Wrapping up my day with this beautiful book - Tuesdays with Morrie: An Old Man, A Young Man and Life's Greatest Lesson by Mitch Album. Sometimes we get so caught up with “what’s happening to us” that we forget to see this precious life we have for what it is.  Morrie says “The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and to let it come in.”  I’ve read this book many times and while each time it reads differently,  this passage has always been my favorite.   

https://m.primal.net/LgqR.jpg 

Some other lines I love : 

Sometimes you cannot believe what you see, you have to believe what you feel. 

If you are ever going to have other people trust you, you must feel that you can trust them, too—even when you’re in the dark. Even when you’re falling.

Accept the past as past, without denying it or discarding it

Learn to forgive yourself and to forgive others

Don’t assume that it’s too late to get involved.

The culture we have does not make people feel good about themselves. And you have to be strong enough to say if the culture doesn’t work, don’t buy it.

(In a conversation with a TV host) “Morrie,” Koppel said, “that was seventy years ago your mother died. The pain still goes on?” “You bet,” Morrie whispered.

Everyone knows they’re going to die, but nobody believes it. If we did, we would do things differently .

How can you ever be prepared to die? “Do what the Buddhists do. Every day, have a little bird on your shoulder that asks, ‘Is today the day? Am I ready? Am I doing all I need to do? Am I being the person I want to be?’

Once you learn how to die, you learn how to live.

Even I don’t know what ‘spiritual development’ really means. But I do know we’re deficient in some way. We are too involved in materialistic things, and they  don’t satisfy us. The loving relationships we have, the universe around us, we take these things for granted.

This is part of what a family is about, not just love, but letting others know there’s someone who is watching out for them. It’s what I missed so much when my mother died—what I call your ‘spiritual security’—knowing that your family will be there watching out for you. Nothing else will give you that. Not money. Not fame.

If you want the experience of having complete responsibility for another human being, and to learn how to love and bond in the deepest way, then you should have children.

Learn to detach. detachment doesn’t mean you don’t let the experience penetrate you. On the contrary, you let it penetrate you fully. That’s how you are able to leave it. 

You have to find what’s good and true and beautiful in your life as it is now.

We’ve got a form of brainwashing going on in our country,” Morrie sighed. “Do you know how they brainwash people? They repeat something over and over. 

Only an open heart will allow you to float equally between everyone.

When Morrie was with you, he was really with you. He looked you straight in the eye, and he listened as if you were the only person in the world.

I believe in being fully present

there are a few rules I know to be true about love and marriage: If you don’t respect the other person, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. If you don’t know how to compromise, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. If you can’t talk openly about what goes on between you, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. And if you don’t have a common set of values in life, you’re gonna have a lot of trouble. Your values must be alike.

“And the biggest one of those values, Mitch?” “Your belief in the importance of your marriage.”

People are only mean when they’re threatened and that’s what our culture does.

The big things— how we think, what we value—those you must choose yourself. You can’t let anyone—or any society—determine those for you.

Every society has its own problems. The way to do it, I think, isn’t to run away. You have to work at creating your own culture.

Invest in the human family. Invest in people. Build a little community of those you love and who love you.

Don’t let go too soon, but don’t hang on too long.

It’s not just other people we need to forgive, We also need to forgive ourselves. For all the things we didn’t do. All the things we should have done. You can’t get stuck on the regrets of what should have happened. 

“If we know, in the end, that we can ultimately have that peace with dying, then we can finally do the really hard thing.”
Which is? “Make peace with living.”

Death ends a life, not a relationship.