Lisa > Lisa's Quotes

“The paradox of our time in history is that we have taller buildings but shorter tempers, wider Freeways, but narrower viewpoints. We spend more, but have less, we buy more, but enjoy less. We have bigger houses and smaller families, more conveniences, but less time. We have more degrees but less sense, more knowledge, but less judgment, more experts, yet more problems, more medicine, but less wellness.

We drink too much, smoke too much, spend too recklessly, laugh too little, drive too fast, get too angry, stay up too late, get up too tired, read too little, watch TV too much, and pray too seldom. We have multiplied our possessions, but reduced our values. We talk too much, love too seldom, and hate too often.

We've learned how to make a living, but not a life. We've added years to life not life to years. We've been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to meet a new neighbor. We conquered outer space but not inner space. We've done larger things, but not better things.

We've cleaned up the air, but polluted the soul. We've conquered the atom, but not our prejudice. We write more, but learn less. We plan more, but accomplish less. We've learned to rush, but not to wait. We build more computers to hold more information, to produce more copies than ever, but we communicate less and less.

These are the times of fast foods and slow digestion, big men and small character, steep profits and shallow relationships.

These are the days of two incomes but more divorce, fancier houses, but broken homes. These are days of quick trips, disposable diapers, throwaway morality, one night stands, overweight bodies, and pills that do everything from cheer, to quiet, to kill. It is a time when there is much in the showroom window and nothing in the stockroom. A time when technology can bring this letter to you, and a time when you can choose either to share this insight, or to just hit delete...

Remember, to spend some time with your loved ones, because they are not going to be around forever. Remember, say a kind word to someone who looks up to you in awe, because that little person soon will grow up and leave your side.

Remember, to give a warm hug to the one next to you, because that is the only treasure you can give with your heart and it doesn't cost a cent.

Remember, to say, "I love you" to your partner and your loved ones, but most of all mean it. A kiss and an embrace will mend hurt when it comes from deep inside of you.

Remember to hold hands and cherish the moment for someday that person might not be there again. Give time to love, give time to speak! And give time to share the precious thoughts in your mind.”
― Bob Moorehead, Words Aptly Spoken

“When You Are Old"


WHEN you are old and grey and full of sleep,
And nodding by the fire, take down this book,
And slowly read, and dream of the soft look
Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

How many loved your moments of glad grace,
And loved your beauty with love false or true,
But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face;

And bending down beside the glowing bars,
Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled
And paced upon the mountains overhead
And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.”
― W.B. Yeats

“Her scent
on the sheets
slowly fading
like the last notes
of your favourite song
drifting into silence;
a ghost of absence
haunting the room”
― Kirk Diedrich

“Whenever you go out-of-doors, draw the chin in, carry the crown of the head high, and fill the lungs to the utmost; drink in the sunshine; greet your friends with a smile, and put soul into every handclasp. Do not fear being misunderstood and do not waste a minute thinking about your enemies. Try to fix firmly in your mind what you would like to do; and then, without veering off direction, you will move straight to the goal. Keep your mind on the great and splendid things you would like to do, and then, as the days go gliding away, you will find yourself unconsciously seizing upon the opportunities that are requiered for the fulfillment of your desire, just as the coral insect takes from the running tide the element it needs. Picture in your mind the able, earnest, useful person you desire to be, and the thought you hold is hourly transforming you into that particular individual... Thought is supreme. Preserve a right mental attitude - the attitude of courage, frankness, and good cheer. To think rightly is to create. All things come through desire and every sincere prayer is answered. We become like that on which our hearts are fixed. Carry your chin in and the crown of your head high. We are good in the chrysalis.”
― Elbert Hubbard

“There is a vast melancholy in the canticles of the wolves, melancholy infinite as the forest, endless as these long nights of winter and yet that ghastly sadness, that mourning for their own, irremediable appetites, can never move the heart for not one phrase in it hints at the possibility of redemption; grace could not come to the world from its own despair, only through some external mediator, so that, sometimes, the beast will look as if he half welcomes the knife that despatches him.”
― Angela Carter, The Company of Wolves

“249    Make few resolutions. Make specific resolutions. And fulfill them with the help of God.”
― Josemaría Escrivá, The Way

“Libraries are reservoirs of strength, grace and wit, reminders of order, calm and continuity, lakes of mental energy, neither warm nor cold, light nor dark ... In any library in the world, I am at home, unselfconscious, still and absorbed."

[Still in Melbourne January 1987]”
― Germaine Greer, Daddy, We Hardly Knew You

“Do not abandon yourselves to despair. We are the Easter people and hallelujah is our song.”
― Pope John Paul II (Karol Wojtyła)

“She was not just a wild creature, she was a wounded creature.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“Sometimes I feel I am crammed with demons.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“The unspoken words trembled in the air.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“I'm not young. I've never had any youth.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“Oh what an ill fate it was that has made me love that man.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“All dreams are sinister.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“Well, you won't abandon me, will you."

"Don't be silly, Ludens, you are buckled to my heart.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“Perhaps there was an intimacy which did not need words.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“Better keep such things decently buried.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“I need daylight. But I wander in the dark.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“I must proceed to my next mystery and for the moment forget this one completely.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“Or was some act of revenge still pending, some thunderbolt long cherished and prepared?”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“Ludens experienced, as an extra pain, an intimation of the happiness he might have felt in such a place.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“Now she did not even wish to try, for fear of rousing up something terrible.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“He was attentive but impersonal, and esteemed rather than loved.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“I see him as a god from elsewhere who has lost his way . . .”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“Happiness. What's that? I don't know. How can one be happy when one loves a demon?”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“Since she had been looking after him she had felt bound to him by a strange silent love.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“Your infatuation will end in tears.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“He did not touch her but enjoyed the particular intimate pain of the tension between them.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“He felt misery, loneliness, a terrible need for love.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet

“He was glad she had come; she was for him, as he for her, 'another place'.”
― Iris Murdoch, The Message to the Planet