When you finally start to write something, do not let yourself stop...even when you are convinced it's the worst garbage ever. This is the biggest caveat for beginning writers. Instead, force yourself to finish what you began, and THEN go back and edit it.

What if what you know isn’t what people want to hear?

if i have gained anything over these months, it is the knowledge there is no starting over - only living with the mistakes you've made. but then, caleb taught me long ago you can't build anything without some sort of foundation. maybe we learn to live our lives by understanding, firsthand, how not to live them.

people think they know what they're getting, and they're always wrong.

Words are like eggs dropped from great heights; you can no more call them back than ignore the mess they leave when they fall.

But mostly I wondered why the head could move so swiftly while the heart dragged its feet. I still loved him. It felt like anything else permanent that has gone missing; a lost tooth, a severed leg. You might know better, but that doesn’t keep your tongue from poling at the hole in your gum, or your phantom limb from aching.

It seems to me that no matter what religion you subscribe to, acts of kindness are the stepping-stones to making the world a better place--because we become better people in it.