“Feeling good about ourselves is essential in our being able to love others.”

Whatever we choose to imagine can be as private as we want it to be. Nobody knows what you’re thinking or feeling unless you share it.

You make each day a special day. You know how, by just your being you.

The only thing evil can’t stand is forgiveness.

I don’t think anyone can grow unless he’s loved exactly as he is now, appreciated for what he is rather than what he will be.

It’s a mistake to think that we have to be lovely to be loved by human beings or by God.

Peace means far more than the opposite of war.

Everyone longs to be loved. And the greatest thing we can do is to let people know that they are loved and capable of loving.

There is no normal life that is free of pain. It’s the very wrestling with our problems that can be the impetus for our growth.

I hope you’re proud of yourself for the times you’ve said “yes,” when all it meant was extra work for you and was seemingly helpful only to someone else.

The connections we make in the course of a life, maybe that’s what heaven is.

Love and trust, in the space between what’s said and what’s heard in our life, can make all the difference in the world.

Life is for service.

Love isn’t a state of perfect caring. It is an active noun like struggle. To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now.

Love begins with listening.

The greatest gift you ever give is your honest self.

All I know to do is to light the candle that has been given to me.

I don’t think a lot of actors talk about it, but there’s usually a process where you essentially purge yourself of the character that you played prior to the movie.

Now it is established in the sciences that no knowledge is acquired save through the study of its causes and beginnings, if it has had causes and beginnings; nor completed except by knowledge of its accidents and accompanying essentials.

For movies like The Longest Ride, I got to hang out with cowboys at rodeos and learned how to ride a bull, essentially.

The essential humanity of men can be protected and preserved only where government must answer, not just to the wealthy, not just to those of a particular religion, or a particular race, but to all its people.

For mass struggles, nonviolence is essential.

The thing a drama school can’t give you is instinct. It can sharpen instinct but that can’t be taught, and you have to have intuition. It’s an essential ingredient.

Government is essentially immoral.

If it be true, as I believe it is, that morality is dependent upon religion, then religion is not only the most practical thing in the world, but the first essential.