Jan Bretz

“Reading is the act of listening and speaking at the same time, with someone you've never met, but love. Even if you hate them, it's a loving thing to do.

You speak someone else's words to yourself, and hear them for the first time.

What you're doing now is listening to me, in the parlor of your mind, but also speaking to yourself, thinking about the parts of me you like or the parts that aren't funny enough. You evaluate, like Mrs. Miller says. You think and wrestle with every word.”
― Daniel Nayeri, Everything Sad Is Untrue

“A god who listens is love. A god who speaks is law. At their worst, the people who want a god who listens are self-centered...And the ones who want a god who speaks are cruel. They just want laws and justice to crush everything...Love is empty without justice. Justice is cruel without love....God should be both. If a god isn't, that is no God.”
― Daniel Nayeri, Everything Sad Is Untrue

“I'll tell you this. I've labored all my life. I've baked and brewed. I've woven, spun, and dyed. I've kept my husband's house and raised his young. And many other things besides. So where was time for holiness? What strength was left for faith? Let monks and nuns and priests have care of that. The dead shall rise? The Lord himself will sit as justicer in manor court? It may be true for all I know. But in the meanwhile bread, beer, work, and rest at night, they're truth enough for me.”
― Frederick Buechner, Godric

“among the failed startups, 80 percent never managed to innovate beyond their original vision for their companies. Among the successful startups, however, two-thirds had found success by discarding whatever founding vision had gotten them funded, because trial and error had led them to a new vision of success.”
― Keith Ferrazzi, Competing in the New World of Work: How Radical Adaptability Separates the Best from the Rest