It is paradoxical that many educators and parents still differentiate between a time for learning and a time for play without seeing the vital connection between them.

We are no longer puppets being manipulated by outside powerful forces: we become the powerful force ourselves.

I dont think anybody likes to be in pain, but I dont reject pain because pain is definitly a part of life, and when you grow to recognize this, then when pain comes you experience it, you don’t happily. I dont go out in the street and joyously celebrating the fact that I am in pain but I do take it in my arms, I experience it, I cry if necessary, I yell, I scream, I curse, I do whatever is necessary to get that out of me, then I try to learn what caused it and to do something about it. Otherwise it’s just diffuse energy that doesn’t go for any particular reason I see, so I dont celebrate pain

Love is always inclusive. It says everybody come, everybody share with me because only through those sharings in relationships and loving relationships can I continue to grow.

When you are in pain, you see less clearly, and therefore what is may not be, and you get further and further away from the reality that will help you again rebalance your life. So you got to take this rag in hand and clean that slate clean and start all over again because then you can see again what the possibilites are, and there are always many alternatives not just one.

I think it begins with doing away with the hate, the viciousness and the past and starting with something new. It has to start with cleaning it all away, you can’t go to the past, the past gnaws at you and destroys you and there’s nothing that can be done about it. Why waste so much of your life, your mind, your creativity over what has already gone and can’t be changed.

Risks must be taken, because the greatest risk in life is to risk nothing. The person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing, is nothing, and becomes nothing. He may avoid suffering and sorrow, but he simply cannot learn and feel and change and grow and love and live.

You need to know that people care. How we all need to care more about each other; when we experience deep pain of an emotional nature, we need to be approached with great sensitivity.

I think that may be the greatest challenge of love… To love when you are not loved in return. Its an enormous challenge.

There are scores of people waiting for someone just like us to come along; people who will appreciate our compassion, our encouragement, who will need our unique talents. Someone who will live a happier life merely because we took the time to share what we had to give.

I think we’ve grown up when we recognize that a beautiful day is not necessarily a day where everything went your way. But maybe a day by through some action of yours you made it somebody elses day and you made them happy.

Don’t spend your precious time asking “Why isn’t the world a better place?” It will only be time wasted. The question to ask is “How can I make it better?” To that there is an answer.

I still get wildly enthusiastic about little things… I play with leaves. I skip down the street and run against the wind.

I’ve always thought that people need to feel good about themselves and I see my role as offering support to them, to provide some light along the way.

Love is always bestowed as a gift – freely, willingly and without expectation. We don’t love to be loved; we love to love.

Love is life. And if you miss love, you miss life.

Never idealize others. They will never live up to your expectations.

Happiness and love are just a choice away.

We seem to gain wisdom more readily through our failures than through our successes. We always think of failure as the antithesis of success, but it isn’t. Success often lies just the other side of failure.

And so, too, I speak of love: he who is held by it is held by the strongest of bonds, and yet the stress is pleasant. Moreover, he can sweetly bear all that happens to him. When one has found this bond, he looks for no other.

Forgiveness is a quality that we must develop if we are going to interact with other people. You see people cannot be by necessity what we want them to be, we are going to have to accept what they are, and that involves this process of forgiving. None of us is perfect and all of us will make mistakes and I’m just grateful that there are people around in my life and have been since the beginning of my history, who are forgiving of me, who recognize that I may do errors or that I might hurt them. Being imperfect, we must recognize that people will also hurt us and if we take on that anger and if we maintain that grudge then we’re the ones that are going to be taking on their actions as our problem and consequently becoming buried in pain, despair, anger and viciousness… There’s no point in it! What is done cannot be rectified, it can only be accepted, recognized and forgiven and then you cut these terrible things that are hanging around you’re neck like dead albatrosses and you free yourself by forgiving. When you think about it, you only have two choices. One is to maintain the anger, the hurt forever which gnaws away at you, it doesn’t hurt the other person. The other person may be out having a glorious time, having forgotten all about it but here you are in misery over what they have caused you or what you think they have caused you. When you let it go, its you who becomes free.

Do you know something that maybe you have forgotten? Because nobody has told you this for many many years.. You are uniquely, something that will never occurr again in the history of the world. You are that magic combination that will never be again, and I dont care who you are! How exalted you feel, or how lowly you feel. Everyone of you is something unique and special. I wish we could tell this to children early, so it doesn’t take you a lifetime to find it out. Everyone of you has something to give that only you can give.

Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.

There are two big forces at work, external and internal. We have very little control over external forces such as tornadoes, earthquakes, floods, disasters, illness and pain. What really matters is the internal force. How do I respond to those disasters? Over that I have complete control.

If I don’t have wisdom; I can only teach you my ignorance.
If I don’t have joy; I can only teach you despair.
If I don’t have freedom; I can only put you in cages.

The majority of us lead quiet, unheralded lives as we pass through this world. There will most likely be no ticker-tape parades for us, no monuments created in our honor. But that does not lessen our possible impact, for there are scores of people waiting for someone just like us to come along; people who will appreciate our compassion, our unique talents. Someone who will live a happier life merely because we took the time to share what we had to give. Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have a potential to turn a life around. It’s overwhelming to consider the continuous opportunities there are to make our love felt.

As soon as the love relationship does not lead me to me, as soon as I in a love relationship do not lead another person to himself, this love, even if it seems to be the most secure and ecstatic attachment I have ever experienced, is not true love. For real love is dedicated to continual becoming.

We must never forget that the need for affection, touching, reassuring, communication and love is still there — only now, intensified. We all need each other.

If I dont have wisdom, I can only teach you my ignorance.
If I dont have joy, I can only teach you despair.
If I dont have freedom, I can only put you in cages.

I exist, I am, I am here, I am becoming, I make my own life and no one else makes it for me. I must face my own shortcomings, mistakes, transgressions. No one can suffer my non-being as I do, but tomorrow is another day, and I must decide to leave my bed and live again. And if I fail, I don’t have the comfort of blaming you or life or God.