What I Know For Sure

When you make loving others the story of your life, there’s never a final chapter, because the legacy continues. You lend your light to one person, and he or she shines it on another and another and another.

The Four Agreements. According to Don Miguel, “Ninety-five percent of the beliefs we have stored in our minds are nothing but lies, and we suffer because we believe all these lies.

For me, just waking up “clothed in my right mind,” being able to put my feet on the floor, walk to the bathroom, and do what needs to be done there is five stars. I’ve heard many stories of people who aren’t healthy enough to do that.

Sit. Feast on your life.

Beginning when we are girls, most of us are taught to deflect praise. We apologize for our accomplishments. We try to level the field with our family and friends by downplaying our brilliance. We settle for the passenger’s seat when we long to drive. That’s why so many of us have been willing to hide our light as adults. Instead of being filled with all the passion and purpose that enable us to offer our best to the world, we empty ourselves in an effort to silence our critics.

Happiness is never something you get from other people. The happiness you feel is in direct proportion to the love you are able to give.

What I know for sure is that the only way to endure the quake is to adjust your stance. You can’t avoid the daily tremors. They come with being alive. But I believe these experiences are gifts that force us to step to the right or left in search of a new center of gravity. Don’t fight them. Let them help you adjust your footing.

During difficult times I often turn to a gospel song called “Stand.” In it, songwriter Donnie McClurkin sings, “What do you do when you’ve done all you can, and it seems like it’s never enough? What do you give when you’ve given your all, and it seems like you can’t make it through?” The answer lies in McClurkin’s simple refrain: “You just stand.

The thoughts that linger are the “if only” questions, like Who could I have become if I had finally done the things I always wanted to do?

big miracles we’re waiting on are happening right in front of us, at every moment, with every breath. Open your eyes and heart and you’ll begin to see them.

The truth is that as much as you plan and dream and move forward in your life, you must remember you are always acting in conjunction with the flow and energy of the universe.

If you can get paid for doing what you love, every paycheck is a bonus. Give yourself the bonus of a lifetime: Pursue your passion. Discover what you love. Then do it!

Sometimes I feel like Gayle is the better part of myself—the part that says “No matter what, I’m here for you.” What I know for sure is that Gayle is a friend I can count on. She has taught me the joy of having, and being, a true friend.

Barn’s burnt down / Now I can see the moon.

The gift of deciding to face your mortality without turning away or flinching is the gift of recognizing that because you will die, you must live now. Whether you flounder or flourish is always in your hands—you are the single biggest influence in your life. Your journey begins with a choice to get up, step out, and live fully.

What I know fore sure is that pleasure is energy reciprocated: What you put out comes back. Your base level of pleasure is determined by how you view your whole life.

My dad saved for everything that mattered—a washer and dryer, a new refrigerator. By the time I left home in Nashville in 1976, he still hadn’t gotten a new TV. He said his “money wasn’t right.” When The Oprah Winfrey Show went national, that’s the first thing I bought him—a color TV, paid for in cash

For me, poetry is the unexpected utterance of the soul. It is where the soul touches the everyday. It is less about words and more about the awakening the sense of aliveness we carry within us from birth. To walk quietly till the miracle in everything is poetry. whether we write it down or not.

For me, poetry is the unexpected utterance of the soul. It is where the soul touches the everyday. It is less about words and more about awakening the sense of aliveness we carry within us from birth. To walk quietly till the miracle in everything speaks is poetry, whether we write it down or not.

every experience is a valuable teacher.

Each of us, at our core, longs to be loved, needed, understood, affirmed—to have intimate connections that leave us feeling more alive and human.

I’ve always known that life is better when you share it. But I now realize it gets even sweeter when you expand the circle.

Every physical encounter has a metaphysical meaning.

When you make loving others the story of your life, there's never a final chapter, because the legacy continues. You lend your light to one person, and he or she shines it on another and another and another.

Maya Angelou once passed on to me: “I’m convinced that the negative has power—and if you allow it to perch in your house, in your mind, in your life, it can take you over,” she said. “Those negative words climb into the woodwork, into the furniture, and the next thing you know, they’re on your skin. A negative statement is poison.

power to destroy, they also have the power to heal.

Psalms 37:4. “Delight thyself in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart.

Your base level of pleasure is determined by how you view your whole world.

Become the change you want to see—those are words I live by. Instead of belittling, uplift. Instead of demolishing, rebuild. Instead of misleading, light the way so that all of us can stand on higher ground.

It’s true that when you summon the courage to cast a vote for yourself, when you dare to step out, speak up, change yourself, or even simply do something outside of what others call the norm, the results may not always be pleasant. You can expect obstacles. You’ll fall down. Others may call you nutty. At times it may feel like the whole world is rising up to tell you who you cannot become and what you cannot do. (It can upset people when you exceed the limited expectations they’ve always had for you.) And in moments of weakness, your fear and self-doubt may cause you to falter. You may be so exhausted that you want to quit. But the alternatives are even worse: You might find yourself stuck in a miserable rut for years at a time. Or you could spend too many days languishing in regret, always wondering, What would my life have been like if I hadn’t cared so much about what people thought?