“The sad thing is that many of us come to Christ because we are sinners, and then spend the rest of our lives trying to pretend that we are not!”

Dating should be a part of your life, not your life a part of dating. There is more to life than finding a date.

A culture is like an immune system. It operates through the laws of systems, just like a body. If a body has an infection, the immune system deals with it. Similarly, a group enforces its norms, either actively or passively.

Dating is about finding out who you are and who others are. If you show up in a masquerade outfit, neither is going to happen.

Dont use all-or-nothing thinking. Take each day as its own day, and dont worry about it if you mess up one day. The most important thing you can do is just get back up on the horse.

Everything has seasons, and we have to be able to recognize when something’s time has passed and be able to move into the next season. Everything that is alive requires pruning as well, which is a great metaphor for endings.

Dating is a place to practice how to relate to other people.

When leaders lead in ways that people’s brains can follow, good results follow as well.

Boundaries are basically about providing structure, and structure is essential in building anything that thrives.

Christianity is not about morality. It’s about reality.

Spouses in healthy relationships cherish each other’s space and are champions of each other’s causes.

Dating is a give and take. If you only see it as “Taking,” you are not getting it.

Being right can never compete with doing well.

People tend to look at dating sort of like a safari – like they’re trying to land the trophy.

Be Hard on the issue, Soft on the person.

A good test of a relationship is how a person responds to the word ‘no.’ Love respects ‘no,’ control does not.

If you are building a culture where honest expectations are communicated and peer accountability is the norm, then the group will address poor performance and attitudes.

Are there not some places where we seem to breathe sadness? – why, we cannot tell. It is a chain of recollections – an idea which carries you back to other times, to other places – which, very likely, have no connection with the present time and place.

People who are prone to sadness are more likely to pick up a pen.

You said my sadness was like the sun, beautiful from a distance but it hurt you too much to come closer.

There are days when the melancholy settles on you like a sudden change in weather. The kind of sadness that is intangible. Like the presence of an ache where you can’t pinpoint exactly where it hurts, you just know it does.

Sadness and fear and hate, how they well up in the heart and mind, whenever one opens pages of these messengers of doom.

I don’t think all writers are sad, she said. I think it’s the other way around- all sad people write.

A Betrayal I cannot undo what I have done; I can’t un-sing a song that’s sung. And the saddest thing about my regret- I can’t forgive me, and you can’t forget.

And I sighed and wept for what could not be–and for all that could have been.