“Manipulation is what we do when we feel we cannot meet our needs directly, so instead we try to meet them in round about ways. We try to influence others to do what we want them to do so our needs are met. This is particularly prevalent today when the need that is not met is emotional.”

“We invalidate and desensitize our children when we try to make them feel better instead of helping them to feel like it is valid and ok to feel exactly how they feel. We do an immense disservice when we teach them by doing this to resist their own negative emotions. Anything we resist persists, and so we trap our children in their negative emotions when we try to help them avoid negative emotion by showing them how to run in the direction of positive emotion. We need to validate (mirror) their feelings and allow them to befriend the way they feel entirely before any action is taken to improve a situation or the way they feel.”

“Of course, recognising our common humanity is only the beginning of our task. Words alone cannot meet the needs of our people. These needs will be met only if we act boldly in the years ahead; and if we understand that the challenges we face are shared, and our failure to meet them will hurt us all.”

“Until we have met the monsters in ourselves, we keep trying to slay them in the outer world. And we find that we cannot. For all darkness in the world stems from darkness in the heart. And it is there that we must do our work.”

“If we see a romantic partnership as the only relationship that promises to meet our needs, we will put all the pressure on that other person to be the one to meet all of our needs, which is impossible. No one person can meet all of our needs. So, it is a set up for disappointment and for pain.”

“There is no external condition we have to meet to realize our aspirations. We just need to be what we are.”

“When we truly need to do is often what we most feel like avoiding.”

“When we try to help people, we have to be aware: are we doing it for them, or are we doing it because we want their approval?
If you're doing it for them, just be there with them, and for them, in a space of love.”

“If it’s not meeting a need, turn it into a seed. Remember, we will reap what we sow. When you do good for other people, that’s when God is going to make sure that His abundant blessings overtake you.”

“We have no need of other worlds. We need mirrors. We don't know what to do with other worlds. A single world, our own, suffices us; but we can't accept it for what it is.”