“In both writing and sleeping, we learn to be physically still at the same time we are encouraging our minds to unlock from the humdrum rational thinking of our daytime lives.”

If the stuff you’re writing is not for yourself, it won’t work.

We lie best when we lie to ourselves.

The mind can calculate, but the spirit yearns, and the heart knows what the heart knows.

Anything with the power to make you laugh over thirty years later isn’t a waste of time. I think something like that is very close to immortality.

We don’t know the days that will change our lives. Probably just as well.

French is the language that turns dirt into romance.

Friends don’t spy; true friendship is about privacy, too.

If we don’t have each other, we go crazy with loneliness. When we do, we go crazy with togetherness.

Absence may or may not make the heart grow fonder, but it certainly freshens the eye.

Sometimes human places, create inhuman monsters.

People with a high tolerance for boredom can get a lot of thinking done.

Sometimes human places, create inhuman monsters.

People with a high tolerance for boredom can get a lot of thinking done.

You want to remember that while you’re judging the book, the book is also judging you.

Books are a uniquely portable magic.

FEAR stands for face everything and recover.

False encouragement is a kind of theft: it steals time, energy, and motivation a person could put toward some other purpose.

My mum was too busy raising four of us to encourage my hopes. But I’m glad I had the upbringing I did. It made me a worrier and a thoughtful, curious person.

The Christian life is not a constant high. I have my moments of deep discouragement. I have to go to God in prayer with tears in my eyes, and say, ‘O God, forgive me,’ or ‘Help me.’

I’m not sure we will have every single Democrat, but we want a large number of Republicans to be able to vote for this bill because we think that will encourage the House not only to move forward but to pass a bill.

All around you are people whose lives are filled with trouble and sorrow, and they need your compassion and encouragement.

I believe we should encourage children to sing and play instruments from an early age.

Suffering, failure, loneliness, sorrow, discouragement, and death will be part of your journey, but the Kingdom of God will conquer all these horrors. No evil can resist grace forever.

We hurt people by being too busy. Too busy to notice their needs. Too busy to drop that note of comfort or encouragement or assurance of love. Too busy to listen when someone needs to talk. Too busy to care.