If a problem looks difficult, relax. If it looks impossible, relax even more. Then begin encouraging small changes, putting just enough pressure on yourself to move one turtle step forward. Then rest, savor, celebrate. Then step again. You’ll find that slow is fast, gentle is powerful, and stillness moves mountains.

Your individuality is the most valuable thing you have.

The idea is to identify a destructive thought pattern, then simply label it and watch it and let it pass by whenever it appears in your mind.

Friends, there are many areas in which I need encouragement, but worrying is not one of them. I worry the way Renée Fleming sings high Cs: Effortlessly. Loudly. At length.

A confession you make merely to illuminate the murky corners of your little life may end up lighting the path to freedom for a thousand other hearts.

Most unhappy people need to learn just one lesson: how to see themselves through the lens of genuine compassion, and treat themselves accordingly.

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.