“Writers — journalists, essayists, bloggers, poets, playwrights — can disturb the social oppression that functions like a coma on the population, a coma despots call peace, and they stanch the blood flow of war that hawks and profiteers thrill to.” — Toni Morrison

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” — Martin Luther King, Jr.

“It is our knowledge — the things we are sure of — that makes the world go wrong and keeps us from seeing and learning.” — Lincoln Steffens

“Love is the very difficult understanding that something other than yourself is real.” — Iris Murdoch

“If you perceive the universe as being a universe of abundance, then it will be. If you think of the universe as one of scarcity, then it will be.” — Milton Glaser

Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men; and among those fibers, as sympathetic threads, our actions run as causes, and they come back to us as effects. — Herman Melville

Sometimes being a friend means mastering the art of timing. There is a time for silence. A time to let go and allow people to hurl themselves into their own destiny, and a time to prepare to pick up the pieces when it’s all over. — Gloria Naylor

The function of prayer is not to influence God, but rather to change the nature of the one who prays. — Soren Kierkegaard

Faith is taking the first step, even when you don’t see the whole staircase. — Martin Luther King, Jr.

Forget the clock. Get yourself a compass instead. — Ann S. Moore

Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards. — Søren Kierkegaard

Laughter is the closest distance between two people — Victor Borge

Justice is what love looks like in public. — Cornel West

The world breaks everyone, and afterward, some are strong at the broken places. — Ernest Hemingway

When action grows unprofitable, gather information; when information grows unprofitable, sleep. — Ursula K. Le Guin

An artist’s duty is to stay open-minded and in a state where s/he can receive information and inspiration. You always have to be ready for that little artistic Epiphany. — Nick Cave

Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has. — Margaret Mead

Our treasure lies in the beehive of our knowledge. We are perpetually on the way thither, being by nature winged insects and honey gatherers of the mind. — Friedrich Nietzsche

Happiness is a goal, but not a destination. — Gillian Conner-Smith

A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle. — Proverb

It is never too late to give up our prejudices. — Henry David Thoreau

Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity. — Martin Luther King, Jr.

If you want to know what a man’s like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals. — Sirius Black, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Blessed are those who give without remembering. And blessed are those who take without forgetting.
— Bernard Meltzer

Inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist. — George Carlin

For every beauty there is an eye somewhere to see it. For every truth there is an ear somewhere to hear it. For every love there is a heart somewhere to receive it. — Ivan Panin

Nature is God’s intelligent design. — Paul Stamets

Our worst fear is not that we are inadequate, our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. — Nelson Mandela

Silly is you in a natural state, and serious is something you have to do until you can get silly again. — Mike Myers

Good works are links that form a chain of love. — Mother Teresa

Everybody wants the same thing, rich or poor … not only a warm, dry room, but a shelter for the soul. — Samuel “Sambo” Mockbee

If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, ‘thank you,’ that would suffice. — Meister Eckhart.

To defend oneself against fear is to insure that one will, one day, be conquered by it; fears must be faced. — James Baldwin

Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in a lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we are saved by love. — Reinhold Niebuhr

It turns out it might actually be possible to run a large, profitable corporation and still have something resembling a conscience, an idea that seems almost antithetical to the brutal capitalist ideal of money-uber-alles. — Mark Morford

Why didn’t Jesus write anything? Because once you write something down…it becomes dogma. — Margaret Atwood

The highest revelation is that God is in every man. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

I think it’s realistic to have hope. One can be a perverse idealist and say the easiest thing: ‘I despair. The world’s no good.’ That’s a perverse idealist. It’s practical to hope, because the hope is for us to survive as a human species. That’s very realistic. — Studs Terkel

Time exists so that not everything happens at once. — Unknown

If you come to a fork in the road, take it. — Yogi Berra

Love and prayer are nothing but the highest forms of attention. — Simone Weil

Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence. — Erich Fromm

We should take care not to make the intellect our god; it has, of course, powerful muscles, but no personality.— Albert Einstein

For the hard of hearing you shout, and for the almost-blind, you draw large and startling figures. — Flannery O’Connor

A lesson learned with humor is a lesson learned. – The Talmud

When hope is not pinned wriggling onto a shiny image or expectation, it sometimes floats forth and opens. –Anne Lamott

Life is too important to be taken seriously. –Oscar Wilde