Rebecca Stead Quotes

I now see that I never needed to be so mean or cruel.

We can choose to wake up and grumble all day and be bitter and angry and judge others and find satisfaction in others doing bad instead of good. Or we can we wake up with optimism and love and say, 'Just what is this beautiful day going to bring me?'

I have stopped being a misanthrope.

We never know who we are going to be until we are tested, but perhaps we can test ourselves without going to the extremes of war. Perhaps we can be kinder now, live with less now, reach out to others now - and build an inner reserve of a strong identity that will hold us up even when everything else falls away.

You should think about the world and feel about your heart.

He who doesn't consider himself is seldom considerate of others.

Where I didn't have the maturity and the compassion to consider other people's needs, I did a lot of damage.

My concern is how we learn to be genuine human beings.

I think was overly empathetic for a while in my life.

I was once a fairly angry person.

Before my accident I was a little too... selfish and self-absorbed and for me, to now be at the place where I can kinda give back and inspire people. I'm blessed. I'm really blessed.

I've certainly had a lot of experiences in my life where I was much too self-centered.

If I want to be a better person for whoever is in my life, I have to learn.

You may be sorry that you spoke, sorry you stayed or went, sorry you won or lost, sorry so much was spent. But as you go through life, you'll find - you're never sorry you were kind.

The place to improve the world is first in one's own heart and head and hands, and then work outward from there.

You just do the best you can, and when you're able to connect with people, and when you do, it's just incredibly gratifying.

At the end of the day, you have to find the humanity in you in each character.

In my old age I've come to find that if you respect other people, you feel better about yourself.

The individual is capable of both great compassion and great indifference. He has it within his means to nourish the former and outgrow the latter.

I am unjust, but I can strive for justice. My life's unkind, but I can vote for kindness. I, the unloving, say life should be lovely. I, that am blind, cry out against my blindness.

If I am no longer disturbed myself, I will deal less with disturbed people, but I don't regret having concerned myself with them because I think most of us are disturbed.

It's important to determine not just the quality of your mind but the fullness of your heart.

I have seen myself lose intolerance, narrowness, bigotry, complacence, pride and a whole bushel-basket of other intellectual vices through my contact with Nature and with men. And when you take weeds out of a garden it gives you room to grow flowers. So, every time I lost a little self-satisfaction, or arrogance, I could plant some broadness or love of my own in its place, and after a while the garden of my mind began to bloom and be fragrant and I found myself better equipped for my work and more useful to others as a consequence.

I think I regret the impact on everybody. But I think I just maybe could have gone about it in a kinder way.

I think that I come off as, 'Nothing bothers me, I don't care! I'm funny and sassy.' But I'm deeply sensitive. Not only about myself but to others. Not to pat myself on the back, empathy is a quality I've cultivated over my life. It came naturally to me as a child.