"People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."
— Maya Angelou
"Our mission is to plant ourselves at the gates of hope — not the prudent gates of Optimism, which are somewhat narrower; nor the stalwart, boring gates of Common Sense; nor the strident gates of self-righteousness … nor the cheerful, flimsy garden gate of ‘Everything is gonna be all right,’ but a very different, sometimes very lonely place, the place of truth-telling, about your own soul first of all and its condition, the place of resistance and defiance, the piece of ground from which you see the world both as it is and as it could be, as it might be, as it will be; the place from which you glimpse not only struggle, but joy in the struggle — and we stand there, beckoning and calling, telling people what we are seeing, asking people what they see."
— (“The Gates of Hope” meditation by Victoria Safford) from “The Poetry of Creatures,” Public Radio program On Being, Krista Tippet with Prof. Ellen Davis (via growingupdad)
"
Prof. Davis: It’s interesting that none of the so-called prophetic books of the Bible, the books that actually have the names of prophets attached to them, like Jeremiah, Isaiah, Amos, all of those books bring us to despair if we take them seriously. If we apply them to our lives they, in a sense, bring us to our knees. But none of them ends without what they call in the book of Jeremiah “the book of consolation.” None of them ends without a picture of the people of God returning to a healthy relationship with God, and all of them have a picture of the land being fruitful and productive, in celebration you might say, of that restored relationship between God and humanity, God and Israel.
And as kind of a parallel to that, when I began working in this area and I saw how deep the problems were, I got more and more depressed. I noticed this happens with my students when we begin studying this. The first movement is into depression.
Ms. Tippett: Mm-hmm.
Prof. Davis: But then there begins to be a sort of brightening on the path, you might say, as we begin to see that there are other people seeing the same things, we’re seeing and working on these things.
Ms. Tippett: You know, you use phrases in your writing that are kind of countercultural. You know, you speak of “a tenacious but severely chastened hope” or “things that are encouraging and deeply sobering.” And maybe it is that kind of realism that we have to have about hope, how closely it can be mingled with our despair and yet survive.
Prof. Davis: Certainly there is a difference between hope and a foolish optimism. And in order to have hope, you have to see the depth and the dimensions of the problem.
"— “The Poetry of Creatures,” Public Radio program On Being, Krista Tippet with Prof. Ellen Davis (via growingupdad)
"Frasier: Dad, we are talking about perjury! When is that ever acceptable?
Martin: Oh, you want an example? Fine! Let’s say, uh, what if there was a comet hurtling towards the earth…
Frasier: Oh, for God’s sake!
Martin: And you were the only person who could save the earth, but the only way to do it is by lying under oath. Would you do it then?
Frasier: Who am I lying to, the comet?
Martin: Oh, just answer the question!
Frasier: All right, I suppose in certain extreme cases…
Martin: So, then you’d lie?
Frasier: To save mankind from a talking comet, yes!"
Martin: Oh, you want an example? Fine! Let’s say, uh, what if there was a comet hurtling towards the earth…
Frasier: Oh, for God’s sake!
Martin: And you were the only person who could save the earth, but the only way to do it is by lying under oath. Would you do it then?
Frasier: Who am I lying to, the comet?
Martin: Oh, just answer the question!
Frasier: All right, I suppose in certain extreme cases…
Martin: So, then you’d lie?
Frasier: To save mankind from a talking comet, yes!"
— Frasier, To Tell the Truth (the problem with hypotheticals)
"Love without truth is sentimentality; it supports and affirms us but keeps us in denial about our flaws. Truth without love is harshness; it gives us information but in such a way that we cannot really hear it."
— Tim Keller, via Relevant Magazine (via else-wheres)
(via symphosanna)
"There are times when it is hard to believe in the future, when we are temporarily just not brave enough. When this happens, concentrate on the present. Cultivate le petit bonheur (the little happiness) until courage returns. Look forward to the beauty of the next moment, the next hour, the promise of a good meal, sleep, a book, a movie, the likelihood that tonight the stars will shine and tomorrow the sun will shine. Sink roots into the present until the strength grows to think about tomorrow."
— Ardis Whitman (via julie911)
(via symphosanna)
"Some have said their cats would rather be petted than eat. Love-starved people are not unlike those felines. They devour any attentiveness or interest because of hidden hunger. All of us, sooner or later, experience that kind of hunger pang."
"Adding wings to caterpillars does not create butterflies—it creates awkward and dysfunctional caterpillars. Butterflies are created through transformation…"
— Stephanie Marshal
