Joy > Joy's Quotes

“And when you love a book, commit one glorious sentence of it, -perhaps your favorite sentence- to memory. That way you won't forget the language of the story that perhaps moved you to tears.”
― John Irving

“The same road always leads to the same place. If we get on it expecting to go somewhere different, we'll be disappointed, won't we? As you said, it isn't very smart.

...Do the same things, get the same results. Simple, stupid.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“Not appreciating the noise until she was surrounded by silence.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“Through all my adult life, I had wanted to know exactly where I was going and what path to take to get there. I had never considered the beauty of where I was.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“The beginning of a journey is always uncertainty, but with uncertainty comes hope.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“we cannot change where God has put us. If we are to bloom at all, we must bloom where we have been planted.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“But is life a success when it doesn’t include time for after-school talks, and curling up to read books on winter nights, and weaving daisy chains in the summer? Is it a success when you have all the big things but none of the small ones? Is it as it should be when everybody grows up and moves to opposite coasts and doesn’t care if they ever see each other?”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“What we cannot change, we must endure without bitterness.
Sometimes we must try to view the actions of those around us with forgiveness. We must realize that they are going on the only road they can see. Sometimes we cannot raise our chins and see eye to eye, so we must bow our heads and have faith in one another.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“Pride and resentment do not create bread that will rise. Bread, like a good life, can only be created by honest measure, patience, warmth, and time.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“Be patient, Katie. Everything doesn’t have to work itself out today.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“Happiness is not in getting what you want, but in learning to want what you get. Don’t waste your time crying over what you’re not given. When you have tears in your eyes, you can’t see all the beautiful things around you.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“Your children are the greatest gift God will give to you and their souls the heaviest responsibility He will place in your hands. When you are old, nothing else you’ve done will have mattered…”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“I understood now that all of us have that place inside that wants to be part of something, that needs the comfort and companionship of loved ones. Within each of us, there is an empty room, and when we open the door, light flows in. The wider we open it, and the longer we leave it open, the brighter our souls become.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“The secret to a happy life is not in getting what you want. It is in learning to want what you get.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“To my grandmothers,
for tilling the soil in which we grew and for watering our roots with stories of all the old things”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“INDIAN wisdom says our lives are rivers. We are born somewhere small and quiet and we move toward a place we cannot see, but only imagine. Along our journey, people and events flow into us, and we are created of everywhere and everyone we have passed. Each event, each person, changes us in some way. Even in times of drought we are still moving and growing, but it is during seasons of rain that we expand the most—when water flows from all directions, sweeping at terrifying speed, chasing against rocks, spilling over boundaries. These are painful times, but they enable us to carry burdens we could never have thought possible.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“The man who buys what he does not need will often need what he cannot buy.’ ”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses

“Your children are the greatest gift God will give to you, and their souls the heaviest responsibility He will place in your hands. Take time with them, teach them to have faith in God. Be a person in whom they can have faith. When you are old, nothing else you’ve done will have mattered as much.”
― Lisa Wingate, Tending Roses