Happiness branches from the tree of kindness, abounding with the fruit of sweet smiles.

I’m generally quite happy until someone tells me I’m not. I don’t see how they know I’m not, but suddenly I feel less happy.

The first real day of spring is like the first time a boy holds your hand. A flood of skin-tingling warmth consumes you, and everything shines with a fresh, colorful glow, making you forget that...

Saying ‘I’m sorry’ is saying ‘I love you’ with a wounded heart in one hand and your smothered pride in the other.

Let the giggles fill your mouth because nothing tastes as sweet as laughter.

I stumble and fall.I weep and struggle to rise.My mom feels it all.

Imagine fantasy and pretend as neither fantastical nor pretended…..and then believe it.

My pain builds like storm clouds―massive, dark, and heavy with teardrops. Moisture falls torrential as if my world is a violent, eternal downpour; however, at long last the source runs dry and the bitter storm...

There are still blue skies and rainbows and days bathed in sunlight. There are colorful shade trees filled with sweet bird songs. And there are wishing stars in the heavens as well as angels in...

They say if you’re a better person today than you were yesterday you’re well on the road to perfection. So I figure if I’m a real snot today, tomorrow I should make huge progress.

Sometimes the difference between success and failure is simply the degree to which you crave one over the other.

I can’t force your lips to smile, but I can show them how easily mine do.

From the beginning, man could look up at a vast universe dotted by innumerable stars to find every evidence that he was nothing. This evidence has only grown stronger as science and technology record an...

A writer writesregardless…even though…notwithstanding…despite…at any rate…anyhow…nevertheless…in the face of…undeterred by…heedless of…and because.The true writer simply continues to write.

A guilty conscience pushed me to try harder—which I did for what seemed like a tremendous amount of wasted time, staring bug-eyed at uncooperative pencils. What was missing? The answer seemed obvious—intense emotional incentive. But...

You’re right; you can’t make someone be happy. But I don’t see the harm in trying.

I read so I might live a thousand lives in a lifetime. I write to control the particulars in those lives.

Reality is a background so painted over by our own perceptions that every eye sees the world differently.

No one is born a sprinter. We all learn to push ourselves up from the floor and then balance before taking that first, wobbly step. It is an individual choice where to go from there.

If you couldn’t sense heat, you’d not be alive. And if that heat never grew uncomfortable, you would never move. And if you were stagnant—unchallenged by unpredictable flares—you would never grow capable of shielding yourself...

Why so eager to jump in and direct someone else’s life when you can’t stick to your own goals and resolutions?

They say to never look back.But sometimes I do. It’s gratifying to see how far I’ve come.

There is no such thing as constructive criticism. There is constructive advice, constructive guidance, constructive counsel, encouragement, suggestion, and instruction. Criticism, however, is not constructive but a destructive means of faultfinding that cripples all parties...

Take time to laugh, to talk, to hug, and to cry. These are the human relief valves.

Giddy is a grin and giggles and that glint of goofiness in your gaze.

If you invest nothing, the reward is worth little.

It isn’t always a change of scenery needed to make life better. Sometimes it simply requires opening your eyes.

Though I love you to the core of my being, so thoroughly that every cell comprising me aches to be near you, I must accept that we can never be together. For our existence parallels...

Very often, what is meant to be a stepping stone turns out to be a slab of wet cement that will harden around your foot if you do not take the next step soon enough.

It seems a peculiar thing when I go to fill my own cup; it remains empty as if the liquid evaporates as soon as it touches the glass. Yet when I reach to top off...

Happiness is a simple game of lost and found: Lose the things you take for granted, and you will feel great happiness once they are found.

The blue of daylightfades and chills as the sun sinksbeneath clouds of fire.

There are those who fear the sunset, worried they will never see light again. There are those who ignore the sunrise, squandering dawn, believing they will never run out of daylight. And then there are...

Don’t be fool enough to think you can know a person’s character after a few moments of observation. You can’t. You have no idea where his life began or how his saga has unfolded thus...

If I must start somewhere, right here and now is the best place imaginable.

Acknowledge that some moments are just plain awful―desperate and gloomy and painful and miserable and nothing at all but anguish. No truthful, cheerful thought in the world will fix it. So let me cry awhile....

We forget that the sweetest joys are found in the simplest acts: hugs, laughter, quiet observation, basic movements, holding hands, pleasant music, shared stories, a listening ear, an unhurried visit, and selfless service. It is...

Seemingly insignificant choices are like seemingly trivial seeds. Once planted, they root and grow and spread into something tremendous. Imagine the prickly weeds some choices amount to over time and be careful not to plant...

Trying again is okay. Trying again and again and again is okay. It’s sort of an infinite thing because the alternative is failure, and that’s not okay.

I don’t understand why when I wish for happiness it inevitably rains. However, I do tend to find myself grateful for sunlight once the storm ceases.

Minutes turn into hours that add up to days amounting to weeks that become months melting into yearsaccumulating for decadesto pile up for centuriesand ultimately form minutes again―just on a grander, divine scale.

If one is content to freely speak trash about another, it is probably more correct to judge them as the one of ill repute and refuse the load of garbage they offer you.

I love when the sun plays hide-n-seek for a few days because its invisibility often goes unnoticed. The world seems content that its presence behind the clouds is enough. But as soon as that brilliant...

True friends esteem you of greater worth than you feel deserving. False friends demand you prove that worth.

There are few things better than losing yourself in a book. And if you’re lucky enough to have that adventure continue in a series, it’s like chocolate ganache on the icing on the cake.

Theories look great on paper until reality scribbles all over the page.

You are here to make a difference, to either improve the world or worsen it. And whether or not you consciously choose to, you will accomplish one or the other.

Life is a bonfire where everyone else has brought marshmallows, and you—a stick.

It’s advice, not a commandment.Don’t swallow it whole until you’re absolutely sure you’ve been given good, healthy advice.

You stare at your dream from a distance, longing, sighing, seeing what you deem is a warning of IMPOSSIBLE. But if you’d squint real hard you’d see the truth; the sign correctly reads, ‘I’M POSSIBLE.