Kim Quindlen

They get a lot of energy from the happiness of others. Nothing thrills them more than simply knowing that the people they care most about are happy. And when you can get joy from something like that, you can’t help but feel pretty damn lucky.

Why do sky divers wear helmets ? I promise you the helmet won’t help if the parachute doesn’t open.

We romanticize the pain. Because we want to give it a reason, a story, a place of importance. We want to make the pain necessary, even when we know it’s bad, because that’s so much easier than walking away.

The obsession with reliving your mistakes or your embarrassing moments over and over again.

You’re a human being, and it is in our nature to grow, and part of getting back to yourself can actually mean trying things you’ve never tried before.

“A lot of people want Ted Cruz to win, but are we ready for a President that’s a melting candle?”

The number of instances in which you sent the “On my way!!” text while you were still putting on pants is inappropriate.

I wish I had realized that the type of people who judge you solely from the letters on your sweatshirt are not the type of people you want to hang out with anyway. I met some of my best friends in my sorority and I’ll be forever grateful for that, but I also met some of my best friends outside of it. It’s not the be-all, end-all of your college career, and the minute you graduate, no one gives a damn anyway.

Be you, whoever that is right now, and don’t convince yourself that you have to explain your existence to anyone. Make the choices that you think are right, take care of yourself, and always aim to make someone else’s day a little better.

The truth is going to heal your heart a lot faster than simply letting it break over and over until you finally face what you knew all along anyway

The belief that a happy life and an easy life are the same thing. An easy life means no difficult choices, no heartache, no challenges, no fear, no rejection, no failure. But an easy life also means no adventure, no growth, no thrill, no risk, no appreciation for joy, and no love so great that it feels like your heart could burst.

Claustrophobia: it’s a sign that your world is getting too small for you. It’s not to imply that you have to leave everything and everyone you care about behind. It’s just an indication that it’s time for you to expand your world view and step a little further outside of the bubble in which you currently reside.

We soon learn that, in this day and age, we go through the same breakup over and over and over.

You go through the same experience every Monday: your brain is like ‘What was that thing I was looking forward to tonight?’ And then you remember that that thing is watching The Bachelor, and you experience a bunch of excitement followed by a flood of shame over the fact that this is the person you have become.

I want to always be me without you, and I want you to always be you without me. But I want us both to feel like no matter how secure we are as individuals, no matter how well we know ourselves, we’re always happier being us than we are being you and I.

You learn that it’s okay if you have no clue what you’re doing, as long as you are muddling through it together.

You take nothing for granted. You can’t even hold them for twenty seconds without feeling pure joy and gratitude.

The four seasons of Missouri: Almost Summer, Summer, Still Summer, and Construction.