Martha Beck Quotes - Page 3

People who get what they want tend to be the ones who make the effort to know what they want.

Remember, intimacy increases with honesty. Share less to keep people away and more to draw them closer.

Question every thought that causes suffering and test it against your own sense of truth.

Most of our stress and suffering come not from events, but from our thoughts. Reframe from negative thoughts, and stress subsides.

Your life is not little, and your playing small doesn’t serve the world. Your living large, on the other hand-your being your true self despite fear, fatigue, doubt, and opposition- will serve the world more than you can imagine. In fact, it may help save it. And saving the world, after all, is what all heroes (including you) are here to do.

The effect of emotional venting is to sustain an unsatisfactory status quo. Most people think the opposite, that complaining is part of an effort to change an unsatisfying situation. Nope. Complaining lets off pressure so that we neither explode with frustration nor feel compelled to take the often risky steps of openly opposing a difficult person or situation. Keeping emotional pressure tolerably low doesn't change problematic circumstances but rather perpetuates them.

When you meet people, show real appreciation, then genuine curiosity.

When you are in a creative or appreciative zone, you literally have no access to your inner lizard, to that fear-based, non creative, shrieking little beasty who's so afraid you're going to be a bag lady.

Truth itself is something you live, not something you think.

Remember that it’s okay to ask for help when you’re stumped, because sometimes you really can’t be expected to handle everything alone.

If you're miserable, make a choice. If you're still miserable, you can choose again.

Basic human contact - the meeting of eyes, the exchanging of words - is to the psyche what oxygen is to the brain. If you're feeling abandoned by the world, interact with anyone you can.

No matter how difficult and painful it may be, nothing sounds as good to the soul as the truth.

Although beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, the feeling of being beautiful exists solely in the mind of the beheld.

Forcing yourself to think happy lies doesn't heal your dreams. Getting to the truth does.

Whenever you go somewhere that speaks to your soul, you are going home to yourself.

Every day brings new choices.

Everything always passes, and everything is already okay. Stay in the place where you can see that, and nothing will resist you.

If anything is worth doing, it is worth doing it badly.

I really do think that any deep crisis is an opportunity to make your life extraordinary in some way.

Hopeful thinking can get you out of your fear zone and into your appreciation zone.

Bad habits fill needs, so find good alternatives for them.

Allowing children to show their guilt, show their grief, show their anger, takes the sting out of the situation.

Standards of beauty are arbitrary. Body shame exists only to the extent that our physiques don't match our own beliefs about how we should look.

Don’t hide love. If you feel it, express it-not to demand that others love you back, but simply to live outwardly the best of what you feel inwardly. The worst that can happen to your heart is not rejection by another person but failure to act on the love you feel.