Love, Quotes, To Remember and to Think About

We Seek It Here, 

We Seek It There,

 We Look For Love,

 Every Where!

We expect it to come to us, usually through another person. All our conditioning (The Bible, our culture, religion, schooling, society, and our peers) says it is something we “fall” into. And yet—and yet real love cannot be acquired, possessed, or accumulated. It cannot be known at all, when we think it comes from outside ourselves –for love is what we DO. The ultimate paradox is WE ARE IT. We are love. Each one of us is a source of love that has forgotten that love is what I am, what I do. Doesn’t feel right does it? That’s because it’s been so long wince we knew—if we ever did—and experienced ourselves in the true way.

And yet we all know that the deepest trust, faith—the purest love is known and expressed only when we give it, not take it. As we give (or show) love in whatever way is appropriate—without fear--, we we are the only ones to experience it first, on the way out. Falling into love is impossible. To do so is only infatuation, sexual attraction, or obsession with an external object which appears to fill the gap, the emptiness, in ourselves.

A loving relationship is one in which the loved one is free to be himself-to laugh with me; but never because of me; to love life, to love him/her self, to love being loved. such a relationship is based upon freedom and can never grow in a jealous heart.

A smile is the lighting system of the face, the cooling system of the head, and the heating system of the heart.

Above all things I believe in love. Love is like oxygen. As the old song states "Love is a many splendored thing." Love lifts us up where we belong. All you need is love!

--From the movie Moulin Rouge

All, everything I understand, I understand only because I love.

--Leo Tolstoy

And here is my heart which beats only for you.

--Paul Verlaine

And now here is my secret, a very simple secret; it is only with the heart that one can see rightly, what is essential is invisible to the eye.

--Antoine de Saint-Exuperty

At the touch of love everyone becomes a poet...

--Plato

Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength; loving someone deeply gives you courage.

--Lao Tzu

Believe in the importance of love, for it is the strength and beauty that brings music to our souls.

But to see her was to love her,

Love but her, and love forever.

--Robert Burns

Dance, and perform, as though no one is watching you. Love as though you have never been hurt before. Sing as though no one can hear you. Live as though heaven is on earth--for it is.

Do you love me because I'm beautiful, or am I beautiful because you love me?

--Oscar Hammerstein

Do you want me to tell you something really subversive? Love is everything it's cracked up to be. That's why people are so cynical about it... It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for. And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more.

--Eric Jong

Don't frown because you never know who might be  in love with your smile.

Don't hug me, it only makes me want to never let go.

--Alison Mosher

Loving someone isn't always going to be easy,,Anger, tears laughter. It's when you want to be together despite it all. That's when you truly love another. I'm sure of it.

For all that you are and all that you do, and for the many ways you make my heart sing.

--Leland Thomas

Goodnight! Goodnight!

Parting is such sweet sorrow

That I shall say goodnight til it be morrow.

--William Shakespeare

I am so glad that you are here... it helps me realize how beautiful my world is.

--Goethe

I believe in a kind of love that brings sailors home from the sea. Made up of seconds and years and the no-space between hands on skin. I cannot believe how much goes on. I can't even cut out enough red hearts to keep up. Sarah Mimnaugh

I believe that two people are connected at the heart, and it doesn't matter what you do, or who you are, or where you live; there are no boundaries or barriers, if two people are destined to be together.

--Julia Roberts

I have learned not to worry about love;

But to honour it's coming with all my heart.

--Alice Walker

I have you. A lover and a friend. You are everything I need.  You are the sun, the air I breathe. Without you, life wouldn't be the same. Please don't ever go away. And if you go, then don't forget to take me with you.

--Baisa

I love her and that's the beginning of everything.

--F. Scott Fitzgerald

I love you, not for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you.

--Ray Croft

I think we dream so we don't have to be away from one another. If we're in each other's dreams, we'll always be together.

--Hobbes

I'm not supposed to love you, I'm not supposed to care, I'm not supposed to live my life wishing you were there. I'm not supposed to wonder where you are, or what you do...I'm sorry I can't help myself, I love  you.

If I could give you only one gift, I would give you the ability to see yourself as I see you, so you could see how truly special you are.

If I never met  you, I couldn't like you . If I didn't like you, I wouldn't love you. If I didn't love you I wouldn't miss you. But I did, I do, and I will

I there is anything better than to be loved it is loving.

If you find it in your heart to care for somebody else, you will have succeeded--Maya Angelou

If you judge people, you have no time to love them.--Mother Teresa

In dreams and in love, there are no impossibilities.

--Janos Arany

In love, there is always one who kisses & one who offers the cheek

--French proverb

In the arithmetic of love, one plus one equals everything, and two minus one equals nothing.

--Mignon Mclaughlin

In true love, the smallest distance is too great, and the greatest distance can be bridged.

--Hans Nouwens

I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

--Maya Angelou

Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a sunless garden when the flowers are dead. The consciousness of loving and being loved brings a warmth and a richness to life that nothing else can bring.

--Oscar Wilde

Let love be the sweet elixir that awakens your spirit and moves your soul to dance.

--Author Unknown

Life has taught us that love does not consist of gazing at each other but in looking outward together in the same direction.

Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Life without love is like a tree without blossoms or fruit.

--Kahlil Gibran

Love comes when manipulation stops; when you think more about the other person than about his or her reactions to you. When you dare to reveal yourself fully. When you dare to be vulnerable.

--Dr. Joyce Brothers

Love comforteth like sunshine after rain.

--William Shakespeare

Love demands all and has a right to it.

--Beethoven

Love doesn't make the world go 'round. Love is what makes the ride worthwhile.

--Franklin P. Jones

Love doesn't sit there like a stone. It has to be made like bread; remade all the time...made new.

Le Guin

Love grows by giving. The love we give away is the only love we keep. The only way to retain love is to give it away.

--Elbert Hubbard

Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get--only with what you are expecting to give--which is everything.

--Katherine Hepburn

Love is a fan club with only two fans.

--anonymous

Love is a path to the heart that knows its own way.

--Lamar Cole

Love is taking a few steps backward (maybe even more)...to give way to the happiness of the person you love.

--author unknown

Love is a sighn from the heavens that you are here for a reason.

J. Ghetto

Love is all we have, the only way that each can help the other.

Eurpides

Love is like a beautiful flower which I may not touch, but whose fragrance makes the garden a place of delight just the same.

--Helen Keller

Love is like an eternal flame once it is truly lit, it will continue to burn for all time.

--Kamila

Love is not something you look for,

Love is something you do and you must do it over and over again, honestly, till it takes root in your personal experience.

Love is smiling on the inside and and out

--Jennifer Williams

Love many things, for therin lies the true strength, and whowoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much, and what is done in love is done well.

--Vincent Van Gogh

Love wasn't put in your heart to stay. Love isn't love until you give it away

Men always want to be a woman's first love. Woman have a more subtle instinct: What they like is to be a man's last romance.

--Oscar Wilde

Never let a problem to be solved become more important than the person to be loved

Barbara Johnson

See there's this place in me where your fingerprints still rest, your kisses still linger, and your whispers softly echo. It's the place where a part of you will forever be a part of me.

Since love grows within you, so beauty grows. For love is the beauty of the soul.

--Saint Augustine

So, fall asleep love, loved by me.. for I know love, I am loved by thee.

--Robert Browning

To Thine Own Self Be True

The most important words ever spoken

“This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.” Shakespeare-Hamlet

Whatever games are played with us, we must play no games with ourselves. There ARE just two types of people in this world: Those with self-respect and those who never quite make it.

Self Respect

 • To value his own good opinion, a child has to feel that he is a worthwhile person. He has to have confidence in himself as an individual not as a copy of some-thing or some-one else. 

• I care not so much what I am to others as what I am to myself. I will be rich in myself, and not by borrowing or copying others. 

• They cannot take away self-respect if we do not give it to them. 

• We need to learn who we really are and then live with it. 

• A man who doesn’t respect himself can never really trust anyone else. 

• Without self-confidence, we are as babes in the cradle. And how can we generate this quality, which is yet so invaluable, most quickly? By thinking that other people are inferior to ones true self. 

• We do not believe in ourselves until someone reveals that deep inside us is valuable, worth listening to, worthy of our trust, sacred to our touch. Once we believe in ourselves, as we are, we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals man’s nature.

• I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule, or scorn of others, rather than be false and incur my own abhorrence. 

• It is may be good to be helpful and kindly, but don’t give yourself to be melted into candle grease for the benefit of the tallow trade. 

• To free us from the expectations of others, to give us back to ourselves—there lies the great, singular power of self-respect. 

• No one can make you feel inferior without your consent. Never give it. 

• The worst loneliness is not to be comfortable with yourself. 

• And as we let our OWN light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our fear, or presence automatically liberates others. Whatever you have forgotten, you can remember. Whatever you have buried you can unearth. If you are willing to look deep into your own nature, your own heritage, if you are willing to peel away the layers of crap you have adopted in making your way through the tribulations of life, you will find that your true self is not as far removed as you think. 

What is Friendship or Love?

I do not know if there has ever been another time in history when the terms love and friendship have been used as promiscuously as they are at present. We are told constantly that we must be "Friends" with and "LOVE" everyone. Leaders of religion, and other movements, declare that they "love" followers they have and will never meet. Enthusiasts of personal-growth workshops and encounter groups weekends emerge from their experiences announcing that they "love" all people everywhere. Most "Chat Line" and "Test" messages contain at least one LOL and most other correspondence will be closed with a Love You.

Just as currency, with the never ending demand for a growing economy, and higher wages, with more employee benefits, has less and less purchasing power or real value, so the words "Friend and Love" through an analogous process of inflation, through being used less and less discriminatively are progressively emptied of meaning. What then is friendship? Friendship, like love, by its very nature, entails a process of discrimination, of learning, of reaching out, of selection. Friendship-like love- is our response to what represents our highest values. Friendship like love is a response to distinctive characteristics possessed by some but not all. Other wise what would be the tribute of friendship or love? Why would we bother to say that someone is our friend or that we love someone? Really, if your friends or loved ones were to ask why you care for them, consider what their reaction would be if told, "Why shouldn't I call you my friend or say that I love you? All human beings are identical. Therefore, it doesn't make any difference whom I call friend or say that I love. So it might as well be you. Not very inspiring or uplifting is it? Friendship and love are very similar, because friendship is the first necessary step to love.Friendship and love are NOT feelings or emotions; both require a conscious effort in order to find a start and both require a continuing and sustained conscious effort in order to grow and develop into something worthwhile. Above all a friend must be someone you can communicate with and you must be able to do so freely, without any need to censor your thoughts, feelings, or emotions, for fear of offending a fragile ego. And you must never try to hide your passion for without passion, how can love, or friendship, ever grow or develop?

Nourishing the Soul

When I think of nourishing the soul, I think of nurturing the ability to respond positively to life- that is the ability to sustain passion for our interests, values, and projects. I believe that the worst of all spiritual defeats is to lose enthusiasm for life’s possibilities. Consider the case of romantic love. When two adults with significant spiritual and psychological affinities encounter each other, and IF THEY HAVE EVOLVED TO A DECENT LEVEL OF MATURITY-if they are beyond the level of merely struggling to make their relationship “work”- then romantic love can become a pathway, not only to sexual and emotional happiness but also to higher reaches of human growth. It can become a context for a continuing encounter with the self, through the process of interaction with another self Two consciousnesses, each dedicated to personal evolution, can provide an extraordinary stimulus and challenge to each other. But such possibility presupposes self-esteem, and there are no levels of self esteem- you either have it or you do not (Maslow). The first love affair we must consummate successfully is with ourselves; only then are we ready for a relationship with another. A person who feels unworthy and unlovable is NOT READY for romantic love.

The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the mirror reflection of ourselves we finf in them.

==Thomas Merton

The first duty of love is to listen.

--Paul Tillich

The moment you have in your heart this extraordinary thing called love and feel the depth, the delight, the ecstasy of it, you will discover that for you the world is transformed.

--Author Unknown

The most beautiful things in the world are not seen nor touched. They are found in the heart.

--Helen Keller

This is my wish for you: Comfort on difficult days, smiles when sadness intrudes, rainbows to follow the clouds, laughter to kiss your lips, sunsets to warm your heart, hugs when spirits sag, beauty for your eyes to see,, friendships to brighten your being, faith so that you can believe, confidence for when you doubt, courage to know your self, patience to accept the truth, Love to complete your life.

--Author Unknown

To live is like love-all reason is against it, and all healthy instinct for it.

--Samuel Butler

We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.

Sam Keen

We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love.

--Tom Robbins

What we have once enjoyed we can never lose. All that we love deeply becomes part of us

--Helen Keller

What we need to know about loving is no great mystery. We all know what constitutes loving behavior; we need but act upon it, not continually question it. Over-analysis often confuses the issue and in the end brings us no closer to insight. We sometimes become too busy classifying, separating, and examining, to remember love is easy. It's Man who makes it complicated.

--Leo Buscaglia

You must love yourself before you can love another. By accepting yourself and fully being what you are, your simple presence can make others happy.

--Abraham Maslow

Love is not a feeling but a doing

--Abraham Maslow 

You were made perfectly to be loved-and surely I have loved you, in the idea of you, my whole life long.

--Elizabeth Barret Browning

You never lose by loving. You always lose by holding Back.

--Barbara De Angelis

One word frees us of all the weight and pain of life: that word is LOVE.

--Sophocles

You must love yourself before you love another. By accepting yourself and fully being what and who you are, your simple presence can make others happy.