Reflections Inspirational Quotes

We've searched our database for all the quotes and captions related to Reflections Inspirational. Here they are! All 100 of them:

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Sometimes you wake up. Sometimes the fall kills you. And sometimes, when you fall, you fly.
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Neil Gaiman (The Sandman, Vol. 6: Fables & Reflections)
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The truth is, unless you let go, unless you forgive yourself, unless you forgive the situation, unless you realize that the situation is over, you cannot move forward.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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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.
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Marianne Williamson (A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of "A Course in Miracles")
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The outer world is a reflection of the inner world. Other people’s perception of you is a reflection of them; your response to them is an awareness of you.
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Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
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There is nothing more rare, nor more beautiful, than a woman being unapologetically herself; comfortable in her perfect imperfection. To me, that is the true essence of beauty.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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When in a relationship, a real man doesn't make his woman jealous of others, he makes others jealous of his woman.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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I will not try to convince you to love me, to respect me, to commit to me. I deserve better than that; I AM BETTER THAN THAT...Goodbye.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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We all make mistakes, have struggles, and even regret things in our past. But you are not your mistakes, you are not your struggles, and you are here NOW with the power to shape your day and your future.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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If you hang out with chickens, you're going to cluck and if you hang out with eagles, you're going to fly.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Live your truth. Express your love. Share your enthusiasm. Take action towards your dreams. Walk your talk. Dance and sing to your music. Embrace your blessings. Make today worth remembering.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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When you see a good person, think of becoming like her/him. When you see someone not so good, reflect on your own weak points.
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Confucius
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Renew, release, let go. Yesterday’s gone. There’s nothing you can do to bring it back. You can’t β€œshould’ve” done something. You can only DO something. Renew yourself. Release that attachment. Today is a new day!
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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I want to live my life in such a way that when I get out of bed in the morning, the devil says, "aw shit, he's up!
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Who could be so lucky? Who comes to a lake for water and sees the reflection of moon.
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Jalal ad-Din Muhammad ar-Rumi
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When you hold a grudge, you want someone else’s sorrow to reflect your level of hurt but the two rarely meet.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Don’t worry if people think you’re crazy. You are crazy. You have that kind of intoxicating insanity that lets other people dream outside of the lines and become who they’re destined to be.
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Jennifer Elisabeth (Born Ready: Unleash Your Inner Dream Girl)
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If my mind can conceive it, and my heart can believe it - then I can achieve it.
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Muhammad Ali (The Soul of a Butterfly: Reflections on Life's Journey)
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The beautiful journey of today can only begin when we learn to let go of yesterday.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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My past has not defined me, destroyed me, deterred me, or defeated me; it has only strengthened me.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Want to keep Christ in Christmas? Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, forgive the guilty, welcome the unwanted, care for the ill, love your enemies, and do unto others as you would have done unto you.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Plant seeds of happiness, hope, success, and love; it will all come back to you in abundance. This is the law of nature.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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She lacks confidence, she craves admiration insatiably. She lives on the reflections of herself in the eyes of others. She does not dare to be herself.
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AnaΓ―s Nin
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Maybe this is why we read, and why in moments of darkness we return to books: to find words for what we already know.
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Alberto Manguel (A Reading Diary: A Passionate Reader's Reflections on a Year of Books)
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Do you know what you are? You are a manuscript oΖ’ a divine letter. You are a mirror reflecting a noble face. This universe is not outside of you. Look inside yourself; everything that you want, you are already that.
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Jalal ad-Din Muhammad ar-Rumi (Hush, Don't Say Anything to God: Passionate Poems of Rumi)
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I promise you nothing is as chaotic as it seems. Nothing is worth diminishing your health. Nothing is worth poisoning yourself into stress, anxiety, and fear.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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I want to be the best version of myself for anyone who is going to someday walk into my life and need someone to love them beyond reason.
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Jennifer Elisabeth (Born Ready: Unleash Your Inner Dream Girl)
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Down on the lake rosy reflections of celestial vapor appeared, and I said, "God, I love you" and looked to the sky and really meant it. "I have fallen in love with you, God. Take care of us all, one way or the other." To the children and the innocent it's all the same.
