Growth Quotes

You will never be entirely comfortable. This is the truth behind the champion - he is always fighting something. To do otherwise is to settle.

~ Julien Smith

re-examine all you have been told in school or church or in any book, and dismiss whatever insults your own soul; and your very flesh shall be a great poem, and have the richest fluency, not only in its words, but in the silent lines of its lips and face, and between the lashes of your eyes, and in every motion and joint of your body.[From the preface to Leaves Grass]

~ Walt Whitman

The First Splendid Truth: To be happy, I need to think about feeling good, feeling bad, and feeling right, in an atmosphere of growth.

~ Gretchen Rubin

Accomplishments don’t erase shame, hatred, cruelty, silence, ignorance, discrimination, low self-esteem or immorality. It covers it up, with a creative version of pride and ego. Only restitution, forgiving yourself and others, compassion, repentance and living with dignity will ever erase the past.

~ Shannon L. Alder

The hidden well-spring of your soul must needs rise and run murmuring to the sea;And the treasure of your infinite depths would be revealed to your eyes.But let there be no scales to weigh your unknown treasure;And seek not the depths of your knowledge with staff or sounding line.For self is a sea boundless and measureless.Say not, “I have found the truth,” but rather, “I have found a truth.”Say not, “I have found the path of the soul.” Say rather, “I have met the soul walking upon my path.”For the soul walks upon all paths.The soul walks not upon a line, neither does it grow like a reed.The soul unfolds itself, like a lotus of countless petals.

~ Kahlil Gibran

She gave up trying to understand herself, and the vast armies of the benighted, who follow neither the heart nor the brain, and march to their destiny by catch-words. The armies are full of pleasant and pious folk. But they have yielded to the only enemy that matters — the enemy within. They have sinned against passion and truth, and vain will be their strife after virtue. As the years pass, they are censured. Their pleasantry and their piety show cracks, their wit becomes cynicism, their unselfishness hypocrisy; they feel and produce discomfort wherever they go.

~ E.m. Forster

Your strength will be found when you stop struggling with yourself, instead of thinking everyone is a struggle worth overcoming. Every obstacle in life is a lesson that teaches us, not others.

~ Shannon L. Alder

Where we fall are the stepping-stones for our journey.

~ Lolly Daskal

Today I wore a pair of faded old jeans and a plain grey baggy shirt. I hadn't even taken a shower, and I did not put on an ounce of makeup. I grabbed a worn out black oversized jacket to cover myself with even though it is warm outside. I have made conscious decisions lately to look like less of what I felt a male would want to see. I want to disappear.

~ Sierra D. Waters

Science is only a Latin word for knowledge

~ Carl Sagan

The striving of humanity for knowledge and truth [can] not be suppressed. The growth of the spirit [is]an essential part of Creation; it was planned like the growth of the body, of the plants and animals and people - every living thing that God had created.

~ Peter Prange

It takes courage to become authentic. So many talk about the light but not enough speak the truth about the struggles it takes to get there and the tools to overcome it all.

~ Nikki Rowe

Be honest. This applies to every area of your life. Sketchiness is not an attractive trait. No more trying to cover up your baggage, sweeping things under the rug, withholding truth, blatant lying, or even telling seemingly ‘harmless’ white lies or half-truths – release the need to lie completely! Start NOW.

~ Alaric Hutchinson

I’m in no hurry: the sun and the moon aren’t, either.Nobody goes faster than the legs they have.If where I want to go is far away, I’m not there in an instant.(6/20/1919)

~ Alberto Caeiro

The world as it is is the world as God sees it, not as we see it. Our vision is distorted, not so much by the limits of finitude as by sin and ignorance. But the more we raise ourselves in the scale of being, the more will our ideas about God and the world correspond to reality.

~ William Ralph Inge

Greatness comes from the inside and once you believe you have it, it's yours to share with the world.

~ Chris Burkmenn

Growth comes from God, to those with surrendered, yielded hearts.

~ Mary E. Demuth

There is a greater Christian faith than one which settles for the temporal happiness, and that is the augmentation of faith. The more faithful you become, the harder the obstacles get; but the harder the obstacles get, the tougher your spine grows; and the tougher your spine grows, the less dependent you are on man's approval. I came to know this about Christianity when valuing faith before comfort.

