Sentimentality is the emotional promiscuity of those who have no sentiment.
as the shadows assume shapes I fight the slow retreat now my once-promise dwindling dwindling now lighting new cigarettes pouring more drinks it has been a beautiful fight still is.
I tried to drown my sorrows, but the bastards learned how to swim, and now I am overwhelmed by this decent and good feeling.
Your mind is your invisible talisman. The letters PMA (positive mental attitude) are emblazoned on one side, and NMA (negative mental attitude) on the other. These are powerful forces.
I like women who haven’t lived with too many men. I don’t expect virginity but I simply prefer women who haven’t been rubbed raw by experience. There is a quality about women who choose men sparingly; it appears in their walk in their eyes in their laughter and in their gentle hearts. Women who have had too many men seem to choose the next one out of revenge rather than with feeling. When you play the field selfishly everything works against you: one can’t insist on love or demand affection. You’re finally left with whatever you have been willing to give which often is: nothing.
It takes courage to love, but pain through love is the purifying fire which those who love generously know. We all know people who are so much afraid of pain that they shut themselves up like clams in a shell and, giving out nothing, receive nothing and therefore shrink until life is a mere living death.
Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, have great sadness on earth.
Vulnerability is the birthplace of love, belonging, joy, courage, empathy, and creativity. It is the source of hope, empathy, accountability, and authenticity. If we want greater clarity in our purpose or deeper and more meaningful spiritual lives, vulnerability is the path.
We must all suffer from one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The difference is discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tons.
I have discovered, passionate grief does not link us with the dead but cuts us off from them. This becomes clearer and clearer. It is just at those moments when I feel least sorrow - getting into my morning bath is usually one of them - that H. rushes upon my mind in her full reality, her otherness. Not, as in my worst moments, all foreshortened and patheticized and solemnized by my miseries, but as she is in her own right. This is good and tonic.
Remember that no one can hurt you except yourself. If someone does a mean thing to you, that person is hurt. You are not really hurt unless you become embittered, or unless you become angry and perhaps do a mean thing in return.
You will lose someone you can’t live without,and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.
The sun is still there... even if clouds drift over it. Once you have experienced the reality of sunshine you may weep, but you will never feel ice about your heart again.
Our first mistake is the belief that the circumstance gives the joy which we give to the circumstance.
when things break, it's not the actual breaking that prevents them from getting back together again. it's because a little piece gets lost -- the two remaining ends couldn't fit together even if they wanted to. the whole shape has changed.
Sorrows are our best educator. A man can see further through a tear than a telescope.
When things fall apart in your life, you feel as if your whole world is crumbling. But actually it’s your fixed identity that’s crumbling. And as Chögyam Trungpa used to tell us, that’s cause for celebration.
Let the people who never find true love keep saying that there's no such thing. Their faith will make it easier for them to live and die.
The journey of love has been rather a lacerating, if well-worth-it, journey.
I'm one of the most sensitive human beings on Earth - and I know it.
Today I will be the master of my emotions.
Thinking about suicide is a potent consolation: it helps us to get through many a bad night.
If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.
Vulnerability is the core of shame and fear and our struggle for worthiness, but it appears that it's also the birthplace of joy, of creativity, of belonging, of love.
Do one thing every day that scares you. The race is long and, in the end, it's only with yourself.