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Jack Kerouac (The Dharma Bums)
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There is nothing more beautiful than seeing a person being themselves. Imagine going through your day being unapologetically you.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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I believe in the immeasurable power of love; that true love can endure any circumstance and reach across any distance.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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However mean your life is, meet it and live it; do not shun it and call it hard names. It is not so bad as you are. It looks poorest when you are richest. The fault-finder will find faults even in paradise. Love your life, poor as it is. You may perhaps have some pleasant, thrilling, glorious hours, even in a poorhouse. The setting sun is reflected from the windows of the almshouse as brightly as from the rich man's abode; the snow melts before its door as early in the spring. I do not see but a quiet mind may live as contentedly there, and have as cheering thoughts, as in a palace.
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Henry David Thoreau (Walden)
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People tend to be generous when sharing their nonsense, fear, and ignorance. And while they seem quite eager to feed you their negativity, please remember that sometimes the diet we need to be on is a spiritual and emotional one. Be cautious with what you feed your mind and soul. Fuel yourself with positivity and let that fuel propel you into positive action.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Beauty is not who you are on the outside, it is the wisdom and time you gave away to save another struggling soul like you.
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Shannon L. Alder
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Love is forgiving, accepting, moving on, embracing, and all encompassing. And if you’re not doing that for yourself, you cannot do that with anyone else.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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This life is for loving, sharing, learning, smiling, caring, forgiving, laughing, hugging, helping, dancing, wondering, healing, and even more loving. I choose to live life this way. I want to live my life in such a way that when I get out of bed in the morning, the devil says, 'aw shit, he's up!
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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It's funny how, in this journey of life, even though we may begin at different times and places, our paths cross with others so that we may share our love, compassion, observations, and hope. This is a design of God that I appreciate and cherish.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, handsome, talented and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be?
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Marianne Williamson (A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of "A Course in Miracles")
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A beautiful thing happens when we start paying attention to each other. It is by participating more in your relationship that you breathe life into it.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Each star is a mirror reflecting the truth inside you.
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Aberjhani (Journey through the Power of the Rainbow: Quotations from a Life Made Out of Poetry)
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If you are not the hero of your own story, then you're missing the whole point of your humanity.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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You are not a victim. No matter what you have been through, you're still here. You may have been challenged, hurt, betrayed, beaten, and discouraged, but nothing has defeated you. You are still here! You have been delayed but not denied. You are not a victim, you are a victor. You have a history of victory.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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There is strange comfort in knowing that no matter what happens today, the Sun will rise again tomorrow.
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Aaron Lauritsen (100 Days Drive: The Great North American Road Trip)
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It's up to you today to start making healthy choices. Not choices that are just healthy for your body, but healthy for your mind.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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When forever becomes a place...when forever ceases to be just a word… when it ceases to be just a measurement of time…but instead becomes a place where soul mates can dance to the song in their hearts... that is a reflection of true love.
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Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
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I met a boy whose eyes showed me that the past, present and future were all the same thing.
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Jennifer Elisabeth
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Stop trying to be less of who you are. Let this time in your life cut you open and drain all of the things that are holding you back.
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Jennifer Elisabeth (Born Ready: Unleash Your Inner Dream Girl)
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It’s time to care; it’s time to take responsibility; it’s time to lead; it’s time for a change; it’s time to be true to our greatest self; it’s time to stop blaming others.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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I can do this… I can start over. I can save my own life and I’m never going to be alone as long as I have stars to wish on and people to still love.
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Jennifer Elisabeth (Born Ready: Unleash Your Inner Dream Girl)
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There are not enough days in forever to allow me to fully express the depth of my love for you.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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The greatest love stories are not those in which love is only spoken, but those in which it is acted upon.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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A lot of the conflict you have in your life exists simply because you're not living in alignment; you're not be being true to yourself.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Sometimes it's the same moments that take your breath away that breathe purpose and love back into your life.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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The struggles we endure today will be the β€˜good old days’ we laugh about tomorrow.
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Aaron Lauritsen (100 Days Drive: The Great North American Road Trip)
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If you fuel your journey on the opinions of others, you are going to run out of gas.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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The victim mindset dilutes the human potential. By not accepting personal responsibility for our circumstances, we greatly reduce our power to change them.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Get Off The Scale! You are beautiful. Your beauty, just like your capacity for life, happiness, and success, is immeasurable. Day after day, countless people across the globe get on a scale in search of validation of beauty and social acceptance. Get off the scale! I have yet to see a scale that can tell you how enchanting your eyes are. I have yet to see a scale that can show you how wonderful your hair looks when the sun shines its glorious rays on it. I have yet to see a scale that can thank you for your compassion, sense of humor, and contagious smile. Get off the scale because I have yet to see one that can admire you for your perseverance when challenged in life. It’s true, the scale can only give you a numerical reflection of your relationship with gravity. That’s it. It cannot measure beauty, talent, purpose, life force, possibility, strength, or love. Don’t give the scale more power than it has earned. Take note of the number, then get off the scale and live your life. You are beautiful!
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Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
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There is great change to be experienced once you learn the power of letting go. Stop allowing anyone or anything to control, limit, repress, or discourage you from being your true self! Today is YOURS to shape - own it - break free from people and things that poison or dilute your spirit.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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You just have to say to yourself, "I am not willing to accept anything less than what I deserve! I am smart! I am Beautiful! I am a good woman and I deserve to be happy!" It all starts with you.
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Amari Soul (Reflections of a Man)
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Your complaints, your drama, your victim mentality, your whining, your blaming, and all of your excuses have NEVER gotten you even a single step closer to your goals or dreams. Let go of your nonsense. Let go of the delusion that you DESERVE better and go EARN it! Today is a new day!
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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My love is something valuable to me which I ought not to throw away without reflection.
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Sigmund Freud (Civilization and Its Discontents)
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Sometimes letting go is simply changing the labels you place on an event. Looking at the same event with fresh eyes.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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I have frequently seen people become neurotic when they content themselves with inadequate or wrong answers to the questions of life. They seek position, marriage, reputation, outward success of money, and remain unhappy and neurotic even when they have attained what they were seeking. Such people are usually confined within too narrow a spiritual horizon. Their life has not sufficient content, sufficient meaning. If they are enabled to develop into more spacious personalities, the neurosis generally disappears.
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C.G. Jung (Memories, Dreams, Reflections)
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Every time I thought I was being rejected from something good, I was actually being re-directed to something better.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Protect your enthusiasm from the negativity and fear of others. Never decide to do nothing just because you can only do little. Do what you can. You would be surprised at what "little" acts have done for our world.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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You are beautiful. Know this. Anyone who tells you otherwise is simply lying. You are beautiful.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Do not sabotage your new relationship with your last relationship’s poison.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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The more I understand the mind and the human experience, the more I begin to suspect there is no such thing as unhappiness; there is only ungratefulness.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Your opinion is not my reality.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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When you are living the best version of yourself, you inspire others to live the best versions of themselves.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Suddenly, everything was beautiful. The way she viewed the world was nothing more but a reflection of herself.
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Robert M. Drake
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You become mature when you become the authority of your own life.
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Joseph Campbell (A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living)
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Become the leader of your life. Lead yourself to where you want to be. Breathe life back into your ambitions, your desires, your goals, your relationships.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Each person you meet is an aspect of yourself, clamoring for love.
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Eric Micha'el Leventhal
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Happiness is a state of mind, a choice, a way of living; it is not something to be achieved, it is something to be experienced.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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I am not a victim. No matter what I have been through, I'm still here. I have a history of victory.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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The strength of a man isn't seen in the power of his arms. It's seen in the love with which he EMBRACES you.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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In your own life it's important to know how spectacular you are.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Holding a grudge & harboring anger/resentment is poison to the soul. Get even with people...but not those who have hurt us, forget them, instead get even with those who have helped us.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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You have a unique gift to offer this world. Be true to yourself, be kind to yourself, read and learn about everything that interests you and keep away from people who bring you down. When you treat yourself kindly and respect the uniqueness of those around you, you will be giving this world an amazing gift... YOU!
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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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?
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Marianne Williamson (A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of "A Course in Miracles")
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Life itself is simple...it's just not easy.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Stop blaming outside circumstances for your inside chaos.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Life is so outrageous I could not have imagined it, made all the sweeter because it cannot last. It is all about today. Today is the best day ever because tomorrow might not happen.
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Hendri Coetzee (Living the Best Day Ever)
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I will be generous with my love today. I will sprinkle compliments and uplifting words everywhere I go. I will do this knowing that my words are like seeds and when they fall on fertile soil, a reflection of those seeds will grow into something greater.
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Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
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For so many years, I couldn’t understand why every time I thought that someone finally loved me, like… for real, they would eventually turn to vapor. Every person whom I’ve ever loved is trapped inside of my chest. I’ve breathed all of them in so deeply that I’ve nearly choked and died on every soul that I’ve ever given myself to.
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Jennifer Elisabeth (Born Ready: Unleash Your Inner Dream Girl)
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It is when you lose sight of yourself, that you lose your way. To keep your truth in sight you must keep yourself in sight and the world to you should be a mirror to reflect to you your image; the world should be a mirror that you reflect upon.
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C. JoyBell C.
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I look out into the water and up deep into the stars. I beg the sparkling lanterns of light to cure me of myself β€” my past and the kaleidoscope of mistakes, failures and wrong turns that have stacked unbearable regret upon my shoulders.
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Jennifer Elisabeth (Born Ready: Unleash Your Inner Dream Girl)
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The pessimist resembles a man who observes with fear and sadness that his wall calendar, from which he daily tears a sheet, grows thinner with each passing day. On the other hand, the person who attacks the problems of life actively is like a man who removes each successive leaf from his calendar and files it neatly and carefully away with its predecessors, after first having jotted down a few diary notes on the back. He can reflect with pride and joy on all the richness set down in these notes, on all the life he has already lived to the fullest. What will it matter to him if he notices that he is growing old? Has he any reason to envy the young people whom he sees, or wax nostalgic over his own lost youth? What reasons has he to envy a young person? For the possibilities that a young person has, the future which is in store for him? No, thank you,' he will think. 'Instead of possibilities, I have realities in my past, not only the reality of work done and of love loved, but of sufferings bravely suffered. These sufferings are even the things of which I am most proud, although these are things which cannot inspire envy.
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Viktor E. Frankl (Man’s Search for Meaning)
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A very small percentage of the people in this world will actually experience and live today. So many people will be stuck on another day, another time that traumatized them and caused them to spiritually stutter so they miss out on this day.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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β€ŽToday is a new day. It's a day you have never seen before and will never see again. Stop telling yourself the 'same crap, different day' lie! How many days has that lie stolen from you? Seize the wonder and uniqueness of today! Recognize that throughout this beautiful day, you have an incredible amount of opportunities to move your life into the direction you want it to go.
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Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
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Wishful thinking and voluntary daydreaming can occasionally make dreams come true. Unrealistic projects, improbable ventures and unfeasible missions can sometimes be achieved through 'conscious dreaming'. At times, dreams can be an inspiration and generate creative reflections. (<"Lost dreams")
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Erik Pevernagie
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Actors in any capacity, artists of any stripe, are inspired by their curiosity, by their desire to explore all quarters of life, in light and in dark, and reflect what they find in their work. Artists instinctively want to reflect humanity, their own and each other's, in all its intermittent virtue and vitality, frailty and fallibility.
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Tom Hiddleston
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You guys know about vampires? … You know, vampires have no reflections in a mirror? There’s this idea that monsters don’t have reflections in a mirror. And what I’ve always thought isn’t that monsters don’t have reflections in a mirror. It’s that if you want to make a human being into a monster, deny them, at the cultural level, any reflection of themselves. And growing up, I felt like a monster in some ways. I didn’t see myself reflected at all. I was like, β€œYo, is something wrong with me? That the whole society seems to think that people like me don’t exist?" And part of what inspired me, was this deep desire that before I died, I would make a couple of mirrors. That I would make some mirrors so that kids like me might see themselves reflected back and might not feel so monstrous for it.
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Junot DΓ­az
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I wish I had the talent to paint the way I feel about you, for my words always feel inadequate. I imagine using red for your passion and pale blue for your kindness; forest green to reflect the depth of your empathy and bright yellow for your unflagging optimism. And still I wonder: can even an artist’s palette capture the full range of what you mean to me?
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Nicholas Sparks (The Longest Ride)
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He glanced back at the wall. How like a mirror, too, her face. Impossible; for how many people did you know who reflected your own light to you? People were more often--he searched for a simile, found one in his work--torches, blazing away until they whiffed out. How rarely did other people's faces take of you and throw back to you your own expression, your own innermost trembling thought?
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Ray Bradbury (Fahrenheit 451)
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THE FOUR HEAVENLY FOUNTAINS Laugh, I tell you And you will turn back The hands of time. Smile, I tell you And you will reflect The face of the divine. Sing, I tell you And all the angels will sing with you! Cry, I tell you And the reflections found in your pool of tears - Will remind you of the lessons of today and yesterday To guide you through the fears of tomorrow.
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Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
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The less you associate with some people, the more your life will improve. Any time you tolerate mediocrity in others, it increases your mediocrity. An important attribute in successful people is their impatience with negative thinking and negative acting people. As you grow, your associates will change. Some of your friends will not want you to go on. They will want you to stay where they are. Friends that don't help you climb will want you to crawl. Your friends will stretch your vision or choke your dream. Those that don't increase you will eventually decrease you. Consider this: Never receive counsel from unproductive people. Never discuss your problems with someone incapable of contributing to the solution, because those who never succeed themselves are always first to tell you how. Not everyone has a right to speak into your life. You are certain to get the worst of the bargain when you exchange ideas with the wrong person. Don't follow anyone who's not going anywhere. With some people you spend an evening: with others you invest it. Be careful where you stop to inquire for directions along the road of life. Wise is the person who fortifies his life with the right friendships. If you run with wolves, you will learn how to howl. But, if you associate with eagles, you will learn how to soar to great heights. "A mirror reflects a man's face, but what he is really like is shown by the kind of friends he chooses." The simple but true fact of life is that you become like those with whom you closely associate - for the good and the bad. Note: Be not mistaken. This is applicable to family as well as friends. Yes...do love, appreciate and be thankful for your family, for they will always be your family no matter what. Just know that they are human first and though they are family to you, they may be a friend to someone else and will fit somewhere in the criteria above. "In Prosperity Our Friends Know Us. In Adversity We Know Our friends." "Never make someone a priority when you are only an option for them." "If you are going to achieve excellence in big things,you develop the habit in little matters. Excellence is not an exception, it is a prevailing attitude.."..
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Colin Powell
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Perfectly Imperfect We have all heard that no two snowflakes are alike. Each snowflake takes the perfect form for the maximum efficiency and effectiveness for its journey. And while the universal force of gravity gives them a shared destination, the expansive space in the air gives each snowflake the opportunity to take their own path. They are on the same journey, but each takes a different path. Along this gravity-driven journey, some snowflakes collide and damage each other, some collide and join together, some are influenced by wind... there are so many transitions and changes that take place along the journey of the snowflake. But, no matter what the transition, the snowflake always finds itself perfectly shaped for its journey. I find parallels in nature to be a beautiful reflection of grand orchestration. One of these parallels is of snowflakes and us. We, too, are all headed in the same direction. We are being driven by a universal force to the same destination. We are all individuals taking different journeys and along our journey, we sometimes bump into each other, we cross paths, we become altered... we take different physical forms. But at all times we too are 100% perfectly imperfect. At every given moment we are absolutely perfect for what is required for our journey. I’m not perfect for your journey and you’re not perfect for my journey, but I’m perfect for my journey and you’re perfect for your journey. We’re heading to the same place, we’re taking different routes, but we’re both exactly perfect the way we are. Think of what understanding this great orchestration could mean for relationships. Imagine interacting with others knowing that they too each share this parallel with the snowflake. Like you, they are headed to the same place and no matter what they may appear like to you, they have taken the perfect form for their journey. How strong our relationships would be if we could see and respect that we are all perfectly imperfect for our journey.
