The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley Quotes

“You don't forgive people for their benefit. You do it for yours. Because if you don't, it'll eat you alive. Jealousy, envy, holding a grudge- they rot you from the inside out.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“Maybe these simple, little, ordinary things are the big things I’m meant to accomplish with my life.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“If I'm not willing to feel the pain of life, how can I ever expect to feel the joy”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“We all have our stuff. We all have holes, and we all have scars. And we all have things we’d rather keep hidden, because we think it’s easier not to burden someone else with our baggage.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“Happiness isn't that hard to find, you know. It's everywhere. It's all around us. But it's not something that happens to us. It's something we seek. It's something we pursue.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“Life is beautiful and horrible and wonderful and awful all at the same time”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“Happiness isn’t that hard to find, you know. It’s everywhere. It’s all around us. But it’s not something that happens to us. It’s something we seek. It’s something we pursue. And you’ll never find it if you never let anyone in.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“Is it possible that the happy days and the sad days, I don’t know, need each other somehow? As if the two things have to coexist for either to matter at all?”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“Maybe happiness isn’t about what you do, Isadora. Maybe it’s about who you do it with. Or simply about accepting who you are.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“Life is beautiful and horrible and wonderful and awful all at the same time’?” He looks at me then. “And that is the adventure.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“The problem with holding in that hurt is that you’re stuck at that door, hand on the doorknob, every day. You don’t move forward because you’re too busy holding things back.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“I want to belong to someone. I want to be safe. I want to be lifted up. I want to have a spot, I want to share unspoken secrets with a look, and I want the wind to make me soar.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“We didn’t have enough years together. We didn’t have enough time. It could’ve been a hundred, and it still wouldn’t have been enough.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“Mornings are the best time of day, Isadora. A clean slate. A chance to do better than you did yesterday.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“I think it’s better to be present than it is to be on time.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“Taking it all in. Slowing down. Being present. Savoring this exact moment for exactly what it is.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“impossible for two attractive medical professionals to take a simple elevator ride that doesn’t end in a make-out session.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“While it would be easier to criticize the person I was, the truth is, I simply want to give her a hug. She was doing her best.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“Don’t be afraid to occupy your space. You have as much of a right to exist in this world as everyone else.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“No, Isadora,” he says. “You were trusting.” “Which is basically the same thing.” He reaches out and takes my hand. “You just trusted the wrong person.” I meet his eyes, and I want to believe him. That ever-present voice calling out at the back of my mind—He’s just like everyone else! He’s going to leave too!—is strangely silent.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“As a defense mechanism, Isadora Bentley often held full-on conversations with people in her unique and spectacular head. It made up for all the conversations she didn't have in real life.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“I'm not wasting my time chopping up a pineapple, for Pete's sake. I've got life to avoid.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“How many other incorrect assumptions had I made, seeing the world through my jaded lense?”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“The wounds, even as old as many of them are, somehow still feel heavy. A mother who never protected me still has an effect on me years later.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“The wind is in control of the kite, but the kite doesn’t mind. It’s what actually makes a kite a kite. I’m starting to think I need to let go to soar. It’s such an odd feeling for me. It’s so different from what I’m used to. It’s like I’m being magnetically pulled in a completely new direction.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“Step one: “Smile more.” No problem. I have a lovely smile. I catch a glimpse of myself in the glass of my fireplace and try it out. Hmm. I try again with teeth. Yikes. But I can do this. Of course I can. How hard can it be to smile? Chapter 3 Turns out, smiling is hard. I have a new appreciation for models. I’d always assumed it was easy to stand there and let someone take photos of you. I now understand it is not easy. My smile lands somewhere between “feeding hyena” and “painful constipation.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“All at once I see it—sadness and “Surfer Girl,” heartache and hope, melding together to create an entirely new, deep, indelible emotion. And while it has no name, it is so much sweeter than either is on its own.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“This is the horrible part, Shirley. But it doesn’t erase the wonderful and the beautiful. Not by a long shot. In fact, I think this awful part makes those happy days even happier.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“I’ve perfected my smile, by the way. The trick, it turns out, is not to overthink it. Apparently, that’s the trick to a lot of things.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley

“They’ve invested in her. Last year her business doubled, and she expects the same this year. They believed in her and gave her an opportunity she wouldn’t have had otherwise.”
― Courtney Walsh, The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley