Michael Ondaatje Quotes

Before children, even the most cynical people throw down their usual masks and become capable of feeling the purity and love which all human beings seek.

You can't look for love, or it will run away from you. But, you know, don't look for it. Don't look for it. Just go where it is and appreciate it, and, you know, it will find you.

My only hope to receive love is to let you see who I am, then I may believe you.

We keep secrets from people that we love because we're afraid of our own truth. I think sometimes we're afraid to hurt people, because you never know. I think we're afraid of what is, and what can't be.

If you have feelings for someone, be honest with yourself and the person you care about, but trust that there is someone out there who will love you for who you are and will stay by your side.

I've always thrown myself into love in a rather carefree way, and the net result is that you do get hurt. But I wouldn't take away any of the experiences of my life.

Give your heart to everybody you meet. The rest is pretense.

Love is too precious to be ashamed of.

I have a lot of love to give, and when I give that love and others are able to receive it and show me their vulnerability, I believe that God inhabits that space, which means I basically hang out with God a lot, and that's why I feel hopeful.

Surely it's better to love others, however messy and imperfect the involvement, than to allow one's capacity for love to harden.

Do you love me enough that I may be weak with you? Everyone loves strength, but do you love me for my weakness? That is the real test.

Part of me is made of glass, and also, I love you.

Love opens the doors into everything, as far as I can see, including and perhaps most of all, the door into one's own secret, and often terrible and frightening, real self.

I want to be loved despite my faults. It isn't exactly true that I'm a provocateur. A real provocateur is someone who says things he doesn't think, just to shock. I try to say what I think.

I'm someone who can fall in love at the drop of the hat. My parents raised me to be very accepting of other people, so because of that, I feel like I might be overly accepting of girls. If a girl shows any interest, I'm like, 'Yes! I love you, you're amazing!'

Tell me what we had was real, I whisper.

Using another as a means of satisfaction and security is not love. Love is never security; love is a state in which there is no desire to be secure; it is a state of vulnerability.

God offers authentic LOVE. His devotion is the real deal. But He won't give you the genuine until you surrender the imitations.

How could I have thought that I needed to cure myself in order to fit into the 'real' world? I didn't need curing, and the world didn't, either; the only thing that did need curing was my understanding of my place in it. Without that understanding - without a sense of belonging to the real world - it was impossible to thrive in an imagined one.

The vulnerability undid him even as the strength brought him pride. And the whole of her brought him love beyond the measuring of it. Of all he'd craved in his life, all he'd dreamed of having, all he'd fought to gain by fair means or foul, he'd never imagined having such such as she as his own. Never imagined himself the man he'd come to be because she was.

As a body in a world, here is our choice: we can be more loving or less loving. That's it. We can relax as the entire moment's show of love's swirl, feeling open as all--a vicious rainstorm, tweeting birds, our lover's lips, a sense of worthlessness-- or we can close to some aspect of experience, pulling away as if we were separate.

Opening yourself up to making mistakes and being vulnerable is what makes it beautiful and special with the person you love.

Trust isn't something that's spoken and love's never wrong when it's real.

In real life, I don't fall in love with the guy who wines and dines me, I fall in love with the flaws and the humanity. When I see someone get embarrassed or when I see them wearing their heart on their sleeve, I want to see that in movies. I hate seeing the put-together people, and then it makes everyone think they're supposed to look like that. It's all a bunch of BS.