Jennifer Sardam > Jennifer's Quotes

“We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.”
― T. S. Eliot, Four Quartets

“Nonsense is that which does not fit into the prearranged patterns which we have superimposed on reality...Nonsense is nonsense only when we have not yet found that point of view from which it makes sense.”
― Gary Zukav

“we are the richest people on earth, praying to get richer. We’re tangled in unmanageable debt while feeding the machine, because we feel entitled to more. What does it communicate when half the global population lives on less than $2 a day, and we can’t manage a fulfilling life on twenty-five thousand times that amount? Fifty thousand times that amount?”
― Jen Hatmaker, 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess

“Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful.”
― William Morris

“Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up.”
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones

“I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes. Because if you are making mistakes...you're Doing Something.”
― Neil Gaiman

“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“Here’s what is truly at the heart of Wholeheartedness: Worthy now. Not if. Not when. We are worthy of love and belonging now. Right this minute. As is.”
― Brené Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You're Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are

“A human being is part of a whole, called by us the “universe,” a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separate from the rest—a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest us…. We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if humanity is to survive. —Albert Einstein”
― Melinda Blau, Consequential Strangers: Turning Everyday Encounters Into Life-Changing Moments

“Whatever we learn to do, we learn by actually doing it. People come to be builders, for instance, by building, and harp players by playing the harp. In the same way, by doing just acts, we come to be just. By doing self-controlled acts, we come to be self-controlled, and by doing brave acts, we come to be brave. (ARISTOTLE)”
― Lisa Garrigues, Writing Motherhood: Tapping Into Your Creativity as a Mother and a Writer

“We are who we are, be­cause of those we choose to love and be­cause of those who love us.”
― Kate Mosse, The Winter Ghosts

“Once the notion of perfectionism is abolished, persistence is allowed its rightful place in guiding us in achieving our goals.”
― Carla Birnberg, What You Can When You Can: Healthy Living on Your Terms

“Persistence leaves room for success, even in the face of overbooked schedules and home-baked cookies, allowing us to take pride in what we achieved despite the challenges instead of crying over where we’ve fallen short. We’re inclined to trust Voltaire in thinking perfect is the enemy of good—especially since the desire”
― Carla Birnberg, What You Can When You Can: Healthy Living on Your Terms

“We humans are all manifestations of one Divine spirit vibrating at different levels of consciousness and frequencies at one time. Like cells in a body, we’re all on this planet together, and when one cell attacks another in the body, we call that cancer. Similarly, when we attack one another (or ourselves) through condemnation and judgment, it’s no less cancerous and toxic to our entire being—body, mind, and soul.”
― Sonia Choquette, Ask Your Guides: Connecting to Your Divine Support System

“If the answer is simple, God is speaking.”
― Albert Einstein

“Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune.”
― Jim Rohn

“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Mother Night

“Dreams, books, are each a world; and books, we know,
Are a substantial world, both pure and good:
Round these, with tendrils strong as flesh and blood,
Our pastime and our happiness will grow.”
― William Wordsworth

“Do you pay regular visits to yourself? Don't argue or answer rationally. Let us die, and dying, reply.”
― Rumi

“Jane Austen never did marry. Why doesthat statement call for such reflexive pity? It carries a diferent meaning if we follow it up: Jane Austen never did marry, and therefore she was given the time and perspective to produce books as well-written as those by anyone who ever lived."

-David Whyte”
― David Whyte, The Three Marriages: Reimagining Work, Self and Relationship

“We can never know in the beginning, in giving ourselves to a person, to a work, to a marriage or to a cause, exactly what kind of love we are involved with. When we demand a certain specific kind of reciprocation before the revelation has flowered completely we find ourselves disappointed and bereaved and in that grief may miss the particular form of love that is actually possible but that did not meet our initial and too specific expectations. Feeling bereft we take our identity as one who is disappointed in love, our almost proud disappointment preventing us from seeing the lack of reciprocation from the person or the situation as simply a difficult invitation into a deeper and as yet unrecognizable form of affection.”
― David Whyte, Consolations - Revised edition: The Solace, Nourishment and Underlying Meaning of Everyday Words

“Anything or anyone that does not bring you alive is too small for you.”
― David Whyte

“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”
― Anais Nin

“I'm selfish, impatient and a little insecure. I make mistakes, I am out of control and at times hard to handle. But if you can't handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don't deserve me at my best.”
― Marilyn Monroe

“Thoreau wrote, "the mass of men live lives of quiet desperation." This is as true today as it was back then. How many men stand on a balcony and wonder what happened?... He wanted adventure and he got two weeks' vacation. He wanted a mission and he got a lawn that needs mowing. He wanted purpose and he got a cubicle. He wanted a mighty steed and he got a minivan. He wanted a castle and he got a mortgage. He wanted a battle to fight and he got televised sports. He wanted wisdom and he got talking heads on TV. He wanted treasure and he got endless debt. He wanted every part of his life to be wonderful, and here he is... standing on a balcony, in bleak, ruminating hesitation.”
― Zan Perrion, The Alabaster Girl

“People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.”
― George Orwell

“Do not ask your children
to strive for extraordinary lives.
Such striving may seem admirable,
but it is the way of foolishness.
Help them instead to find the wonder
and the marvel of an ordinary life.
Show them the joy of tasting
tomatoes, apples and pears.
Show them how to cry
when pets and people die.
Show them the infinite pleasure
in the touch of a hand.
And make the ordinary come alive for them.
The extraordinary will take care of itself.”
― William Martin, The Parent's Tao Te Ching: Ancient Advice for Modern Parents

“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.”
― Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings