Henri Nouwen Quotes about Struggle

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A little criticism makes me angry, and a little rejection makes me depressed. A little praise raises my spirits, and a little success excites me. It takes very little to raise me up or thrust me down. Often I am like a

A little criticism makes me angry, and a little rejection makes me depressed. A little praise raises my spirits, and a little success excites me. It takes very little to raise me up or thrust me down. Often I am like a small boat on the ocean, completely at the mercy of its waves. All the time and energy I spend in keeping some kind of balance and preventing myself from being tipped over and drowning shows my life is mostly a struggle for survival: not a holy struggle, but an anxious struggle resulting from the mistaken idea that it is the world that defines me.

Henri Nouwen

Ocean, Struggle, Self

Henri Nouwen (2013). “The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming”, p.42, Image

You have to dare to live through the pain and struggle. Acknowledge your anguish but do not let it pull you out of yourself. Hold on to your chosen direction, your discipline, your prayer, your work, your guides, and trust that one day love will have conquered enough of you that even the most fearful part will allow love to cast out all fear.

Henri Nouwen

Prayer, Pain, Struggle

When people show you their boundaries ("I can't do this for you") you feel rejected...part of your struggle is to set boundaries to your own love. Only when you are able to set your own boundaries will you be able to acknowledge, respect and even be grateful for the boundaries of others.

Henri Nouwen

Struggle, Grateful, People

Solitude is the place of purification and transformation, the place of the great struggle and the great encounter.

Henri Nouwen

Struggle, Solitude, Encounters

Henri J. M. Nouwen (2016). “The Spiritual Life: Eight Essential Titles by Henri Nouwen”, p.20, HarperCollins

I have an increasing sense that the most important crisis of our time is spiritual and that we need places where people can grow stronger in the spirit and be able to integrate the emotional struggles in their spiritual journeys.

Henri Nouwen

Spiritual, Struggle, Journey

Henri J. M. Nouwen (2016). “Love, Henri: Letters on the Spiritual Life”, p.266, Hachette UK

Although we tend to think about saints as holy and pious, and picture them with halos above their heads and ecstatic gazes, true saints are much more accessible. They are men and women like us, who live ordinary lives and struggle with ordinary problems. What makes them saints is their clear and unwavering focus on God and God's people.

Henri Nouwen

Struggle, Men, Thinking

"Bread For the Journey". Book by Henri J. M. Nouwen, 1996.

In other words, first we must call people to communion with God, to intimacy with God, to a sense of belonging. Most people are lost, confused, alienated. They suffer and struggle immensely in relationships. We have to proclaim loudly and clearly in our actions and in our words that God loves us that we belong to him. That's a call to the mystical life.

Henri Nouwen

Confused, Struggle, People

Source: www.liguorian.org

I always try to turn my personal struggles into something helpful for others.

Henri Nouwen

Struggle, Trying, Helpful

Live, work, and travel with handicapped people, so I can stay close to them. But since I am often busy with many things, it's a constant struggle to keep the handicapped members of our community in the center of my life.

Henri Nouwen

Struggle, People, Community

Source: www.liguorian.org

Only in the context of the great encounter with Jesus can a real authentic struggle take place. The encounter with Christ does not take place before, after, or beyond the struggle with our false self and its demons. No, it is precisely in the midst of this struggle that our Lord comes to us and says, as he said to the old man in the story: ‘As soon as you turned to me again, you see I was beside you.’

Henri Nouwen

Jesus, Real, Struggle

Henri J. M. Nouwen (2016). “The Spiritual Life: Eight Essential Titles by Henri Nouwen”, p.19, HarperCollins