Manis Friedman > Quotes

“It's like the old question, "Do you lock your house to keep people out, or to protect what's inside?" Should a person act modestly and dress modestly in order to prevent intrusion from the outside, undesirable things from happening, or to preserve and maintain what is inside: the delicate and sensitive ability to have and maintain an intimate relationship.”
― Manis Friedman, Doesn't Anyone Blush Anymore: Love, Marriage and the Art of Intimacy

“Our emotions can be either corrupted or elevated. Human love was not created to be without premeditated purpose.”
― Manis Friedman, Doesn't Anyone Blush Anymore: Love, Marriage and the Art of Intimacy

“Marriage doesn’t demand having everything in common or living a life of easygoing affinity. It means as long as we are together and here for each other, everything else is negotiable.”
― Manis Friedman, Creating a Life That Matters: How to Live and Love with Meaning and Purpose

“The loving person doesn’t wait. He doesn’t react; he initiates. He has a capacity to love.”
― Manis Friedman, Doesn't Anyone Blush Anymore?

“In marriage, the kind of love that is useful is a love that has more to do with the right attitude or the right approach to the relationship rather than the kind of love that is concentrated on “feelings.” Intimacy flourishes in an atmosphere that is permeated with kindness, respect, and sanctity. True love grows within that atmosphere as well.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“It’s true you can’t get everything you want from one person, but then, who says you need everything? Where did you get the idea you deserve everything? The issue is not what you deserve. The issue is, whom are you here to serve? Yourself, or your spouse? Yourself, or God?”
― Manis Friedman, Doesn't Anyone Blush Anymore?

“INTIMACY IS AN ART. It’s not something that just happens. It must be learned, cultivated, and practiced carefully if it is to flourish.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“What the Jewish teachings say is that the unique attraction between men and women originates from a desire to be whole again, to reunite two parts of one adam. It is unnatural to be alone, for God originally created the two as one. Their separation is an unnatural imposition, and thus they are told to seek one another and overcome this unnatural state.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“Married love is fiery, passionate, and intense. It is not constant; it flares up and cools down again. That’s what makes it unique and what creates the attraction. The strength of this kind of love lies in the fact that it is not constant and consistent. Were the relationship of husband and wife to become steady and unchanging like that of a brother and sister, the relationship would become stagnant, and that would be unhealthy.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“intimacy is a serious concern for anyone seeking to lead a meaningful life.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“The purpose of modesty is not to hide ourselves from view; the purpose of modesty is to preserve our intimacy.”
― Manis Friedman, Doesn't Anyone Blush Anymore?

“Intimacy is a connection between two people that transcends all “things.” There are relationships that are created around things—for instance, you both like piña coladas and walks in the rain. But is that grounds for marriage? You both like to play tennis. Is that grounds for marriage? You both want love. Is even that grounds for marriage? Think about it: if you’re interested in getting love when you enter into a relationship, who are you marrying? The person or the love? Love is a very lovely thing, but it’s not the person”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“The mistake is that married couples don’t need increased physical pleasure or better physical pleasure. What we need is closeness. Even more than that, we need oneness. We want and need the joy of intimacy.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“Intimacy implies a soulful connection with another person, an exclusively private and deep relationship.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“The real thing is now. Now that all the excitement has settled down, there are two people who are responsible to one another, who can love each other and respect each other. That’s real.”
― Manis Friedman, Doesn't Anyone Blush Anymore?

“There needs to be love within a relationship, certainly in a marriage. The question is, what is its proper place? In any relationship the most important thing is the foundation, the truth, of the relationship, not the feeling. Feelings rise and ebb. A strong foundation, however, is stable and unchanging.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“In fact, heaven isn’t mentioned in the Torah, except in the very first line. The rest of the Torah is about earth. Because our mission is not to get to heaven but to bring Godliness down to earth.”
― Manis Friedman, Creating a Life That Matters: How to Live and Love with Meaning and Purpose

“The celebrity who loses control in his personal or family life while striving for fame and fortune in the world at large is not a genuine leader and is unfit to be a role model.”
― Manis Friedman, Creating a Life That Matters: How to Live and Love with Meaning and Purpose

“God doesn’t play dice with the universe. Whenever two people come together in marriage, it signifies a special connection between two souls as well as a distinct opportunity.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“I said, “You feel married to him because when the two of you got married, God brought together two parts of one soul. You were meant for each other and so God made it happen. It wasn’t a mistake. When a marriage doesn’t work out and there’s a divorce, some people say, ‘Well, that was a mistake. We weren’t really meant for one another.’ But that’s not right. It wasn’t a mistake. God doesn’t make mistakes. It’s like saying, ‘Oops, I gave birth to the wrong baby. This is not my kid.’ You don’t give birth to the wrong child and you don’t end up marrying the wrong man.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“Far more egregious are those couples who manipulate their children and wield them as a weapon to punish their spouse. That is out and out evil.”
― Manis Friedman, Creating a Life That Matters: How to Live and Love with Meaning and Purpose

“If you raise your children well you can Spoil you grandchildren

If you Spoil your children you will have to raise your grandchildren”
― Manis Friedman, Creating a Life That Matters: How to Live and Love with Meaning and Purpose

“When real intimacy exists between a husband and a wife, they are both exposed and vulnerable. Without this vulnerability, there can be no intimacy. Engaging in real intimacy is risky, but the respect and protection of the vulnerability that gives birth to intimacy make it infinitely precious.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“The essential and unique attraction between men and women is not sexual but spiritual.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“This is also why when a person is down, we say find someone who has worse problems and help them instead.”
― Manis Friedman, Creating a Life That Matters: How to Live and Love with Meaning and Purpose

“Unlike love, intimacy cannot exist without the participation of another. While love is about “me,” intimacy is about “us.”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“You can use your mind to deal with your feelings and emotions, and train them to respond to intelligence.”
― Manis Friedman, Doesn't Anyone Blush Anymore?

“Real intimacy, by contrast, points us outward from the self toward another. It lifts us out of ourselves to encounter the infinite in another person. Desiring that kind of intensely meaningful encounter is intrinsic to our true nature, which is why we yearn for it so deeply and feel its absence so keenly. Indulging in physical pleasure for its”
― Manis Friedman, The Joy of Intimacy: A Soulful Guide to Love, Sexuality, and Marriage

“When God created the world out of nothingness, the first thing He had to do was create existence—because nothing had ever existed before.”
― Manis Friedman, Creating a Life That Matters: How to Live and Love with Meaning and Purpose

“Humility doesn’t require feeling insignificant and worthless. Humility means realizing that I’m important, I’m valid, I’m worthy of the privilege of serving God. Why struggle to eliminate the negative when we can accentuate the positive? The”
― Manis Friedman, Creating a Life That Matters: How to Live and Love with Meaning and Purpose