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Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
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So tonight I reach for my journal again. This is the first time I’ve done this since I came to Italy. What I write in my journal is that I am weak and full of fear. I explain that Depression and Loneliness have shown up, and I’m scared they will never leave. I say that I don’t want to take the drugs anymore, but I’m frightened I will have to. I am terrified that I will never really pull my life together. In response, somewhere from within me, rises a now-familiar presence, offering me all the certainties I have always wished another person would say to me when I was troubled. This is what I find myself writing on the page: I’m here. I love you. I don’t care if you need to stay up crying all night long. I will stay with you. If you need the medication again, go ahead and take itβ€”I will love you through that, as well. If you don’t need the medication, I will love you, too. There’s nothing you can ever do to lose my love. I will protect you until you die, and after your death I will still protect you. I am stronger than Depression and Braver than Loneliness and nothing will ever exhaust me. Tonight, this strange interior gesture of friendshipβ€”the lending of a hand from me to myself when nobody else is around to offer solaceβ€”reminds me of something that happened to me once in New York City. I walked into an office building one afternoon in a hurry, dashed into the waiting elevator. As I rushed in, I caught an unexpected glance of myself in a security mirror’s reflection. In that moment, my brain did an odd thingβ€”it fired off this split-second message: β€œHey! You know her! That’s a friend of yours!” And I actually ran forward toward my own reflection with a smile, ready to welcome that girl whose name I had lost but whose face was so familiar. In a flash instant of course, I realized my mistake and laughed in embarrassment at my almost doglike confusion over how a mirror works. But for some reason that incident comes to mind again tonight during my sadness in Rome, and I find myself writing this comforting reminder at the bottom of the page. Never forget that once upon a time, in an unguarded moment, you recognized yourself as a FRIEND… I fell asleep holding my notebook pressed against my chest, open to this most recent assurance. In the morning when I wake up, I can still smell a faint trace of depression’s lingering smoke, but he himself is nowhere to be seen. Somewhere during the night, he got up and left. And his buddy loneliness beat it, too.
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Elizabeth Gilbert
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If you are an introvert, you are born with a temperament that craves to be alone, delights in meaningful connections, thinks before speaking and observes before approaching. If you are an introvert, you thrive in the inner sanctuary of the mind, heart and spirit, but shrink in the external world of noise, drama and chaos. As an introvert, you are sensitive, perceptive, gentle and reflective. You prefer to operate behind the scenes, preserve your precious energy and influence the world in a quiet, but powerful way.
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Aletheia Luna (Quiet Strength: Embracing, Empowering and Honoring Yourself as an Introvert)
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Yet, at the same time, as the Eastern sages also knew, man is a worm and food for worms. This is the paradox: he is out of nature and hopelessly in it; he is dual, up in the stars and yet housed in a heart-pumping, breath-gasping body that once belonged to a fish and still carries the gill-marks to prove it. His body is a material fleshy casing that is alien to him in many waysβ€”the strangest and most repugnant way being that it aches and bleeds and will decay and die. Man is literally split in two: he has an awareness of his own splendid uniqueness in that he sticks out of nature with a towering majesty, and yet he goes back into the ground a few feet in order to blindly and dumbly rot and disappear forever. It is a terrifying dilemma to be in and to have to live with. The lower animals are, of course, spared this painful contradiction, as they lack a symbolic identity and the self-consciousness that goes with it. They merely act and move reflexively as they are driven by their instincts. If they pause at all, it is only a physical pause; inside they are anonymous, and even their faces have no name. They live in a world without time, pulsating, as it were, in a state of dumb being. This is what has made it so simple to shoot down whole herds of buffalo or elephants. The animals don't know that death is happening and continue grazing placidly while others drop alongside them. The knowledge of death is reflective and conceptual, and animals are spared it. They live and they disappear with the same thoughtlessness: a few minutes of fear, a few seconds of anguish, and it is over. But to live a whole lifetime with the fate of death haunting one's dreams and even the most sun-filled daysβ€”that's something else.
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Ernest Becker (The Denial of Death)