Michael Sliney

“Life is to be lived, not controlled; and humanity is won by continuing to play in face of certain defeat.” — Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man

“If you don’t try at anything you can’t fail… it takes backbone to lead the life you want.”
– from Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates

“And that’s where the whole trouble is. We’re too much alike to understand each other because we don’t even understand our own selves.” – Betty Smith, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

“My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.”

               Thomas Merton, Thoughts In Solitude

“If I can stop one heart from breaking,

I shall not live in vain;

If I can ease one life the aching,

Or cool one pain,

Or help one fainting robin

Unto his nest again,

I shall not live in vain.”

—”If I Can Stop One Heart From Breaking,” by Emily Dickinson