Jennifer Donnelly Quotes

It isn't the great big pleasures that count the most; it's making a great deal out of the little ones--I've discovered the true secret of happiness, Daddy, and that is to live in the now. Not to be for ever regretting the past, or anticipating the future; but to get the most that you can out of this very instant.

You have to look at what you have right in front of you, at what it could be, and stop measuring it against what you've lost. I know this to be wise and true, just as I know that pretty much no one can do it.

Only one person in a thousand knows the trick of really living in the present. Most of us spend fifty-nine minutes an hour living in the past, with regret for lost joys or shame for things badly done (both utterly useless and weakening) or in a future which we either long for or dread. . . . There is only one minute in which you are alive, this minute, here and now. The only way to live is by accepting each minute as an unrepeatable miracle. Which is exactly what it is-a miracle and unrepeatable.

Enjoy the present hour, Be thankful for the past, And neither fear nor wish Th' approaches of the last.

Reflect upon your present blessings of which every man has many - not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some.

No matter how happy I had been in the past I do not long for it. The present is always the moment for which I love.

Joyful let the soul be in the present, let it disdain to trouble about what is beyond and temper bitterness with a laugh. Nothing is blessed forever.

I’m beginning to think that you don’t find happiness from living your life looking ahead or back… that you find it when you look around.

But I don't think of the future, or the past, I feast on the moment. This is the secret of happiness, but only reached now in middle age.

Let life unfold, say what you mean. You can’t always think about what you’ve lost, or what you don’t have, or what you didn’t get. Because when you do that, you’re missing out on the now. You can’t know if you’ll be here tomorrow or a year from now.

I just consciously try to enjoy the good things that are happening. And if it ended tomorrow, that would be fine.

I've been really aware of how important it is to me to just stay in the moment and enjoy it while it lasts. Because that's all you've got. If it ends, I'll move on to doing something else. If it lasts, great.

Happiness in the present is only shattered by comparison with the past.

Learn from the past and let it go. Live in today.

You have to like the present; if not your life becomes secondhand, if you think it was better before. Or that it will be better in the future.

Cease to inquire what the future has in store, and take as a gift whatever the day brings forth.

The first recipe for happiness is: avoid too lengthy meditation on the past.

You don't miss what you never had.

I'm living with every step. I can't live with regret. The past is the past. I'm not worried about it. I can't change it. I can't fix it. It is what it is. I'm just living.

I lost a girlfriend when I was in my 30s. She was 46. It all sounds so trite, but I put a Post-it on my dressing-room wall. It said, 'The past is history. The future is a mystery. This moment is a gift, which is why it's called the present.'

It's ungrateful to be wishing you were doing something else at the moment you are living. You haven't lived in the moment that you are really living, you are wishing you were somewhere else.

I don't want to be one of those people who have the best part of their life be 'back when.'

You gotta appreciate every day!

I've just learned to enjoy every moment for what it is and take it all in.

If I could undo what's been done, But I guess everyone is living, With water and bridges.