Loving Yourself
Spend time with — or talk to — someone who loves you exactly as you are. See yourself through their eyes. From this day on, commit to becoming someone who loves you exactly as you are.
KEEP MOVING.
— Maggie Smith, Keep Moving, p. 81
Do It with Love.
Whatever you do, do it with love. If you can’t feel love in your heart, then go for kindness, respect, patience — or stay silent. As difficult as it is to comprehend — and I grant you, it is difficult if not impossible to believe — absolutely everything in our lives is a stage set up for love.
— Caroline Myss, Intimate Conversations with the Divine, p. 262
More Than Enough
Forget what you’ve learned about scarcity; it doesn’t apply to intangibles. When someone triumphs or finds joy, they aren’t taking what would have been yours — they are making more of what we all draw from. There is more than enough.
KEEP MOVING.
— Maggie Smith, Keep Moving, p. 77
Plant Seeds
It is impossible to know, in the moment, how a small act of goodness will reverberate through time. The notion is empowering and it is frightening — because it means that we’re all capable of changing the world, and responsible for finding those opportunities to protect, feed, grow, and guide love. We can all plant seeds, though only some of us may be so lucky as to sit in their shade. Since we can’t start twenty years ago, the best time to start is today.
— Bishop Michael Curry, Love Is the Way, p. 139
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, April 2, 2021
Spread the Care
Fight the urge to withdraw, to fold in on yourself, as if your pain is contagious and might infect someone else. We are here to take care of one another; the care is what’s catching, spreading person to person to person. So take — and give — care.
KEEP MOVING.
— Maggie Smith, Keep Moving, p. 71
Photo: Bluebell Trail, Bull Run Regional Park, Virginia, April 8, 2021
Thankful for the Wounds
Be thankful for your wounds, as strange as that sounds; the ways you’ve been hurt and the ways you’ve faltered make you useful to other people. Empathy is a kind of fellowship; be thankful that your wounds made this togetherness possible.
KEEP MOVING.
— Maggie Smith, Keep Moving, p. 70
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, April 6, 2021
Truly Good News
The truly good news is that God is not a distant God, a God to be feared and avoided, a God of revenge, but a God who is moved by our pains and participates in the fullness of the human struggle.
— Henri J. M. Nouwen, You Are Beloved, p. 105
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, April 2, 2021
Grow Anyway.
It is not your job to make other people comfortable with who you are. Be wary of those who don’t want you to change or grow. Grow anyway — there is no alternative.
KEEP MOVING.
— Maggie Smith, Keep Moving, p. 66
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, March 30, 2021
Love With Skin On
We are being shepherded beyond our fears and needs to becoming our actual selves. This sucks and hurts some days, and I frequently do not want it or agree to it. But it persists, like water wearing through a boulder in the river. Hope springs from realizing we are loved, can love, and are love with skin on. Then we are unstoppable.
— Anne Lamott, Dusk Night Dawn, p. 190-191
Photo: South Riding, Virginia, March 30, 2021
Open Your Eyes.
Do not let loss drain the color from everything. Open your eyes to the brilliance around you: it’s still here.
KEEP MOVING.
— Maggie Smith, Keep Moving, p. 56
Photo: Keukenhof, Holland, April 17, 2004