~ Criss Jami

Life doesn’t have a singular purpose and yet we try to pigeonhole this infinite gift by searching for a single meaning behind our existence. We hunger for meaning the way a starving man does food—convinced we will waste away without it. As though to experience what it is to be alive weren’t enough to justify drawing breath. Life is a multi-layered practice in exploration, self-definition, connection, and realization. The greatest challenge presented to us as human beings is to allow the infinite to be infinite; to accept that we will always be the student never the teacher, and allow the truths we’ve gathered to evolve because what we seek to understand is a living thing and is in a perpetual state of change. Humanity’s progression of understanding is open-ended. Anyone who professes mastery only shows their ignorance of the infinite procession of enlightenment of which they are a part. Each of us get to add a line into the coverless tome of understanding, which has no beginning and no end.

~ L.m. Browning

Sometimes God pulls us away from normal just long enough to begin something great in us.

~ Bethany Kaczmarek

Don't envy results, seek to know the process. Don't want a man's glory till you hear his story. Sometimes what you see is not even the destination, it's just the current location but the result of a long journey. God sometimes would bring you to a point where it is much more than the gift...He captures your heart. My friend, not everything in the kingdom is a gift, somethings are rewards.

~ Kingsley Opuwari Manuel

The lotus is the most beautiful flower, whose petals open one by one. But it will only grow in the mud. In order to grow and gain wisdom, first you must have the mud --- the obstacles of life and its suffering. ... The mud speaks of the common ground that humans share, no matter what our stations in life. ... Whether we have it all or we have nothing, we are all faced with the same obstacles: sadness, loss, illness, dying and death. If we are to strive as human beings to gain more wisdom, more kindness and more compassion, we must have the intention to grow as a lotus and open each petal one by one.

~ Goldie Hawn

Mistakes are the growing pains of wisdom.

~ William Jordan

Don't you notice that there are particular moments when you are naturally inspired to introspection? Work with them gently, for these are the moments when you can go through a powerful experience, and your whole worldview can change quickly.

~ Sogyal Rinpoche

COMING FORTH INTO THE LIGHTI was born the dayI thought:What is?What was?AndWhat if?I was transformed the dayMy ego shattered,And all the superficial, materialThings that matteredTo me before,Suddenly ceasedTo matter.I really came into beingThe day I no longer cared aboutWhat the world thought of me,Only on my thoughts forChanging the world.

~ Suzy Kassem

It is not until you change your identity to match your life blueprint that you will understand why everything in the past never worked.

~ Shannon L. Alder

When every situation which life can offer is turned to the profit of spiritual growth, no situation can really be a bad one.

~ Paul Brunton

Sometimes we have to soak ourselves in the tears and fears of the past to water our future gardens.

~ Suzy Kassem

In order to grow, I promise you'll have to let go of some habits. 10 times out of 10, they'll be the habits you're most in love with.

~ Brandi L. Bates

Don’t follow someone else’s map. You should glean teachings from all directions, keeping true to those that bring progress yet remaining open to changes in yourself.

~ Deepak Chopra

From the cradle to the grave, joy and pain is the fertilizer for wisdom.

~ T.f. Hodge

Vulnerability really means to be strong and secure enough within yourself that you are able to walk outside without your armor on. You are able to show up in life as just you. That is genuine strength and courage. Armor may look tough, but all it does is mask insecurity and fear.

~ Alaric Hutchinson

Relationships are steppingstones for the evolution of our consciousness. Each interaction we have, be it one of joy or contrast, allows us to learn more about who we are and what we want in this lifetime. They bring us into greater alignment…as long as we continue to move forward and do not get attached to hurt, anger, or being a victim.

~ Alaric Hutchinson

Love is being able to view a situation without adding duality to it.

~ Alaric Hutchinson

Love is supposed to lift you up, not hold you down. It is supposed to push you forward, not hold you back.

~ Suzy Kassem

It’s all about reprogramming our minds to focus more on what brings us joy.

~ Alaric Hutchinson

Accept the past as the past and realize that each new day you are a new person who doesn’t need to carry old baggage into the new day with you. It’s amazing how many people ruin the beauty of today with the sorrows of yesterday. Yesterday doesn’t exist anymore! For example, if ever I feel foolish or guilty about something I’ve done, I learn from it and attempt to do better the next time. Shame or guilt serves no one. Such feelings actually keep us down, often lowering the vibrations of those around us, as well. Living in the present moment is the recurring baptism of the soul, forever purifying every new day with a new you.

~ Alaric Hutchinson

Your greatest responsibility is to live a life that nourishes your highest truth.

~ Mollie Marti

There is no adversity that cannot bear a gift and no gift that cannot bring adversity.

~ Mollie Marti

Mastery is the breeding ground of fresh, creative passion.

~ Mollie Marti