Christmas is a season not only of rejoicing but of reflection.

I’m reflective only in the sense that I learn to move forward. I reflect with a purpose.

Wonder is the basis of worship.

Half our life is spent trying to find something to do with the time we have rushed through life trying to save.

What’s done can’t be undone.

The virtues are lost in self-interest as rivers are lost in the sea.

Time stays, we go.

My mum passing away wasn’t funny, but that funeral and what I went through, the things that happened, looking back at it, there were funny moments. You have to be strong enough to look back at it, to sit and assess the situation.

I can only note that the past is beautiful because one never realises an emotion at the time. It expands later, and thus we don’t have complete emotions about the present, only about the past.

As the eagle was killed by the arrow winged with his own feather, so the hand of the world is wounded by its own skill.

I wish I had known when I was in the White House what I know now about the Third World.

If you wish to forget anything on the spot, make a note that this thing is to be remembered.

Write down the thoughts of the moment. Those that come unsought for are commonly the most valuable.

But men must know, that in this theatre of man’s life it is reserved only for God and angels to be lookers on.

History is a relentless master. It has no present, only the past rushing into the future. To try to hold fast is to be swept aside.

You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait, be quiet still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked, it has no choice, it will roll in ecstasy at your feet.

I just think that it’s strong and it’s important that we recognize what the Christmas season is about; it’s about the birth of our Savior, and there’s a lot of pressure today to be politically correct, but people are realizing, too, that you have to be open to express your faith what you want believe.

We are time’s subjects, and time bids be gone.

If one way be better than another, that you may be sure is nature’s way.

Things have never been more like the way they are today in history.

It is a most mortifying reflection for a man to consider what he has done, compared to what he might have done.

No man is rich enough to buy back his past.

At ev’ry word a reputation dies.

I’ve never understood why people consider youth a time of freedom and joy. It’s probably because they have forgotten their own.

Life is the childhood of our immortality.

Don’t ever take a fence down until you know why it was put up.

Anyone who thinks must think of the next war as they would of suicide.

I vividly remember a conversation I had many years ago in 1974, which marked a turning point in my leadership journey. I was sitting at a Holiday Inn with my friend, Kurt Campmeyer, when he asked me if I had a personal growth plan. I didn’t. In fact, I didn’t even know you were supposed to have one.

Yesterday’s just a memory, tomorrow is never what it’s supposed to be.

I always say this about my music, and music in general: Music is like a time capsule. Each album reflects what I’m going through or what’s going on in my life at that moment.

Only when the tide goes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked.

It is sadder to find the past again and find it inadequate to the present than it is to have it elude you and remain forever a harmonious conception of memory.

It is not possible to eat me without insisting that I sing praises of my devourer?

When I think over what I have said, I envy dumb people.

These words dropped into my childish mind as if you should accidentally drop a ring into a deep well. I did not think of them much at the time, but there came a day in my life when the ring was fished up out of the well, good as new.

Errors are not in the art but in the artificers.

To be able to look back upon ones life in satisfaction, is to live twice.

One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.

Remembrance and reflection how allied. What thin partitions divides sense from thought.

I think we’ve taken the meaning of Christmas out. People don’t stop and think about Jesus or the birth of Jesus. When they think of Christmas, they think of Santa Claus and – for the children, and they think of giving gifts and out-giving the next person of spending their time looking for the right thing for somebody who has everything.

Old friends pass away, new friends appear. It is just like the days. An old day passes, a new day arrives. The important thing is to make it meaningful: a meaningful friend – or a meaningful day.

Women have served all these centuries as looking glasses possessing the power of reflecting the figure of man at twice its natural size.

All who think cannot but see there is a sanction like that of religion which binds us in partnership in the serious work of the world.

Remember that children, marriages, and flower gardens reflect the kind of care they get.

Comfort and prosperity have never enriched the world as much as adversity has.

The pause between the errors and trials of the day and the hopes of the night.

The object of opening the mind, as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid.

If you don’t know your full-throttle history, the whole story of how you came to where you are, it’s kind of hard to put things together.

Sometimes one pays most for the things one gets for nothing.

If some years were added to my life, I would give fifty to the study of the Yi, and then I might come to be without great faults.

I’ve learned that you shouldn’t go through life with a catcher’s mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw something back.

It is a great piece of folly to attempt to make anything out of my early life.

Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‚What are you doing for others?‘

I do sometimes look back at things I’ve written in the past, and think, ‚I just don’t remember being the person who wrote that.‘

I was so rude when I was a little girl.

We are always doing something for posterity, but I would fain see posterity do something for us.

Thinking: the talking of the soul with itself.

Life cannot be without relationship, but we have made it so agonizing and hideous by basing it on personal and possessive love. Can one love and yet not possess? You will find the true answer not in escape, ideals, beliefs but through the understanding of the causes of dependence and possessiveness.

Changing your mind is probably one of the most beautiful things people can do. And I’ve changed my mind about a lot of things over the years.

When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.

There’s a deceptive sin that can keep us from walking in love: pride. It’s deceptive because when you have pride, you’re usually too proud to admit it. I know this because I used to have teachings on pride and they didn’t sell well.