Ellen Goodman Quotes

The month of November makes me feel that life is passing more quickly. In an effort to slow it down, I try to fill the hours more meaningfully.

In any weather, at any hour of the day or night, I have been anxious to improve the nick of time, and notch it on my stick too; to stand on the meeting of two eternities, the past and future, which is precisely the present moment; to toe that line.

The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time.

The future is keeping you out of the present time.

Life gives you plenty of time to do whatever you want to do if you stay in the present moment.

The only time you'll ever have is now.

We all spend so much time worrying about the future that the present moment slips right out of our hands. And so all we have left is retrospection and anticipation, retrospection and anticipation. In which case what's left to recall but past anticipation? What's left to anticipate but future retrospection?

Each day is a precious gift to be savored and used, not left unopened and hoarded for a future that may never come.

We think very little of time present; we anticipate the future, as being too slow, and with a view to hasten it onward, we recall the past to stay it as too swiftly gone. We are so thoughtless, that we thus wander through the hours which are not here, regardless only of the moment that is actually our own.

Each moment is magical, precious and complete and will never exist again. We forget that now is the moment we are in, that the next one isn't guaranteed. And if we are blessed with another moment, any joy, creativity or wisdom it brings will ensue from the way we live in the present one.

If you are not living with a whole heart now, the end of the world poses no threat; your life is already gone. Life is only as valuable as our presence to enjoy it. To miss the beauty of the moment because you are preparing to protect yourself from the next one, is to trade a precious gem for a cheap trinket.

If you don't fully take every moment and love every moment and every person that you're with, your life will be over before you realise.

It's easy to spend - especially in this day and age - to spend your time not being in the present. It's very easy to be way ahead. What's tomorrow and the day after that?

Time is given us to be happy and for no other reason [...] When we waste time, we waste happiness.

Time did not mean anything to those who had too much of it, but it was even more precious once it was limited.

As I learned from chapters past, it's important to try and stay in the chapter that you're in, and enjoy it while it's lasting. Not be constantly worrying about where this step will take you - living in the potential future. Like a good meal. Like a good chef's tasting meal. You don't want to wonder what's next while you're eating the foie gras.

Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.

As long as we have some definite idea about or some hope in the future, we cannot really be serious with the moment that exists right now.

When you live completely in each moment, without expecting anything, you have no idea of time.

It's not the time in your life, it's the life in your time.

Every moment is an eternity in itself. Bliss is the present moment and each and everyone of us needs to understand this.

Modern man lives increasingly in the future and neglects the present.

We do not rest satisfied with the present.... So imprudent we are that we wander in the times which are not ours and do not thinkof the only one which belongs to us; and so idle are we that we dream of those times which are no more and thoughtlessly overlook that which alone exists. For the present is generally painful to us.

Time by itself means nothing, no matter how fast it moves, unless we give it something to carry for us; something we value. Because it is such a precious vehicle, is time.