When the heart is ready for a fresh beginning, unforeseen things can emerge. And in a sense, this is exactly what a beginning does. It is an opening for surprises. Surrounding the intention and the act of beginning, there are always exciting possibilities.
— John O’Donohue, To Bless the Space Between Us, p. 5
I’ve started to realize that waiting is an art, that waiting achieves things. Waiting can be very, very powerful. Time is a valuable thing. If you can wait two years, you can sometimes achieve something that you could not achieve today, however hard you worked, however much money you throw up in the air, however many times you banged your head against the wall.
— The Courage to Change by Dennis Wholey
. . .
We don’t have to put our life on hold while we wait. We can direct our attention elsewhere; we can practice acceptance and gratitude in the interim; we can trust that we do have a life to live while we are waiting — then we go about living it.
— Melody Beattie, The Language of Letting Go, p. 293
That’s the heartening news for those of us on a spiritual path. We don’t have to do what we always did! We don’t have to think the way we always thought. We don’t have to expect what we always expected.
— Karen Casey, Change Your Mind and Your Life Will Follow, p. 19-20
Once we make an apology, we don’t have to keep repeating it. If someone wants to keep on extricating an apology from us for the same incident, that is the person’s issue, and we don’t have to get hooked.
— Melody Beattie, The Language of Letting Go, p. 273
Walking away doesn’t mean agreeing with your adversary. On the contrary, it means nothing more than that you have made the choice to disengage. These days, I actually relish every opportunity to let a situation pass me by that would have engaged my ire in the past. I feel empowered every time I make this choice.
— Karen Casey, Change Your Mind and Your Life Will Follow, p. 18
Happy women know that with each phase of life, they give up something, but they also get something in return.
— Dan Baker, PhD, and Cathy Greenberg, PhD, What Happy Women Know, p. 236
Perspective will come in retrospect.
We could strain for hours today for the meaning of something that may come in an instant next year.
Let it go. We can let go of our need to figure things out, to feel in control.
Now is the time to be. To feel. To go through it. To allow things to happen. To learn. To let whatever is being worked out in us take its course.
In hindsight, we will know. It will become clear. For today, being is enough. We have been told that all things shall work out for good in our life. We can trust that to happen, even if we cannot see the place today’s events will hold in the larger picture.
— Melody Beattie, The Language of Letting Go, p. 263
Stop making excuses for other people.
Stop making excuses for ourselves.
While it is our goal to develop compassion and achieve forgiveness, acceptance, and love, it is also our goal to accept reality and hold people accountable for their behavior. We can also hold ourselves accountable for our own behavior, and, at the same time, have compassion and understanding for ourselves.
— Melody Beattie, The Language of Letting Go, p. 260
When the deepest desire we feel within our hearts is for something other than God, a spirit of entitlement develops. We see ourselves as needing something we don’t have and we believe we should have. Justice is on our side. So we think. Prayer becomes demand when desire becomes our tyrant.
Soon we’re caught in the addictive cycle. Whatever brings satisfaction relieves pain for the moment, then creates deeper emptiness that, in turn, more rudely clamors for relief. We lose our power to choose. The will becomes a slave to whatever god makes us feel better. We die as persons while Satan chuckles.
— Larry Crabb, Shattered Dreams, p. 86
Happy women know that saying no to others gives you the opportunity to say yes to yourself.
— Dan Baker, PhD, and Cathy Greenberg, PhD, What Happy Women Know, p. 234