The more I expect, the more unhappy I am going to be. The more I accept, the more serene I am.
Our challenges don’t define us, our actions do.
Acceptance doesn't mean resignation; it means understanding that something is what it is and that there's got to be a way through it.
One's dignity may be assaulted, vandalized and cruelly mocked, but cannot be taken away unless it is surrendered.
I see possibilities in everything. For everything that's taken away, something of greater value has been given.
I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence I can reach for; perfection is God's business.
If you have one foot in yesterday and one foot in tomorrow, you're pissing all over today.
Family is not an important thing. It's everything.
I remember my son wanted to go to bed with his cowboy boots on, and we had this fight for like an hour. Then I realized that the only good reason I had for him not to do it is because I didn't want him to. There was really no other reason. And finally I said, "OK, fine." It was a great victory for me, because I realized it doesn't really matter.
If you fixate on the worst-case scenario and it actually happens, you’ve lived it twice.
A creative mess is better than idle tidiness.
Happiness is a decision.
Look at the choices you have, not the choices that have been taken away from you. In them, there are whole worlds of strength and new ways to look at things.
I like to encourage people to realize that any action is a good action if it's proactive and there is positive intent behind it.
Optimism is a cure for many things.
Don't spend a lot of time imagining the worst-case scenario. It rarely goes down as you imagine it will, and if by some fluke it does, you will have lived it twice.
I urge you to be challenged and inspired by what you do not know.
Do the right thing, and then do the next right thing, and that will lead you to the next right thing after that.
When something enters your life that is so big and so non-negotiable as catastrophic illness, you either go in denial for a while or ultimately you accept it and you make space for it. And in making space for it, you illuminate a lot of things that you normally don't have room for you simply just look at the world differently.
My happiness grows in direct proportion to my acceptance, and in inverse proportion to my expectations.
I have no choice about whether or not I have Parkinson's. I have nothing but choices about how I react to it. In those choices, there's freedom to do a lot of things in areas that I wouldn't have otherwise found myself in.
A lot of times, when you have a disability, one of the things you deal with is other people's projections of what your experience is and their fear about it, and not seeing the experience you're having. There's nothing horrifying about it to me. It is what I deal with. It is my reality and my life, but it's not horrible.
I believe that the majority of times the scale tilts toward the good. It's this amazing thing that rolls on and if we get in the flow of it, that's God. And if we fight it, if we swim the other way, we're swimming away from the purest expression of this life.
Whatever the situation, just take it for what it is. You don't have to make it worse or better than it is. It just is what it is. Always deal with the honesty, the truth of what something is, and then you've got all kinds of choices.
I can't always control my body the way I want to, and I can't control when I feel good or when I don't. I can control how clear my mind is. And I can control how willing I am to step up if somebody needs me.
