"Treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is.  Treat a man as he can and should be and he will become as he can and should be."

-Goethe

 "What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us."

-Oliver Wendell Holmes

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.  Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.  It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.  We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?  Actually, who are you not to be?  You are a child of God.  Your playing small does not serve the world.  There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you.  We are all meant to shine, as children do.  We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.  It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone.  And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.  As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."

-Marianne Williamson
A Return to Love:  Reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles

"You either get bitter or you get better. It's that simple.  You either take what has been dealt to you and allow it to make you a better person, or you allow it to tear you down.  The choice does not belong to fate, it belongs to you."

-Josh Shipp

"For as God bestows any ability or gift upon any of us, he binds us to such as have need of us and as we are able to help."

-John Calvin

Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love.
Where there is injury, pardon.
Where there is doubt, faith.
Where there is despair, hope.
Where there is darkness, light.
Where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master,
grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

-Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi

"No task will be so sordid and base . . .that it will not shine and be reckoned very precious in God's sight."

-John Calvin

"Isn't it interesting with regard to the matter of individual

fulfillment, a natural and basic human need, that some fail to 

observe that one of the great advantages of being fulfilled is 

that one does not have to spend all of his or her time thinking about being fulfilled?"

Neal A. Maxwell

BYU Devotional

Family Perspectives, 15 January 1974

"All of these events (in our lives) happen for divine purposes.  It has taught me that God truly blesses the details of our lives.  These interactions and relationships, which might seem random in the moment, are ordained to bless and perfect our lives."

Visions of Glory by John Pontius
pg. 16