you’re in the dark. Even when you’re falling.”
― Mitch Albom, Tuesdays With Morrie

“There are all kinds of mix tapes. there is always a reason to make one.”
― Rob Sheffield, Love Is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time

“It's always that one song that gets to you. You can hide, but the song comes to find you.”
― Rob Sheffield, Love Is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time

“No, life cannot be understood flat on a page. It has to be lived; a person has to get out of his head, has to fall in love, has to memorize poems, has to jump off bridges into rivers, has to stand in an empty desert and whisper sonnets under his breath... We get one story, you and I, and one story alone. God has established the elements, the setting and the climax and resolution. It would be a crime not to venture out, wouldn't it?" -Donald Miller,Through Painted Deserts”
― Donald Miller

“I could not have known then that everybody, every person, has to leave, has to change like seasons; they have to or they die. The seasons remind me that I must keep changing.”
― Donald Miller, Through Painted Deserts: Light, God, and Beauty on the Open Road

“Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted. And experience is often the most valuable thing you have to offer.”
― 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

“I don’t live in either my past or my future. I’m interested only in the present. If you can concentrate always on the present, you’ll be a happy man. Life will be a party for you, a grand festival, because life is the moment we’re living now.”
― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist

“You are, after all, what you think. Your emotions are the slaves to your thoughts, and you are the slave to your emotions.”
― Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love

“Faith is walking face-first and full-speed into the dark. If we truly knew all the answers in advance as to the meaning of life and the nature of God and the destiny of our souls, our belief would not be a leap of faith and it would not be a courageous act of humanity; it would just be... a prudent insurance policy.”
― Elizabeth Gilbert

“You were given life; it is your duty (and also your entitlement as a human being) to find something beautiful within life, no matter how slight.”
― Elizabeth Gilbert

“The Bhagavad Gita--that ancient Indian Yogic text--says that it is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else's life with perfection.”
― Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love

“There is so much about my fate that I cannot control, but other things do fall under the jurisdiction. I can decide how I spend my time, whom I interact with, whom I share my body and life and money and energy with. I can select what I can read and eat and study. I can choose how I'm going to regard unfortunate circumstances in my life-whether I will see them as curses or opportunities. I can choose my words and the tone of voice in which I speak to others. And most of all, I can choose my thoughts.”
― Elizabeth Gilbert

“The most important thing we learn at school is the fact that the most important things can't be learned at school.”
― Haruki Murakami, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

“The most often repeated commandment in the Bible is 'Do not fear.' It's in there over two hundred times. That means a couple of things, if you think about it. It means we are going to be afraid, and it means we shouldn't let fear boss us around. Before I realized we were supposed to fight fear, I thought of fear as a subtle suggestion in our subconscious designed to keep us safe, or more important, keep us from getting humiliated. And I guess it serves that purpose. But fear isn't only a guide to keep us safe; it's also a manipulative emotion that can trick us into living a boring life.”
― Donald Miller, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: What I Learned While Editing My Life