Preach

"I don't trust a theologian who dismisses the beauty of science or a scientist who doesn't believe in the power of mystery."

-Brene Brown

Effort Surplus

"A surplus of effort could overcome a deficit of confidence."

-Sonia Sotomayor

Wilderness

"The clearest way into the universe is through a forest wilderness."

-John Muir

The pearl is the oyster's autobiography - Federico Fellini

"You guys know how pearls are made, right? The most valuable ones are called 'wild pearls,' created spontaneously in the sea and are extremely rare. A pearl is the byproduct of an unwanted irritant (typically something sharp, dangerous or painful like a parasite, a grain of sand or a piece of shell) that has lodged itself inside the walls of the shell, where it becomes impossible to abandon. The oyster then reacts with a defense mechanism that coats the irritant, over time turning it into a thing of lateral iridescent beauty. I love this. We don't get to choose the irritants that invade our beings, the things that make it past the shell. But the story doesn't end there: the pearl is the oyster's art, it's her novel, her paining, her song. In the same way it is possible for our wounds and our pain, our grit, to be our gift of transformation and transcendence as well. Slowly and surely, layer by beautiful layer, we are growing something of high worth and deep, incontestable beauty inside us."

-Ali Makes Things

The Innkeeper

"My favorite Christmas character: the innkeeper. I mean, I get him. He's like me. On most days, I can't be Mary or Joseph or the wisest of men or the gentlest of shepherds, but I still get to decide day after day, year after year, to make room for a miracle."

-Erin Loechner

Conversations

"Every friend was once a stranger and if you know this, you have to understand that conversations are the beginning of connection."

-Israelmore Ayivor

No's

no
might make them angry.
but
it will make you free.

-if no one has ever told you, your freedom is more important than their anger

-unknown

An Artist

"I feel like I'm an artist. I mean, if how you smile and how you dress even for bed and how you order appetizers and how you arrange your fridge and your sentences and your dreams is all art, then I feel like I'm an artist. We are all artists in some cozy corner booth of our lives.

But I've ruined two large canvasses with my artless attempts at more than a base very very basic base layer, and I'm feeling like I'm anything but an artist…but then I remember how I'm trying not to say anything negative about anybody for three days as a start and I think that should include myself, maybe. So let me tell you this: The top two shelves in my fridge look so darn swoon right now. Like an artist lives here."

-Mackin Ink

Consumerism

"Here's the thing: In the end I believe our life will be characterized by contribution or consumerism, by one or the other, but not both."

-Allie Maria Smith

Unplug

"Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you."

-Anne Lamott

They change your cells

"When you interact with someone repeatedly over time, it changes you. That's why what you watch on TV or read or see in a magazine is so critical. So watch what you watch. Be careful with whom or what you are interacting. These recurrent interactions change your cells. They change your soul. They change your countenance."

-Truman G. Madsen

Fearfully and Wonderfully Made

"I love myself as I am- for I am
fearfully and wonderfully made.
I am beautiful, right no, jut
the way I am. I am more than
my body, the clothes in my closet,
or the style of my hair, for
I am strong and do hard things.
I am worth loving. I hold myself
to a standard of grace not perfection,
and I refuse to put myself down.
I am a beautiful being, a daughter
of God, and I love myself as I am.

-The Small Seed #choosingtolovemyself movement

Big Bursts and Little Bursts

"Life depends on what she things of as 'big bursts' and 'little bursts'. Big bursts are things like marriage or children, intimacies that keep you afloat, but these big bursts hold dangerous, unseen currents. Which is why you need the little bursts as well: a friendly clerk, let's say or the waitress at Dunkin' Donuts who knows how you like your coffee. Tricky business, really."

-Elizabeth Strout, Olive Kitteridge

Complete Destruction

"For a seed to achieve its greatest expression, it must come completely undone. The shell cracks, its insides come out and everything changes. To someone who doesn't understand growth, it would look like complete destruction."

-Cynthia Occelli

Spring Seeds

"Show me that you have a seed there, and I am prepared to expect miracles."

-Henry David Thoreau

salt + honey

put some honey and sea water by your bed.
acknowledge. that your being needs sweetness and cleansing.
that it is sore.
that you are. soft.

-orishas
-nayyirah waheed

We are Trees

  

“Sometimes I feel like a tree on a hill, at the place where all the wind blows and the hail hits the tree the hardest. All the people I love are down the side aways, sheltered under a great rock, and I am out of the fold, standing alone in the sun and the snow. I feel like I am not part of the rest somehow, although they welcome me and are kind. I see my family as they sit together and it is like they have a certain way between them that is beyond me. I wonder if other folks ever feel included yet alone.” 

-Sarah Agnes Prine, These is My Words

contract or expand

some people
when they hear
your story.
contract.
others
upon hearing
your story.
expland.
and
this is how
you know.

-nayyirah waheed

Unplug

"Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you."

-Anne Lamott