Meeting Life's Challenges

So apt in these trying days, and oh so tough to follow. So tough.

Self-acceptance comes from meeting life's challenges vigorously. Don't numb yourself to your trials and difficulties, nor build mental walls to exclude pain from your life. You will find peace not by trying to escape your problems, but by confronting them courageously. You will find peace not in denial, but in victory.

-- J. Donald Walters

Who you really are

I believe that when you realize who you really are, you understand that nothing can stop you from becoming that person.

-- Christine Lincoln

Wealth

The real measure of our wealth is how much we'd be worth if we lost all our money.

-- Benjamin Jowett (1817-1893)

Time

All we have to decide is what to do with the time we are given.

-- Gandalf to Frodo ("The Fellowship of the Ring" movie)

Learners and the learned

In times of profound change, the learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.

-- Eric Hoffer

God is awake

Have courage for the great sorrows of life and patience for the small ones; and when you have laboriously accomplished your daily task, go to sleep in peace. God is awake.

-- Victor Hugo (1802 1885)

Power

We touch the lives of others in ways we often never know. People sometimes come into our personal world for fleeting moments and can leave us forever changed. We have more power to create or to destroy than we can imagine.

We can leave things or individuals better or worse than we found them.

-- Gail Pursell Elliott

C-ing it through

" Confidence, curiosity, courage and constancy. ...the secrets of making dreams come true. "

-- Walt Disney

Therefore..

Nothing worth doing is completed in our lifetime,
Therefore, we are saved by hope.
Nothing true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history;
Therefore, we are saved by faith.
Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone.
Therefore, we are saved by love.
No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as from our own;
Therefore, we are saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness.

-- Reinhold Niebuhr